Lead Software Engineer (Tucson)

About Us

Alicat builds high-performance instrumentation for measuring and controlling flow and pressure. Our products support aerospace, bioprocessing, energy, environmental science, and advanced research, where precision and reliability are essential.

What many people do not see at first is the complexity required to deliver that level of performance at scale. Alicat builds thousands of highly customized instruments, and every order carries real operational complexity across configuration control, traceability, manufacturing execution, quality, and fulfillment. The business has to run with the same discipline and reliability as the instruments we ship.

That is why our internal software matters. Alicat relies on a homegrown ERP system that is deeply embedded in how the company operates. It connects quoting, order flow, production, inventory, quality, shipping, engineering workflows, and customer support into one platform that teams across the organization depend on every day. This is not a bolt-on tool. It is core infrastructure, and improving it improves the entire company.

Our environment is tightly integrated and highly collaborative. You will work directly with the people who use what you build, across Sales, Marketing, Operations, Manufacturing, Engineering, and Quality. You will have real ownership to improve workflows, raise engineering standards, and ship changes that teams across the company feel immediately.

Job Summary

As a Lead Software Engineer at Alicat Scientific, you will lead the team responsible for building and evolving our homegrown ERP system. This platform is critical to how we operate, and it directly impacts how work moves through the business from quote to shipment.

You will work at the intersection of software, operations, and real-world manufacturing complexity, solving problems where reliability, usability, and maintainability all matter. The software you build will directly improve how each function in the business collaborates, enabling faster decisions, cleaner execution, and stronger business performance.

Collaboration is central to this role. You will work closely with stakeholders across the organization to translate real workflows into scalable, supportable software. Your leadership will shape architecture decisions, engineering standards, prioritization, and the delivery cadence needed to support a business that moves quickly and expects results.

In addition to your leadership responsibilities, you will remain a technical contributor. You will participate in design reviews, write and review production code, guide debugging and problem resolution, and help raise the quality bar through best practices in testing, code review, and continuous improvement. This is not a coordination-only role.

This is a hands-on leadership role for someone who enjoys building high-impact software, leading strong engineers, and owning outcomes that are visible across the entire organization. Based in Tucson, Arizona, you will have direct access to the teams you support and the ability to see the impact of your work through how the business runs.

What You’ll Love About This Role

• You will lead a team that builds software the business runs on. Your work shows up immediately in how orders move, how production flows, and how teams operate day to day.
• You get real ownership. You will shape priorities, architecture, standards, and execution, not just manage tickets.
• You will stay technical. You will still write code, review code, and solve hard problems while leading engineers and raising the bar.
• You will work close to the users. You will collaborate directly with Sales, Operations, Manufacturing, Engineering, and Quality, and you will see feedback fast.
• You will improve real workflows, not vanity features. The problems are practical, high-impact, and tied to measurable outcomes.

This Role Is a Great Fit If You

• Want to be a true player-coach, leading engineers while still contributing technically every week.
• Enjoy building systems that need to be reliable, traceable, and supportable, not just “done.”
• Like turning messy real-world workflows into software that makes people faster and removes friction.
• Prefer environments where decisions happen quickly, ownership is real, and you can drive change without bureaucracy.
• Take pride in building teams that ship consistently, communicate clearly, and improve the platform over time.

Technical Functions

• Architect and evolve Alicat’s homegrown ERP platform and supporting internal systems that connect quoting, order flow, production, inventory, quality, shipping, and engineering workflows.
• Lead system design for new modules and enhancements, including domain models, workflow logic, integration points, and long-term maintainability strategy.
• Write, review, and improve production code, setting a high bar for clarity, reliability, and maintainable design.
• Drive best practices in software quality, including unit testing, integration testing, regression prevention, and pragmatic test coverage suited to a business-critical system.
• Design and optimize database schemas and data access patterns, ensuring performance, traceability, and data integrity across high-usage workflows.
• Troubleshoot complex production issues across application, database, and integration layers, and lead root cause analysis and corrective action.
• Improve system observability and operational reliability through logging, monitoring, diagnostics, and actionable error handling.
• Collaborate with internal stakeholders to translate real business workflows into scalable software features, balancing usability, speed, and long-term supportability.
• Own and improve integration patterns between ERP modules and other systems, including data synchronization, reporting, and automation across departments.
• Drive technical debt reduction and modernization initiatives, including refactoring, performance improvements, platform upgrades, and incremental architecture improvements.

Leadership Functions

• Lead and develop a small team of software engineers, providing mentorship, technical coaching, and structured feedback to grow execution strength and engineering maturity.
• Set clear expectations for deliverables, timelines, code quality, and operational reliability, and ensure strong communication across engineering and business stakeholders.
• Establish lightweight, effective processes for planning, estimation, prioritization, and release execution that fit Alicat’s fast-moving environment.
• Coordinate team tasking and sequencing to keep engineers focused on the highest-impact work, and lead regular checkpoints to track progress and remove blockers early.
• Foster a culture of accountability, ownership, and continuous improvement, while maintaining a high standard for professionalism and collaboration.
• Partner with cross-functional leaders to clarify requirements, manage tradeoffs, and align engineering execution with business priorities.
• Own hiring and onboarding for software engineers, including defining what good looks like, improving interview quality, and building a team that scales effectively.
• Drive engineering standards for documentation, code review practices, and maintainable system design so the platform remains understandable and supportable over time.
• Develop team capability through training, deliberate skill growth, and role clarity, ensuring the group can deliver reliably without becoming dependent on heroics.

Qualifications and Experience

• BS in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or equivalent professional experience.
• 8+ years of professional software engineering experience building and supporting production software.
• 3+ years leading engineers, either through direct people management or senior technical leadership with clear ownership of delivery outcomes.
• Strong proficiency with the Microsoft stack, including C# and .NET, and the ability to design maintainable systems that hold up under real operational use.
• Experience building business-critical applications where reliability, traceability, and data integrity matter.
• Strong working knowledge of relational databases and SQL, including schema design, performance tuning, indexing, and transactional data workflows.
• Experience leading technical design discussions, making architecture tradeoffs, and guiding engineers toward clean, supportable solutions.
• Strong debugging and problem-solving skills, including the ability to lead root cause analysis and drive corrective action in production systems.
• Demonstrated ability to balance hands-on technical contribution with team leadership responsibilities without becoming a bottleneck.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to translate business workflows into clear technical execution plans.
• Proven ability to collaborate across departments, earn trust with stakeholders, and deliver software that improves how teams work day-to-day.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience building ERP systems, manufacturing systems, workflow automation tools, or internal platforms with complex business rules.
• Experience with Angular or other modern front-end frameworks and full-stack development practices.
• Familiarity with CI/CD pipelines, automated testing st]]>