Lead Full Stack Software Engineer
MetLife · Cary, NC
$120,000–$165,000from the description
Jul 25, 2026
Cary, NC
Jul 26, 2026
What this job asks for AI summary
A lead-level engineering role focused on building and maintaining full stack applications for a large financial services organization. The position involves guiding a team of software engineers, architecting scalable distributed systems using Java, TypeScript/JavaScript, and frameworks such as Spring Boot and ReactJS, and coordinating across internal and external teams. Cloud platforms, CI/CD pipelines, microservices, and API integrations are central to the day-to-day work.
Senior level · 8+ years · New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ-PA · Bachelor's required · Full-time
Advertised as Staff, but the requirements read as Senior.
“or” means any one of them counts — you don't need all of them.
We read this from the posting text with AI. Skim the description below before ruling yourself out.
How this req sits in the market our data
Roughly 480 people in the New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ-PA area plausibly meet what this posting asks for (software developers). range 360–630
Applicant volume Moderate — A normal amount of company. The rare requirements below are what will separate a shortlisted application from the rest.
Rare in this occupation — lead with these, and say what you built with them.
Most people in this occupation already list these. Still required — just not what gets you shortlisted.
What the occupation pays Median $170,499 (middle half $133,523–$210,499). This posting is about at that midpoint.
Estimated from BLS employment for this occupation and area, per-skill prevalence across our listing corpus, and published wage benchmarks — as of Jul 28, 2026. It is a model, not a headcount.
Why we read it this way (6)
The title 'Lead Full Stack Software Engineer' and the responsibility to 'lead a dedicated team of software engineers' introduce a people-management signal, but the JD is predominantly focused on hands-on full stack development (8+ years of hands-on experience required, detailed technical stack). The role is classified as an IC Software Developer with team-lead responsibilities rather than a people manager; 11-3021 is noted as a runner-up.
The advertised title uses 'Lead', which maps to Staff in the advertised seniority field, but the actual requirements (8+ years, senior IC scope, no explicit org-wide authority) support a Senior classification.
Location is not explicitly stated in the posting. MetLife's Global Technology headquarters is in New York; the CBSA reflects that assumption. The hybrid requirement (3 days/week in office) confirms this is not a fully remote role.
The Required Qualifications list Azure alongside Java/TypeScript/Spring/React/Node.js using 'and/or', suggesting Azure is a hard gate alongside the other technologies listed in that same sentence.
Azure DevOps and AWS DevOps are mentioned together in the CI/CD requirement; AWS is captured as a preferred skill since the primary platform named throughout is Azure.
ASE (Azure App Service Environment) is listed under Preferred Qualifications alongside AKS and Azure Functions; captured as preferred under the broader Azure ecosystem.
Read the full posting
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