Lead Software Engineer

Purpose of The Job

Lead the architecture, development, deployment, operational ownership, and AI-enabled engineering practices for the new Mobile Backend-for-Frontend (BFF) platform supporting the React Native app rewrite and future web/app ordering experiences across 3,400+ restaurants. This role provides the technical direction for the BFF service layer that will replace key responsibilities currently handled by the kfc-sdk, including menu merge/decorate logic, CMS aggregation, feature flags, store reads, delivery estimates, favorites reads, promo-code validation, and related restaurant-ordering capabilities.

This role is accountable for more than feature delivery. It serves as a lead developer and software architect responsible for how the cloud-hosted BFF, API contracts, React Native codebase, Yum integrations, Contentful/CMS data, and front-end application layers fit together. The front end of the app and web experiences will rely on this BFF layer, so this role must define scalable architecture, direct implementation patterns, and ensure the platform is reliable, maintainable, observable, secure, and production-ready.

This role also serves as the AI-enabled development leader for the team, establishing practical patterns for using AI coding assistants, agentic development workflows, prompt/context practices, generated tests, architecture documentation, refactoring support, and technical discovery. The role is expected to bring the broader development team along by coaching engineers, creating repeatable AI playbooks, and ensuring AI accelerates delivery without reducing quality, security, or human engineering ownership.