Head of Software Platform

About The RoleThe Software Platform Team is responsible for ensuring a reliable, scalable, performant, secure, and cost effective cloud environment, architecture, and tooling are available to our wider engineering teams. With growing headcount and a rapidly increasing fleet to support, we’re looking for a dedicated leader to take the helm of the Software Platform Team to continue to deliver a world-class platform. You will manage and lead our more senior platform engineers across backend, cloud, SRE, data, and security, working in close proximity to other senior product and engineering leaders to deliver on the most important projects.

You will report directly to the VP Product & Engineering, keeping you close to the business context and ensuring alignment between engineering focus and the exec team. You will work in a modern codebase in an AWS environment alongside deeply experienced engineers with strong practices of IaC, a love for autonomy, and a culture of experimentation. This is a rare opportunity to lead the team responsible for step change improvements across Halter’s systems as we scale. About YouYou have a strong software engineering background with a previous focus on platform or infrastructure engineering.

You know how to architect a system to scale and intuitively take into consideration reliability, performance, and security, having done it before. You work from first principles in solving any problem, recognising the changes our system needs to see as the order of magnitude of throughput increases. You know how to encourage incremental improvements to our system and how and when to prioritise these to keep momentum in our teams and stability in our systems. You’re also not scared to get stuck in yourself, rolling up your sleeves, working alongside your team to contribute to what matters most.

You’re also a strong team lead and people manager, having familiarity with working with engineers, each with their own disciplines, who are the best at what they do. You set clear expectations knowing what context is required to see the best results, but also know how to recognise when context has been missed and therefore direction needs to be steered. You’re direct in feedback, but only with the understanding you will get it back, having built strong rapport across the team.

All in you’re someone who is kind, curious, brings joy and wants to win–someone who enjoys the challenges and opportunities that come with rapid growth.

Key ResponsibilitiesLead, coach, and grow the Software Platform Team, providing technical direction across backend, cloud infrastructure, SRE, data, and security domainsOwn the strategic vision and delivery of Halter’s software platform, ensuring it is reliable, scalable, performant, secure, and cost-effective as we continue to growCollaborate closely with senior engineering and product leadership, aligning technical initiatives with business priorities and ensuring seamless execution of cross-functional projectsMaintain a strong hands-on presence, contributing directly to high-priority projects and supporting your team in navigating complex technical challengesEnable a culture of ownership, experimentation, and continuous improvement across the wider engineering organization, by building tools, systems, and practices that accelerate product developmentContribute to architectural and operational excellence alongside other engineering leaders, helping identify and deliver key improvements to system reliability, developer experience, and infrastructure efficiencyEnsure security and compliance best practices are embedded into all layers of our platform and development lifecycle while supporting our context over control cultureMonitor and manage platform spend, identifying opportunities to improve cost efficiency without compromising performance or reliabilityWhy our team loves working at HalterEvery now and again a company comes along that disrupts and transforms an entire industry, leaving society in a better place.

Few people get the opportunity to work at companies like these. Halter is an incredible technology transforming an essential industry. We have a genuine and shared connection to our mission to make a difference in the worldOur product changes the lives of our customers, directly improving their livelihoods and their lifestyle. Your work mattersDedicate yourself to solving real-world problems alongside an epic team in a high-growth culture. The excitement, risk and reward of a high-growth technology scale-up on the global stage.

Our ideas are truly valued, we are able to move fast, and our impact is realState-of-the-art, dog-friendly office that’s been thoughtfully designed right in the heart of Auckland city. Did we mention dogs and cows?Healthy body, healthy mind. We’re partnered with Southern Cross Health Insurance to support your well-beingWe offer 6 months of fully paid parental leave for primary caregivers, 4 weeks of fully paid secondary caregiver leave and many other parental benefits that support you and your familyOur personal growth is important.

Halter offers an annual $1000 self-development budget to be used for anything that fuels personal growthOur time to recharge is valued, we’re offered wellness leave and unlimited paid annual leaveWe offer an inclusive and attractive remuneration package made up of salary, benefits and an employee stock ownership planOur Office First ApproachThere’s a reason you visit your friends in person, live with your family and don’t do dinners over Zoom. Humans are wired for connection. We believe a world-class, in-person office culture is the best way for high-performing teams.

Being office first is a core pillar of our culture. We believe in-person connections are key to driving your own growth, learning, impact, and building genuine long-lasting relationships. Strong relationships make it easier to disagree, give feedback, and do meaningful and aligned work. We don’t like having heaps of rules or policies, but this means having strong, trusted relationships is critical. We’re office first, not office only. This means working from the office everyday is our default setting, but we flex when we need to.

We have a high-trust culture, so everyone is trusted to do what’s best for Halter. Our office vibe is something special, it’s hard to describe until you’re here, but people at Halter who have come from fully remote or hybrid companies say they could never go back - the high energy and spectacular people they are now surrounded by everyday makes work so enjoyable. Your growth, your learning and your impact is truly unlimited here, and a big part of that comes from being together solving problems, innovating, building context, and constantly learning from each other.

About HalterAt Halter, we’re on a mission to enable farmers and graziers to run the most productive and sustainable operations. Our customers are using Halter to break free from the time-intensive constraints of conventional practices. Imagine watching 500 cattle stand up and walk calmly towards their next break? No quad bikes, no dogs, no fences. Just a group of cattle walking at their own pace. People say it looks like magic. Our customers are revolutionizing grazing with Halter. It's changing lives and transforming an industry. People join Halter to do meaningful work.

By joining us you’ll be solving challenging problems within a talented team and a culture built for high performance. Our team out-think, out-work and out-care. We’re committed to delivering real change in the world - this isn’t easy, and in truth, we love that it’s hard. We’re backed to deliver on a mission that matters by Tier 1 investors including Bessemer Venture Partners, DCVC, Blackbird, Promus Ventures, Rocket Lab’s Peter Beck and Icehouse ventures. To find out more, visit our careers website, LinkedIn & Instagram.

Join our teamHalter is committed to promoting a diverse and inclusive workplace — a place where we can each be ourselves and do the best work of our lives. Research shows that while men apply to jobs when they meet an average of 60% of the requirements, women and under-represented groups of candidates tend to only apply when they meet every requirement. If you think you have what it takes but don’t necessarily tick every requirement on this job description, please still get in touch and apply to Halter.

We’d love to chat to see if you’ll be an epic fit!If this opportunity sounds like you, please apply below by sending through your cover letter explaining why you’re excited about this role and working at Halter, along with your CV, and we’ll be in touch!Please also feel free to check out the careers page for more information on working at Halter and don't forget to follow us on LinkedIn & Instagram.