Specialist Product Engineer

at  Absa Bank Limited

Empowering Africa’s tomorrow, together…one story at a time.
With over 100 years of rich history and strongly positioned as a local bank with regional and international expertise, a career with our family offers the opportunity to be part of this exciting growth journey, to reset our future and shape our destiny as a proudly African group.
Job Summary
Apply critical thinking & problem solving skills to contribute to all phases of the development lifecycle & quickly produce well-organised, optimized, and documented source code to deliver high-performing, scalable, enterprise-grade applications.
Job Description

DevOps

• Apply critical thinking, design thinking and problem solving skills in an agile team environment to solve technical problems (Front End, Back End OR Middleware) with high quality solutions
• Contribute to all phases of the development lifecycle including
• Evaluate analysis, problem definition, business requirements, solution development & provide recommendations to enable the operational feasibility of solutions
• Quickly produce well-organised, optimized, and documented source code to deliver technical solutions
• Ensure designs & solutions support the technical organisation principles of self-service, repeatability, testability, scalability & resilience
• Apply general design patterns and paradigms to deliver technical solutions
• Support the development of CI / CD Pipelines (authoring & supporting CI/CD pipelines in Jenkins / similar tools and deploying to multi-site Kubernetes environments – supporting and managing your applications all the way to production)
• Use & configure modern observability techniques leveraging e.g. aggregated logging via ELK stack, metrics via Prometheus / Grafana / NewRElic and tracing using Zipkin/Jaeger
• Automate tasks through appropriate tools and scripting e.g. Jenkins, Docker, Ansible, Kubernetes
• Debug existing source code and polish feature sets.
• Work with integrated teams and other developers to improve and evolve technical products and services
• Align all application development & development process to Group Architecture & Infrastructure guidelines
• Provide input into project & program teams (when required) to plan & manage the development lifecycle e.g. releases, risk management, testing, integration etc.
• Conduct reviews, performance monitoring & ongoing optimization and maintenance on applications
• Stay ahead of the curve on emerging technologies and development practices and continuously evolve existing knowledge & skill in preparation for cross domain and other experiences e.g. Secure Side, Testing, Infrastructure solutions etc.

People

• Conduct peer reviews, testing, problem solving within and across the broader team
• Support the people change teams in the development of user material (Customer, Employee & 3rd Party Adoption)

Risk & Governance

• Identify technical risks and mitigate these (pre, during & post release)
• Update / Design all application documentation aligned to the organization technical standards and risk / governance frameworks
• Participate in incident management & DR activity – applying critical thinking, problem solving & technical expertise to get to the bottom of major incidents

Technical Skills Required

Scrum & Agile Methodologies

• Experience with Agile frameworks, particularly Scrum.
• Ability to participate in and lead daily stand-ups, sprint planning, and retrospectives.
• Familiarity with Agile project management tools (e.g., JIRA, Azure DevOps).

C# Object-Oriented Programming (OOP)

• Proficiency in C# for front-end and back-end development.
• Strong understanding of OOP principles and design patterns.
• Experience with frameworks such as .NET Framework, .NET Core and ASP.NET.

Front-End Development

• Knowledge of HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and front-end frameworks (e.g., React, Angular).
• Experience in creating responsive, user-friendly interfaces.

Back-End Development

• Skilled in back-end services and APIs using C#.
• Familiarity with RESTful APIs and Microservices architecture.
• Understanding of serverless architecture and event-driven design.

Data Analysis, ETL, & Business Intelligence

• ETL Development: Experience with ETL processes to extract, transform, and load data from various sources.
• Familiarity with ETL tools and frameworks (e.g. SSIS, Informatica, AWS Glue).
• Proficiency in data cleansing, transformation, and integration techniques.
• Data Analysis: Skilled in analyzing datasets to derive meaningful business insights and inform stakeholder reporting and decision-making.
• Business Intelligence: Proficient in BI tools (e.g. Qlikview, Qliksense, Power BI) and creating data visualizations and reports.

SQL & Database Management

• Proficient in SQL for database querying, optimization, and management.
• Experience with relational databases (e.g., SQL Server, MySQL).
• Knowledge of data warehousing concepts is a plus.

AWS Cloud Development

• Hands-on experience with AWS services such as EC2, Lambda, S3, RDS, and API Gateway.
• Familiarity with DevOps practices, including CI/CD in cloud environments.
• Knowledge of automation tools to streamline deployment and testing.
• Knowledge of infrastructure as code (e.g., CloudFormation, Terraform) is a plus.
• Awareness of data security and privacy standards.
• Experience implementing secure coding practices and handling secure data storage.

Soft Skills Required

Communication Skills

• Ability to convey technical information to both technical and non-technical audiences.
• Clear, concise, and professional verbal and written communication.

Stakeholder Engagement

• Skilled in building and maintaining positive relationships with stakeholders.
• Experience in gathering requirements, providing updates, and managing expectations.
• Ability to align project goals with business needs and communicate insights effectively.
• Ability to understand the end-user’s perspective, ensuring that products meet not only technical but also usability requirements.

Problem-Solving, Analytical, Strategic Thinking & Taking Initiative

• Aptitude for troubleshooting complex issues and identifying root causes.
• Ability to think critically and make data-driven decisions.
• The ability to see the big picture and align technical work with business objectives.
• Proactivity in seeking improvements, suggesting innovative solutions, and taking initiative to solve complex problems independently.

Collaboration & Teamwork

• Strong team player, comfortable working in a cross-functional, agile team environment.
• Open to feedback and proactive in helping team members succeed.

Adaptability, Flexibility & Learning Agility

• Comfortable working in a fast-paced, constantly evolving environment.
• Open-mindedness to adopt new tools, frameworks, and technologies quickly.
• Demonstrates a growth mindset, able to self-teach, and adapt to evolving project needs.

Attention to Detail

• High level of accuracy and thoroughness in completing tasks.
• Able to spot errors, inconsistencies, and improvements in code and data.

Time Management & Prioritization

• Skilled in managing multiple tasks, deadlines, and priorities.
• Ability to handle short and long-term goals effectively.

Education
Bachelor’s Degree: Information Technology
Absa Bank Limited is an equal opportunity, affirmative action employer. In compliance with the Employment Equity Act 55 of 1998, preference will be given to suitable candidates from designated groups whose appointments will contribute towards achievement of equitable demographic representation of our workforce profile and add to the diversity of the Bank.
Absa Bank Limited reserves the right not to make an appointment to the post as advertise

Please refer the Job description for details