At Roche you can show up as yourself, embraced for the unique qualities you bring. Our culture encourages personal expression, open dialogue, and genuine connections, where you are valued, accepted and respected for who you are, allowing you to thrive both personally and professionally. This is how we aim to prevent, stop and cure diseases and ensure everyone has access to healthcare today and for generations to come. Join Roche, where every voice matters.
The PositionAs a Custom Software Developer, you act as a seasoned expert who takes ownership of tasks and drives quality. You will challenge the status quo, foster collaboration and mentorship, and design complex software solutions utilizing strong full-stack expertise. By possessing a deep understanding of the broader technical landscape, you will improve the entire software delivery process, proactively addressing technical debt and architectural challenges while aligning your efforts with global organizational strategies.
Description of the area
The Engineering Excellence & Experience team, part of Roche's RDT organization, owns and evolves the engineering tooling landscape that supports software development across Roche. We are responsible for the platforms that thousands of colleagues rely on every day to plan, build, test and release software — including the Atlassian suite (Jira, Confluence), codebeamer, OpenPDM and AllureTestOps — in a global and highly regulated (GxP) environment.
Our mission is to make it easy for engineering teams to do their best work: we run these platforms reliably at enterprise scale, we simplify and standardize how they are used, and we continuously improve the developer experience through automation and AI-enabled solutions. The team also drives strategic initiatives such as the migration of Jira from Data Center to Cloud and the rationalization of the wider engineering tooling portfolio.
You will join a distributed, international team that combines deep hands-on platform engineering with close partnership with business stakeholders, Product Owners and software compliance colleagues.
Job Responsibilities
- Scope / (Content Leadership): Takes ownership of tasks and topics that are in the "grey zone" (no defined owner), successfully driving small to medium (S/M) initiatives.
- Accountability/Problem Solving: Challenges the status quo and is highly skillful in navigating group dynamics and diversified settings. Fosters good collaboration, knowledge sharing, coaching, and mentoring.
- Stakeholder Management: Prioritizes and communicates with stakeholders effectively. Maintains a bigger picture view and understands how various technical components fit into the overall strategy and goals.
- Impact/Strategy: Acts as a technical mentor and aligns development plans with the global strategy. Gets involved in initiatives and tasks reaching outside of regular project scope, gives speeches, shares knowledge in organizational events (e.g., DevOps Days, Tech Talk), and engages in the organization of knowledge-sharing events.
- Complexity/ (Product Size): Operates at the "Product/Site" level.
- Business/Technical ability: Possesses a deep understanding of the broader technical landscape beyond the specific component being worked on. Formulates and implements technical strategies aligned with organizational objectives, investing time and energy into initiatives that boost creativity and innovation while keeping the highest engineering quality.
Qualifications
Education / Experience
- Minimum 5 years of professional experience in software engineering or IT platforms, including at least 3 years of hands-on Atlassian administration (ideally Atlassian Cloud).
- Current or past hands-on experience as a software developer.
- Proven experience successfully driving small to medium (S/M) initiatives (Project/Squad/Product), and contributing to different initiatives as priorities change.
- Demonstrated experience acting as a technical mentor and sharing knowledge through speeches and organized events.
Technical Skills
- Deep knowledge of Jira and Confluence. The broader the Atlassian portfolio (e.g., Jira Product Discovery, Marketplace apps), the better.
- Hands-on experience managing and administering Atlassian Cloud at enterprise scale. Data Center experience and Data Center to Cloud migration are a plus.
- Understanding of GxP and computer system validation (CSV), ideally on validated Jira templates (requirements, test and defect management) — will be an advantage.
- Solid experience automating work (scripts, APIs, Jira automation…) and using AI-assisted development tools (e.g., VS Code with GitHub Copilot, Codex, Claude Code).
- Proven, hands-on programming expertise with some of these languages Python, Java, or JavaScript and willingness to learn what is missing.
- Proven capability to design, craft, deploy, and sustain software solutions that are tailored to business requirements and objectives.
- Ability to design and improve the entire software delivery process, from code to production.
- Good understanding of cybersecurity and the implementation of secure software development practices.
- Ability to identify and proactively address complex technical debt, performance bottlenecks, and architectural challenges.
- Solid understanding of software quality management and metrics.
Additional Qualifications
- Strong willingness to collaborate, learn, improve and help others, valued above technical knowledge.
- Accountable, proactive and autonomous. Needs little supervision and focuses on delivering value continuously.
- Strong ability to plan and estimate work needed to accomplish S-M tasks.
Who we are
A healthier future drives us to innovate. Together, more than 100’000 employees across the globe are dedicated to advance science, ensuring everyone has access to healthcare today and for generations to come. Our efforts result in more than 26 million people treated with our medicines and over 30 billion tests conducted using our Diagnostics products. We empower each other to explore new possibilities, foster creativity, and keep our ambitions high, so we can deliver life-changing healthcare solutions that make a global impact.
Let’s build a healthier future, together.
Roche is an Equal Opportunity Employer.
Skills Required
- Minimum 5 years of professional experience in software engineering or IT platforms
- At least 3 years of hands-on Atlassian administration experience, ideally Atlassian Cloud
- Current or past hands-on experience as a software developer
- Experience driving small-to-medium initiatives and contributing to changing priorities
- Experience acting as a technical mentor and sharing knowledge through speeches or organized events
- Deep knowledge of Jira and Confluence
- Hands-on experience managing and administering Atlassian Cloud at enterprise scale
- Experience with Atlassian Data Center and Data Center-to-Cloud migration
- Understanding of GxP and computer system validation, ideally involving validated Jira templates
- Experience automating work using scripts, APIs, or Jira automation
- Experience using AI-assisted development tools
- Programming expertise in Python, Java, or JavaScript
- Ability to design, deploy, and sustain software solutions aligned with business requirements
- Ability to improve the software delivery process from code through production
- Understanding of cybersecurity and secure software development practices
- Ability to address technical debt, performance bottlenecks, and architectural challenges
- Understanding of software quality management and metrics
- Ability to plan and estimate small-to-medium tasks
Roche Compensation & Benefits Highlights
The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about Roche and has not been reviewed or approved by Roche.
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Retirement Support — U.S. materials describe a 401(k) with both matching and an additional company contribution, supported by formal plan documents and true‑up features. This structure is positioned as a standout element of the total package, particularly at Genentech.
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Leave & Time Off Breadth — Time‑off provisions include substantial vacation, a year‑end shutdown, and a paid six‑week sabbatical after six years. These elements indicate a recharge‑oriented approach within the U.S. offering.
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Healthcare Strength — Company materials emphasize comprehensive medical, dental, vision, and mental‑health resources alongside well‑being programs. Benefits pages consistently highlight breadth across core health coverage elements.
Roche Insights
What We Do
Roche is a global pioneer in pharmaceuticals and diagnostics focused on advancing science to improve people’s lives. The combined strengths of pharmaceuticals and diagnostics under one roof have made Roche the leader in personalised healthcare – a strategy that aims to fit the right treatment to each patient in the best way possible. Roche is the world’s largest biotech company, with truly differentiated medicines in oncology, immunology, infectious diseases, ophthalmology and diseases of the central nervous system. Roche is also the world leader in in vitro diagnostics and tissue-based cancer diagnostics, and a frontrunner in diabetes management. Founded in 1896, Roche continues to search for better ways to prevent, diagnose and treat diseases and make a sustainable contribution to society. The company also aims to improve patient access to medical innovations by working with all relevant stakeholders. Thirty medicines developed by Roche are included in the World Health Organization Model Lists of Essential Medicines, among them life-saving antibiotics, antimalarials and cancer medicines. Roche has been recognised as the Group Leader in sustainability within the Pharmaceuticals, Biotechnology & Life Sciences Industry ten years in a row by the Dow Jones Sustainability Indices (DJSI).
