Fletchers Solicitors
Tech Lead (Fullstack)
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Locations: hybrid working model, options for primarily remote, or more in-person in Manchester or London.
Overview
We are looking for a Tech Lead to join our expanding AI team at Fletchers Solicitors and lead on full stack development. This role sits within a fast-paced, high-autonomy environment where we are rapidly prototyping, iterating, and deploying state-of-the-art AI products for use across Fletchers and the wider legal sector. The team operates as a start-up-style unit within the wider business, reporting directly to the executive team, with a clear mandate to move quickly from idea to production.
You will be responsible for designing and driving the build of the systems and apps at the heart of production AI services in the legal sector, and leading technical teams as we expand. We have strong demand internally and externally and so the demands on our apps, and team, will grow considerably in the next year.
About Fletchers Solicitors And Our AI Initiative
Fletchers is a rapidly growing consumer law firm specialising in personal injury and clinical negligence, and with a growing practice in family and private client. Fletchers was one of the first consumer law firms to deploy a machine learning tool for legal work (in 2017) and was one of, or the first, law firm to have a dedicated AI department. Since then, we have been experimenting with a broader range of ML techniques, extending those tools already in use, and productionising new ones through our growing data science & engineering teams.
We believe that we are well positioned to leverage Fletchers’ unique legal-medical dataset and industry expertise to build AI tools that will shape the future of consumer law. We are well funded through our Private Equity backers, which allows us to invest heavily in the development of sector-specific AI tools that assist, automate, and augment our specialist legal work. We’re building specialist tools that improve and automate live legal processes, transform how law firms like ours run, and which are used by colleagues for 90%+ of their working day.
The AI team operates as a separate unit within the wider business, reporting to the Director of AI and group CEO, with a mandate move fast from idea to production. We have a mix of data science, product, engineering, and legal engineering teams, and work alongside lawyers who run cases day-to-day. We are going to grow all aspects of the team significantly over the next year as we expand our internal capabilities and commercialise our technology externally, and that growth is starting with engineering.
We currently have an engineering team with 8 members, split across backend, frontend, and infra (though we are not keen on rigidly enforcing these role descriptions). They own and run our existing products, which are already live and in-use by hundreds of users (to-date we have processed over 15 million pages of pdf documents, among other milestones).
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The Role
This is for a full-stack Technical Lead, overseeing our engineering team, and reporting into the Director of AI. You’ll own the systems, services and infrastructure that enable the development, testing and deployment of our AI tools, and their transformation into marketable products. Covering frontend and backend, you’ll provide technical leadership for the engineering team, set standards, shape architecture, mentor other engineers, and you’ll lead on doubling that team in the next year. There will also be plenty of scope for forward-deployed hands-on development: you’ll work side by side with our internal users and external customer firms to ideate solutions, solve integrations, and drive adoption, bringing in the team as you see fit.
Main Responsibilities
Engineering delivery, excellence and infrastructure
- Design and drive the build of the applications and services at the heart of production AI apps (backend: Python, frontend: TypeScript and React), ensuring performance and reliability
- Build the systems that deploy, test, and improve those apps while they’re used at scale
- Build efficient and scalable data integration pipelines from a range of sources (legacy legal case management systems, unstructured Word documents, PDF files, SQL DBs, etc.)
- Own software architecture across core projects and lead on infrastructure and architecture design decisions, with a strong understanding of the business problem
- Own infrastructure, site reliability, and disaster recovery for our production systems
- Work closely with our infra and infosec teams, within their frameworks while also constructively challenging and defining our own standards for AI
- People, leadership, and collaboration
- Own the software development standards for software development, including how we use AI
- Review code, manage, and provide technical guidance and mentorship to other engineers and establish best practices across the team
- Grow the engineering team from 10 to 20+, with the right structures and processes in place to ensure technical excellence as we expand
- Work side-by-side with internal users and engage directly with external customers, across pre-sale, setup and integrations
- Collaborate with and maintain close productive relationships with technical and non-technical teams across multiple projects in parallel (product; data science; as well as legal; nursing, etc.)
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Essential Skills and Experience:
- Strong degree qualification(s) in a STEM subject from a top-tier university
- Strong professional experience in software development (we prioritise general technical ability and leadership over specific skills)
- Track record of effectively owning production systems
- Experience defining backend and frontend architecture, standards, and setting technical direction
- Experience leading development efforts or acting as a technical lead, including reviewing code and mentoring other engineers
- Strong interpersonal and communication skills that make you comfortable working side by side with users and customers, including in pre-sale, onboarding, and integration settings
- Comfortable operating in a fast-paced environment where requirements may evolve rapidly
- Based near London or Manchester (although the role can be primarily remote, we anticipate meeting with the whole team twice/month in Manchester, and a local team two or three times/week in a London office)
- Fluency in English
Desirable Skills and Experience:
- Start-up experience (building backends and data environments completely from scratch)
- Previous experience with Azure (Container Apps, endpoints, and cloud deployment)
- Prior exposure to NLP, LLMs, and ML tools
- Experience in professional services domains
In Return Fletchers Offers
- 35 hours working week
- Bonus scheme (subject to targets being met)
- 35 days holiday a year including bank holidays and Christmas Closure, you also have an option to purchase up to 3 extra days’ holiday per year, until you long service award the 3 days after your 5th, 7th, and 9th full year of employment
- Pension scheme with NI-efficient salary sacrifice option
- Life Assurance Policy
- Medicash policy to cover some dental, optical and other medical expenses
- Company sick pay
- Enhanced Maternity, Paternity and IVF schemes
- Flexible, agile working environment with a positive work-life balance
- Varied calendar of funded company social events (check out Fletchers Group on LinkedIn)
- Monthly voucher awards for winning nominees
- A genuinely supportive and friendly culture
- Ongoing training and professional development opportunities
Fletchers Group is an inclusive employer with a diverse workforce: we welcome applications from any and all backgrounds. We’re committed to providing a culture and environment where everyone can thrive, understanding and celebrating that no colleague is the same. We’re proud of our work on the Disability Confident scheme, signed up to BITC’s Race at Work charter, and working towards Henpicked’s Menopause and Menstrual Friendly accreditations.
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