Senior Full Stack Developer

Who are we?
Digital Theatre+ stands at the forefront of English and Drama/Theatre arts education. As the premier on-demand platform for the performing arts, we offer a stunning collection of live performances, behind-the-scenes insights, interviews with industry leaders, and curriculum-linked resources. We’re available to over 10 million students across 3,500 institutions worldwide. Now, we invite you to be a part of our mission: to elevate our Education Platform for the Arts, ensuring every teacher can inspire and every student can thrive.

We are seeking an experienced Senior Full Stack Developer to join our small, focused engineering team responsible for the Digital Theatre+ product and associated services (https://edu.digitaltheatreplus.com).

As part of a team of four engineers, you will have a direct impact on both the technical direction and the success of our business and platform. 

The ideal candidate is a problem-solver who is comfortable with full ownership of projects, can learn and adapt to existing systems, and has a strong balance of front-end and back-end experience using the technologies in our stack.

In this role, you’ll work closely with the stakeholders and the product team to design, develop, and maintain robust web applications while being responsible for both architecture and hands-on coding. 

As part of a small team, you’ll need to be flexible and able to contribute across the stack while collaborating with other developers and stakeholders.

Responsibilities

1. Lead architecture and system design for scalable web applications in existing multi-tenant projects
2. Develop secure, accessible software solutions following established patterns and principles appropriate to the project context
3. Implement and manage CI/CD pipelines
4. Write automated unit, integration, and end-to-end tests
5. Implement and manage authentication and authorisation, including:
   1. Protocols: OAuth 2.0, OpenID Connect (OIDC), SAML (Security Assertion Markup Language)
   2. Methods: Password-based authentication, Multi-factor authentication (MFA), Single Sign-On (SSO), Token-based authentication, Magic links / Passwordless authentication, JWT (JSON Web Tokens)
   3. Frameworks: Role-Based Access Control (RBAC), Rule-Based Access Control
   4. Session Management: Cookie-based sessions, Token-based sessions
   5. API Security: API Keys, OAuth 2.0 scopes
   6. Identity Providers (IdPs) and Federation: Commercial IdPs (e.g., Microsoft Entra ID, Google Workspace, Okta, Auth0); Academic and Research Federations: InCommon (US), UK Access Management Federation, eduGAIN (global interfederation service)
6. Work with a wide range of AWS services (Lambda, DynamoDB, SNS, SQS, RDS Aurora, EventBridge, Fargate, etc.).
7. Develop infrastructure-as-code using Terraform/Terragrunt or Serverless Framework.
8. Ensure WCAG compliance and web application performance (including lighthouse metrics).
9. Integrate with Contentful, HubSpot, and Okta.
10. Monitor and maintain system observability with alerting and metrics.
11. Collaborate with cross-functional teams to design and deliver solutions.
12. Take ownership of projects and solutions, ensuring high quality and timely delivery.

Qualifications

1. 7+ years of full stack web development experience
2. Deep experience with Node.js, TypeScript, Next.js, React, Nest.js, and TailwindCSS.
3. Strong experience in AWS (DynamoDB, Lambda, RDS, SNS, SQS, ElasticSearch, EventBridge, Step Functions, API Gateway).
4. Proficiency with GraphQL, REST, and web application security best practices.
5. Experience with Terraform/Terragrunt, Serverless Framework, or SST.
6. Experience with observability, monitoring, and alerting systems.
7. Familiarity with performance optimisation tools such as Lighthouse.
8. Understanding of accessibility standards (WCAG compliance).
9. Excellent problem-solving skills, and an ability to take ownership of solutions.
10. Experience integrating with third-party platforms like Contentful, HubSpot, and Okta.
11. Familiarity with modern CI/CD and testing frameworks.
12. Strong verbal and written communication skills.

Preferred

1. Experience with Yarn, NX, monolith and microservices architectures.
2. Experience with both RDS Aurora MySQL and Postgres.
3. Experience with Gitlab for Git, CI/CD and Issue Management.
4. Experience with Education Technology, including Learning Tool Interoperability.
5. Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or a related field, or a demonstrated ability to work with complex systems through substantial real-world experience in web-based software architecture, system design and implementation.

Company benefits

• Work-life balance: Enjoy 25 days of holiday, plus bank holidays and an extra day off for your birthday
• Flexibility: We offer flexible working hours and a hybrid model of working
• Supporting parents: We offer enhanced maternity and paternity leave
• Wellbeing: 24/7 access to an EAP wellbeing platform and counselling
• Social: Social committee that runs company-wide events, as well as quarterly team socials
• Other benefits include access to training courses for personal/professional development, access to Perkbox platform and free subscription to Calm App

Equal Opportunities Employer:

Digital Theatre is an equal opportunities employer. We welcome your application and believe in diversity of experience and opinion.  Applications will be considered without regard to  education, culture, ethnicity, race, sex, gender identity and expression, nation of origin, age, languages spoken,  colour, religion, disability, sexual orientation and beliefs. We celebrate multiple approaches and points of view and believe passionately that employing a diverse workforce is central to our growth and success, so we are building a culture where difference is valued.