Senior Software Engineering Manager

Ezra is seeking a Senior Software Engineering Manager to join its leadership team in Nairobi, Kenya. This is a pivotal role at the heart of Ezra's mission-critical lending, data, and customer value platform. You will be responsible for managing and growing a high-performing team of software engineers while simultaneously shaping the technical strategy and providing architectural oversight that keeps Ezra's platform robust, secure, and massively scalable.

Reporting directly to the Chief Technology Officer, you will bridge people leadership with deep technical expertise. You will drive engineering excellence across event-driven backend services built on Java, Spring Boot, and Clojure, and play a central role in defining how the engineering organisation evolves — including the strategic adoption of emerging technologies such as AI. If you thrive at the intersection of great people management and cutting-edge distributed systems, this role is built for you.

• Lead, mentor, and develop a team of software engineers, conducting regular one-on-ones, performance reviews, and structured career development conversations.
• Foster a team culture defined by ownership, accountability, technical excellence, and continuous improvement.
• Drive hiring, onboarding, and upskilling of new engineering talent to grow team capability and capacity.
• Help engineers deeply understand business, customer, and partner needs and translate them into thoughtful technical and product decisions.
• Define and drive the technical roadmap for the backend platform, ensuring architectural decisions promote scalability, security, and long-term maintainability.
• Partner with senior engineers, solution architects, and principal engineers to shape and execute technical strategy across your domain.
• Guide the architectural evolution of event-driven services, ensuring alignment with best-in-class design principles.
• Champion Test-Driven Development (TDD), secure software development practices, clean code principles, and efficient CI/CD pipelines.
• Collaborate strategically with product managers, QA engineers, platform engineers, and business stakeholders to translate complex product vision into clear technical execution plans.
• Identify and drive the adoption of new technologies and approaches — including AI — that deliver strategic business value.
• Own the sustained stability and performance of the core Java and Clojure platform as a key measure of success.

• Demonstrate 8+ years of software engineering experience with a proven track record of delivering production-grade, scalable backend systems.
• Show at least 3 years in an engineering management or team lead role, with direct responsibility for people development, hiring, and performance management.
• Write, review, and architect production code using Java and Spring Boot; experience with Clojure or another functional language is a strong advantage.
• Design and operate event-driven, distributed microservices architectures in cloud environments (AWS, GCP, or Azure).
• Apply Test-Driven Development and enforce clean code standards across an engineering team through code review and mentorship.
• Build and maintain CI/CD pipelines and champion DevSecOps practices within the team.
• Translate ambiguous product and business requirements into well-scoped, executable technical plans with clear delivery milestones.
• Communicate technical architecture and decisions effectively to both engineering peers and non-technical stakeholders including C-suite executives.
• Demonstrate experience working in fintech, lending, or other regulated, data-intensive industries is highly desirable.
• Show ability to evaluate and integrate emerging technologies — particularly AI/ML tooling — into engineering workflows and product capabilities.

Ezra offers a competitive, market-aligned compensation package. The salary for this role is open and will be negotiated based on your experience, skills, and the value you bring to the team. Estimated monthly gross compensation for a role of this seniority in the Kenyan market typically ranges from KES 350,000 to KES 600,000. Ezra is committed to rewarding top engineering talent appropriately.

• Competitive base salary negotiable on merit
• Opportunity to shape technical strategy at a high-growth fintech
• Collaborative, innovation-driven engineering culture
• Career growth within a scaling technology organisation

Ideal candidate: You are a seasoned engineering leader who has managed backend engineering teams in a fast-paced, product-driven environment. You are equally comfortable reviewing a pull request and presenting architectural trade-offs to a CTO. You have hands-on Java experience, understand distributed systems deeply, and genuinely care about building great engineers as much as great software. Experience in fintech or lending platforms will set you apart.

Do not apply if: You are purely a people manager with limited hands-on technical depth, or if you have never managed a software engineering team before. This role requires both dimensions — strong individual technical credibility and proven leadership. Candidates without experience managing engineers directly will not be considered for this position.

• Prepare an updated CV highlighting your engineering leadership experience, team size managed, and key technical projects delivered.
• Write a brief cover letter (no more than one page) outlining your approach to technical leadership and a specific example of an architectural decision you drove and its business impact.
• Submit your application through the Ezra careers portal or the job platform where you discovered this listing.
• Shortlisted candidates will be contacted for an initial screening call, followed by a structured technical and leadership interview process.
• Apply as soon as possible — Ezra will close applications once a suitable candidate is identified.