Backend engineer

As a valued employee of the British Council you already help us deliver our mission to support peace and prosperity by building connections understanding and trust between people in the UK and countries worldwide. For over 90 years we have shaped brighter futures through education arts culture language and creativity.

You are part of our organisation in over 200 countries and territories and where we are on the ground in more than 100 countries.

We connect. We inspire.

British Council Pay Band 8

Location: Krakw/Warsaw Poland

Department:Digital and Technology

Contract type: Indefinite Contract (permanent role)

Closing Date: 22nd May 2025 at 23:59 UK time

Interview Dates:To be confirmed later.

Salary: Starting at PLN 16300 gross per month if you are based in Warsaw. For other locations such as Krakw the starting salary is PLN 15150 gross per month. Additional benefits will be offered with details to be discussed at a later stage. We have two office locations in Poland: Krakw and Warsaw.

This role is open for applications from employees who are currently located and have the right to work in Poland The successful candidate will remain in their current location/entity

You must have the legal right to work in Poland at the time of application as there is no relocation or sponsorship support.

British Council supports working in new ways such as hybrid working subject to full approval by line management and conditional upon our ability to provide the appropriate level of service. This may not be appropriate for all roles but can be explored at interview.

Role purpose

As Backend Engineer you will be a key member of the team developing and maintaining robust scalable and efficient Backend systems to meet the needs of a range of British Council products and services accessed globally.
You will use your expertise to contribute to the technical design implementation and optimisation of our Backend solutions. With your strong understanding of software engineering principles and best practice you will play a pivotal role in assuring the stability performance and security of these systems whilst guiding their seamless integration with client applications to support our organisations usercentred digital initiatives.

You will work alongside software engineers working in crossfunctional teams sharing your development skills planning and insight to ensure high quality code is delivered in line with project goals and delivery plans using agile methods.
You will enjoy working openly as part of a multidisciplinary team and collaborate closely with teams of Engineering Product Design and Operations colleagues based around the world to build our next generation of digital systems.

Role context

The Digital and Technology Directorate leads the British Councils digital strategy and transformation. It creates and executes technology initiatives to fulfil the organisations mission and corporate priorities.

Key focus areas are:

• Creating digital products that attract and retain customers delivering business value through digital design and delivery expertise.
• Developing and optimising digital platforms that provide seamless customer interactions and use scalable and secure capabilities.
• Enhancing digital capability across the organisation.
• Enabling growth impact and efficiency through technology.

Digital and Technology is a global Directorate organised into four divisions: Product Engineering Operations and Performance which collectively create digital products and services maintain and improve products services and platforms and optimise performance. Areas of responsibility include digital and technology strategy architecture infrastructure software development data innovation and cybersecurity. It ensures that technology initiatives are customer and value focused accessible efficient and secure.

This role is a senior role in the Engineering unit. The Engineering team brings together capabilities which include Architecture Software Engineering QA and Delivery expertise to ensure excellence in the development of our global products and services. Encompassing Reuse Buy and Build strategies it champions community of practices define solutions and corecapabilities and create amazing products.

Main accountabilities include but not limited to:

Product/Programme/Service delivery

• Use agreed specifications to design code review test and document programs or scripts using the right standards and tools.
• Collaborate with product managers and other stakeholders to plan development on Backend engineering stories.
• Contribute to the technical design and implementation of scalable and reliable Backend systems to support product/service delivery.
• Ensure timely delivery of Backend engineering projects adhering to project milestones quality standards and coding best practice.
• Identify and recommend the adoption of emerging technologies
• Collaborative and contribute to an inclusive team culture promoting knowledge sharing innovation and continuous improvement.
• Identify opportunities for cost optimisation and efficiency improvements in Backend systems while balancing business needs and quality standards.

Customers & stakeholders

• Engage with key stakeholders and business partners to understand their Backend engineering needs and provide technical solutions that meet their requirements.
• Collaborate with customer success managers to gather feedback from customers and incorporate it into the continuous improvement of Backend systems.

Risk & compliance

• Identify potential risks and vulnerabilities in Backend systems and suggest appropriate security measures to mitigate them.
• Ensure compliance with industry standards regulations and data privacy requirements in the design and implementation of Backend solutions
• Implement and maintain robust monitoring and logging mechanisms to detect and respond to potential security breaches or compliance issues.

Analysis & reporting

• Develop and maintain analytics and reporting capabilities for Backend systems providing insights on performance usage patterns and user behaviour.
• Collaborate with data analysts and business analysts to gather requirements and develop datadriven solutions for Backend systems optimisation.

Role specific skills

• Strong understanding of Backend technologies frameworks and architectures.
• Thinking: analyse problems identify patterns and propose innovative solutions.
• Strategic mindset and the ability to align technical decisions with the organizations goals and objectives

Role specific knowledge and experience

Minimum

• Experience in Backend engineering involved in designing and implementing scalable and highperformance systems.
• Proficiency in programming languages such as .Net C# PHP NodeJS Python and experience with Backend frameworks (e.g. Symfony Express Django).
• Good understanding of distributed system concepts cloud architectures (e.g. AWS Azure) and microservices architecture.
• Experience with relational and NoSQL databases data modelling and query optimization.
• Solid knowledge of RESTful APIs message queues caching mechanisms and other Backend technologies.
• Experience with endtoend unit and integration testing (e.g. Cypress Jest and Playwright)
• Prototyping skills
• Knowledge of resource allocation and management and component optimisation
• Excellent written and oral communication skills.
• Experience of agile development (Scrum/Kanban) software patterns test and behaviour driven development and version control

Desirable

• Knowledge of containerization and orchestration platforms (e.g. Docker Kubernetes) and related technologies.
• Knowledge of DevOps practices CI/CD pipelines automated testing and infrastructureascode tools (e.g. Jenkins Terraform).
• Understanding of frontend technologies (e.g. React Angular)
• Familiarity with eventdriven architecture and stream processing frameworks (e.g. Kafka Apache Flink).
• Understanding of security best practices authentication and authorisation protocols (e.g. OAuth JWT).

Education

Minimum

• Bachelors degree in Computer Science Software Engineering or a related field; or equivalent experience.
• Continuous learning through online courses workshops and industry conferences to stay updated with emerging technologies and best practices in Backend development.
• Strong foundation in computer science fundamentals including algorithms data structures and software design principles.

Desirable

• Masters degree in computer science or a relevant specialisation providing a deeper understanding of advanced topics and research in Backend engineering.

A connected and trusted UK in a more connected and trusted world.

Equality Diversity and Inclusion Statement

We are committed to equality diversity and inclusion and welcome applications from all sections of the community as we believe that a diverse workforce gives added depth to our work. The British Council is a Disability Confident Employer. The Disability Confident scheme helps challenge attitudes increase understanding of disability and ensure staff are drawn from the widest possible pool of talent. We guarantee an interview for disabled applicants who meet the minimum role requirements. We welcome discussions about specific requirements or adjustments to enable participation and engagement in our work and activities.

Safeguarding Statement

The British Council is committed to safeguarding children young people and adults who we work with. We believe that all children and adults everywhere in the world deserve to live in safe environments and have the right to be protected from all forms of abuse maltreatment and exploitation as set out in article 19 UNCRC (United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child) 1989. Appointment to positions where there is direct involvement with vulnerable groups will be dependent on thorough checks being completed in line with legal requirements and with the British Councils Safeguarding policies for Adults and Children.

If you experience any difficulties with submitting your application please email