AI-First Software Development Lead (Business Analyst + Scrum Master + Hands-on Technical Lead)
Must Have Skills
Preferred Skills
About Us:
We are calling applicants on behalf of a software solutions company headquartered in East Brunswick, NJ. Incorporated in 2003, provides solutions across GRC, Technology, Procurement, Healthcare Provider and Oracle to customers globally.
Position Summary
We are seeking a hands-on AI-First Software Development Lead who combines business analysis, Scrum Master / Agile delivery leadership and technical leadership in one role. The successful candidate will translate business problems into clear, testable requirements; guide a team through predictable delivery; and personally design, build, review, test and troubleshoot production-quality software using approved AI-assisted engineering tools.
This is not a purely coordination or architecture role. The lead remains technically hands-on and accountable for business value, delivery execution, engineering quality, team flow and production outcomes across the software development lifecycle.
Key Responsibilities
Business Analysis & Product Discovery
- Engage customers and users to understand business goals, pain points, workflows, constraints and measurable success criteria.
- Facilitate discovery and process mapping; document business rules, current/future-state workflows and functional / non-functional requirements.
- Convert needs into epics, user stories, acceptance criteria and process flows; prioritize the backlog and own UAT readiness.
Scrum Mastery & Agile Delivery
- Facilitate sprint planning, daily stand-ups, reviews, retrospectives, backlog refinement and release planning focused on outcomes.
- Maintain clear sprint goals, Definition of Ready / Done, manageable work in progress and transparent delivery forecasts.
- Remove blockers and manage dependencies, risks, decisions and escalations across business, engineering, QA, security and operations.
- Coach teams in Scrum / Kanban, estimation, collaboration and continuous improvement; communicate status and trade-offs clearly.
Hands-on Technical Leadership & Engineering
- Remain hands-on: write, debug and refactor production code, build APIs, integrations and UI components, and resolve critical technical issues.
- Translate requirements into pragmatic solution designs, modular architecture, interface contracts, data models and actionable technical tasks.
- Conduct code reviews and pair-programming; mentor developers and set standards for maintainability, testability and secure-by-design implementation.
- Promote automated testing, Git, code quality gates, CI/CD, deployment automation and production readiness.
AI-First Delivery, Quality & Responsible Use
- Embed approved AI tools into discovery, requirements, design, coding, testing, documentation, migration and support workflows.
- Use AI assistants for code, tests and documentation with human verification; check correctness, security, privacy, licensing and data exposure.
- Measure impact through cycle time, escaped defects, test effectiveness, rework and customer value—not AI usage volume alone.
- Maintain traceability from requirements to code, tests and release evidence, and follow Atlas / customer policies for data, access and intellectual property.
Stakeholder, Team & Production Ownership
- Act as an accountable point across business, delivery and engineering with clear decisions, ownership and escalation paths.
- Balance scope, quality, timeline, cost, technical debt and operational risk; support release notes, runbooks and post-release reviews.
- Build a culture of customer focus, flexibility, agility, precision, accountability and continuous learning.
Required Qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Information Technology or a related discipline, or equivalent practical experience.
- Typically 8+ years of software application development and delivery experience, including hands-on coding and cross-functional team leadership.
- Experience in business analysis: stakeholder interviews, requirements elicitation, user stories, acceptance criteria, backlog management and UAT.
- Practical Scrum Master / Agile facilitation experience, including sprint ceremonies, impediment removal, team coaching and delivery improvement.
- Solid software engineering fundamentals in at least one modern programming language and application stack, with ability to review, debug and deliver production code.
- Experience delivering APIs, web applications, integrations, databases and automated tests; familiarity with Git, code reviews and CI/CD.
- Practical use of AI-assisted development tools in real engineering workflows, with disciplined verification and secure use.
- Strong communication, structured problem-solving and stakeholder-management skills; able to move effectively between business, delivery and technical detail.
Technical Skills
Business Analysis & Agile Delivery
- Requirements discovery, process mapping, user stories, acceptance criteria, backlog prioritization, UAT, Scrum, Kanban, sprint planning, flow metrics and retrospectives.
Programming & Application Engineering
- One or more of Java, C#, Python, JavaScript / TypeScript or equivalent; web frameworks, REST APIs, integrations, SQL / data modelling and debugging.
AI-First Development
- Approved coding copilots / LLM assistants, context and prompt design, AI-generated tests and documentation, evaluation and human-in-the-loop review.
Quality & DevOps
- Unit/integration/API testing, Git, CI/CD, code quality tools, observability, logging, deployment automation and root-cause analysis.
Security & Responsible AI
- Secure coding, least privilege, secrets handling, privacy, dependency scanning and responsible handling of customer data and intellectual property.
Preferred / Nice-to-Have Skills
- Experience with AI agents or Model Context Protocol (MCP), cloud-native platforms, containers, workflow automation, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) or enterprise data platforms.
- Experience delivering software in regulated customer environments and using AI to improve engineering productivity while maintaining quality and security.
Core Competencies
- Business-first thinking and ability to connect requirements to measurable customer outcomes.
- Hands-on technical credibility and willingness to contribute production code—not just assign or review work.
- Facilitative leadership, collaboration, coaching, conflict resolution and decisive prioritization.
- Pragmatism, ownership, adaptability and comfort operating in a changing client environment.
- AI fluency balanced with critical thinking, confidentiality, quality discipline and human accountability.
- Agile execution, risk management, stakeholder communication and continuous improvement.
- Engineering quality, secure-by-design thinking and disciplined production ownership.
- Clear written and verbal communication with business and technical audiences.
- Problem solving, learning agility and effective cross-functional collaboration.
- Customer focus, precision, accountability and commitment to outcomes.
Success Measures
- Requirements are clear, prioritized, testable and traceable to business outcomes, reducing ambiguity and avoidable rework.
- Sprints and releases demonstrate improved predictability, healthy flow, timely risk escalation and stakeholder alignment.
- The lead contributes meaningful code and technical problem-solving while raising the quality and capability of the wider team.
- AI-assisted practices measurably improve cycle time, test effectiveness, documentation or rework without increasing security risk or escaped defects.
- Production releases meet agreed quality, security, performance and operational-readiness expectations; incidents result in durable corrective actions.
- Customers recognize responsive communication, ownership, precision and consistent delivery of business value.
Screening questions
Asked of every applicant before they can apply.
