Tech Lead (Senior Engineering)

About the role

Stuff Digital is looking for a hands‑on Tech Lead to join one of its product development squads. You will directly lead a small team of engineers, influence architectural decisions across the organisation, and drive the integration of AI and LLM technologies into our consumer‑facing journalism platforms.

Key responsibilities

• Set technical direction for the squad and ensure regular, reliable deployments to high‑traffic production systems.
• Design and implement AI/LLM integration patterns that respect privacy, editorial standards, and media‑specific compliance.
• Monitor and improve system performance during news spikes, defining metrics and optimisation strategies.
• Coach engineers through 1:1s, code reviews, hiring, and growth conversations.
• Participate in cross‑team architectural discussions, build‑vs‑buy decisions, and business alignment on technical solutions.

Required profile

• 7+ years of software development experience, including several years in a Tech Lead, Staff Engineer, or equivalent senior role.
• Proven track record of coaching and growing engineering talent.
• Hands‑on experience shipping code at a multi‑deploy‑per‑week cadence.
• Experience operating distributed, cloud‑based services in production.
• Familiarity with New Zealand privacy regulations, WCAG AA, and high‑trust media security requirements.

Required skills

• Distributed systems
• Cloud platforms
• APIs and data services
• Event‑driven architecture
• Performance scaling and trade‑off analysis
• AI integration and LLM deployment
• Security and compliance for media platforms