Back-End Software Engineer, Cancer Research
PHP & Symfony, 12 Month FTC
£40-50k
More information about location
1-2 days a week in office (Stratford, London)
Cancer prevention, awareness and research charity
Be an early applicant
Cancer prevention, awareness and research charity
1001+ employees
Be an early applicant
£40-50k
More information about location
1-2 days a week in office (Stratford, London)
1001+ employees
Company mission
To prevent, control and cure cancer through ground-breaking research.
Role
Who you are
- Experienced Software Engineer with a proven ability to write clean, readable, and properly tested code based on tried and tested design patterns
- Must have demonstrable knowledge of PHP Symfony and ideally JavaScript/ TypeScript with an ability and willingness to learn new languages, frameworks, and tools
- Experience using large-scale code repositories
- Some experience developing REST APIs and other back-end components
- Ran critical services in production and designed highly available, scalable, and secure solutions
- Awareness of accessibility standards and guidelines
- Ability to communicate with technical and non-technical business colleagues
What the job involves
- Contract: 12 month fixed-term contract
- Reports to: Lead Software Engineer
- As a Back-End Software Engineer, you will be part of our Fundraising & Trading portfolio rotating across a range of change initiatives and products that helped raise £597m towards Cancer Research UK's life-saving work (e.g. , our events management product which enables mass events such as Race for Life, London Marathon, Shine, and individual events)
- However, you will predominantly focus on using Symfony to develop the back-end of our Online Fundraising Web Application which is an in-house software solution that has created half a million fundraising pages for our supporters, processed 2.6m donations, and fundraised c.£65m for the charity
- In this role, you will help take our Fundraising & Trading products to the next level by partnering with our product teams to develop our software packages and high-quality code; ensure best practices and deliver technical solutions as part of our Engineering Strategy
- You will also gain exposure to stakeholders across the charity while collaborating with other Engineers, Product Managers, Testers, Agile Coaches, Architects, and Business Analysts to help convert business challenges into technical solutions while continually improving the accessibility, availability, performance, and security of our products
- Developing software packages and solutions within our Fundraising & Trading portfolio with a specific focus on our Online Fundraising applications
- This will involve a significant focus on the back-end creation of Cancer Research UK’s Online Fundraising Web Application (PHP Symfony)
- Applying lean and Agile principles to develop high-quality code that has minimal bugs, adheres to Cancer Research UK standards, and is highly supportable
- Working either independently or in collaboration with Solution Architects to design new solutions in line with the Software Engineering strategy
- Autonomously delivering backlog items for an existing product
- Collaborating with the Fundraising & Trading product team (e.g., Product Managers, Service Designers, UX Designers, Business Analysts etc) to identify user needs, discuss capabilities, and iteratively design solutions
- Contributing to the Software Engineering capability team to share good practices, develop standards, patterns, automation & tools, and reduce technical debt and operational risks
- Applying Site Reliability Engineering principles to track and improve the availability, performance, and security of our Fundraising & Trading products while supporting the resolution of incidents impacting these products
- Hours: Full time 35 hours per week
Application process
- End Date: December 7, 2024
- Interview date: From the week commencing 16 December 2024
- CVs are required for all applications; but we won’t be able to view them until we invite you for an interview. Instead, we ask you to fully complete the work history section of the online application form for us to be able to assess you quickly, fairly, and objectively
Salary benchmarks
Our take
The world’s largest independent cancer research charity, Cancer Research UK (CRUK) was founded from a merger between the Cancer Research Campaign and the Cancer Research Fund in 2002. CRC and ICRF had been longstanding pinnacles of the British medical institution, their work dating back to 1902 and 1923 respectively, and the merger signalled a strong step forward for UK medical institutes’ global influence.
A multi-armed charity, CRUK uses both grant-funded researchers and its own employed staff to research the treatments and causes of cancer, whilst its striking advertising and marketing campaigns are responsible for influencing public policy on the causes, prevention, and treatment of the disease. An example of a significant public campaign was Stoptober, which appeared to have triggered a third of a million smokers at the time to try quit tobacco throughout the month of October.
Alongside its pharmaceutical efforts, in 2023 CRUK funded clinical trials for the first-ever proton beam therapy for breast cancer, indicating a focus on technological innovations in the fight against cancer. On this subject, CRUK has also taken part in a billion-pound investment in the Francis Crick Institute, a biomedical research institute that is aiming to make England an international leader in the industry.
Steph
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
Some candidates hear
back within 2 weeks
9% employee growth in 12 months
Company
Company benefits
- Health & Wellbeing - Health and wellbeing are important to us. We want our people to have time away from work to support their different commitments, needs and interests
- Our occupational health and mental wellbeing support are accompanied by online health assessment tools, Our confidential employee assistance programme is available to all to provide support for any concerns in your work or personal life for ongoing everyday support or free counselling if you need it. We also have a team of Mental Health First Aiders supporting across the organisation
- Our occupational health and mental wellbeing support are accompanied by online health assessment tools, Our confidential employee assistance programme is available to all to provide support for any concerns in your work or personal life for ongoing everyday support or free counselling if you need it
- We also have a team of Mental Health First Aiders supporting across the organisation
- UK-wide savings - Our staff have access to a wide range of discounts, benefits and cashback deals to support you with your financial wellbeing, through our Rewards platform. We offer an online savings and discounts portal covering many widely recognised retailers and brands from electronics, groceries, home and leisure, holidays and more
- Cancer Research UK staff can take advantage of savings through a cycle to work scheme, or an interest free loan to help spread the cost of travel season tickets. Staff also enjoy great benefits in and around our head office in Stratford, London with deals at local shops, bars and restaurants
- Income Protection and Life Assurance - We provide all staff with free insurance policies, paying 50% of your salary if you are unable to work through illness, and up to 4 times your salary for your beneficiaries should the unthinkable happen and you die while in our employment
- Flexible Working - We want our people to have time away from work to support their different commitments, needs and interests. We encourage a flexible working culture, including options such as home-working, reduced or flexi-hours, job shares, job-splits, compressed and core hours
- We offer a high level of flexibility for the vast majority of our office-based roles, meaning that you’ll only be required to work from a specific location for 1 or 2 days a week on average
- Annual Leave - For the majority of our roles we offer 25 days holiday a year plus bank holidays, and an extra day for Christmas Eve. You can choose to use the religious bank holidays flexibly. On top of this, you can choose to buy up to 1 week’s additional holiday each year
Company values
- Bold: Act with ambition, courage and determination
- Credible: Act with rigour and professionalism
- Human: Act to have a positive impact on people
- Together: Act inclusively and collaboratively
Company HQ
Stratford, London, UK
Articles
Leadership
Previously Non-Executive Director of NHS England for 4 years, and Chief Executive of the MS Society for 5 years.
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