Software Engineer/Developer Intern

About the Role

• Eminence Outsourcing is seeking a Software Engineer/Developer Intern with real-world development experience who is looking to deepen their expertise in a structured, client-driven engineering environment. This internship offers a unique opportunity to contribute to live projects, collaborate with senior engineers, and gain hands-on exposure to modern software development practices within a fast-paced BPO and technology services company.

About the Company

• Eminence Outsourcing is a Nairobi-based Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) and call center provider that specializes in customer support, back-office operations, lead generation, and AI-enabled CRM integrations to help startups and enterprises scale globally. The company serves a diverse portfolio of clients across multiple industries, providing a rich environment for learning and professional growth.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead the end-to-end development of assigned features under the guidance of Senior Developers, from technical design through implementation, testing, and deployment. You will own the delivery of specific components while receiving mentorship on architecture and best practices.
• Contribute to system architecture discussions, proposing scalable, maintainable solutions aligned with project requirements. This includes evaluating trade-offs between different design approaches and recommending optimal solutions.
• Design and build robust RESTful or GraphQL APIs that are consumed by front-end clients or third-party integrations. Ensure APIs are well-documented, versioned, and adhere to industry standards for security and performance.
• Optimise existing code for performance, readability, and scalability. You will refactor legacy code and implement improvements that reduce technical debt and enhance maintainability.
• Make and justify technology or library choices within the scope of your assigned work. This includes evaluating alternatives and documenting decisions for future reference.
• Implement secure coding practices and contribute to security review discussions. You will learn to identify common vulnerabilities and apply mitigation techniques as part of the development lifecycle.
• Write comprehensive unit, integration, and end-to-end tests with high coverage as a standard practice, not an afterthought. Testing is integral to the development workflow, and you will be expected to maintain quality standards.
• Set up or maintain CI/CD pipelines to automate build, test, and deployment workflows. You will gain practical experience with continuous integration and delivery tools such as Jenkins, GitHub Actions, or GitLab CI.
• Deploy and manage application components on cloud infrastructure (AWS, GCP, or Azure), including containerised environments using Docker or Kubernetes. You will learn to provision resources, configure networking, and monitor costs.
• Monitor application health post-deployment using observability tools and respond to incidents with structured root-cause analysis. This includes setting up alerts, dashboards, and participating in on-call rotations as needed.
• Conduct and lead code reviews, providing substantive, technically grounded feedback beyond surface-level corrections. You will learn to evaluate logic, performance, and security implications in peer contributions.
• Actively participate in sprint planning, story estimation, and backlog refinement, not just execution. You will contribute to the agile process by helping define user stories and breaking down work into manageable tasks.
• Engage directly with project managers or client liaisons to clarify requirements and flag technical risks early. This builds your ability to communicate effectively with non-technical stakeholders.
• Produce high-quality technical documentation: architecture decision records, API specs, deployment runbooks, and post-mortems. Documentation is treated as a first-class deliverable, and you will be expected to maintain it throughout the project lifecycle.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree (or higher) in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Information Technology, or a closely related technical discipline. Candidates with equivalent practical experience in lieu of a degree will also be considered.
• A minimum of 1 year of professional software development experience in a full-time role, contract position, or equivalent demonstrable work. This includes internships or co-op placements where you contributed to production code.
• Proven track record of delivering features or products in a team environment, with verifiable contributions such as a GitHub history, portfolio, or references from previous employers or mentors.
• Experience working within an Agile or Scrum team with real sprint cycles, not just academic simulation. You should be comfortable with daily stand-ups, retrospectives, and iterative delivery.
• Strong proficiency in at least one backend language such as Python, Node.js, Java, Go, or PHP, and familiarity with frontend technologies like React, Vue, Angular, or TypeScript. Full-stack capability is a plus.
• Solid understanding of relational databases including schema design, indexing, query optimisation, and transactions, plus exposure to NoSQL systems like MongoDB or Redis. You should be able to write complex SQL queries and explain query plans.
• Experience designing and consuming REST or GraphQL APIs in production environments. You understand HTTP methods, status codes, authentication mechanisms, and API versioning strategies.
• Advanced Git proficiency including feature branching strategies, rebasing, resolving complex merge conflicts, and managing pull request workflows. You should be comfortable with git workflows like GitFlow or trunk-based development.
• Hands-on experience with at least one cloud platform (AWS, GCP, or Azure), including compute services (EC2, Compute Engine), storage (S3, Blob), and managed databases (RDS, Cloud SQL). Experience with serverless is a bonus.
• Working knowledge of Docker for containerisation; experience with Kubernetes or container orchestration is a strong plus. You should be able to write Dockerfiles and docker-compose configurations for development and production.
• Practical awareness of application security including input validation, authentication flows (OAuth/JWT), and OWASP top-10 vulnerabilities. You understand common attack vectors and how to defend against them.
• Familiarity with monitoring and observability tools such as Datadog, Grafana, Sentry, or CloudWatch. You should be able to interpret metrics, logs, and traces to diagnose issues.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, able to write clear technical specs, lead discussions, and explain trade-offs to non-engineers. You can articulate complex ideas concisely.
• Strong sense of ownership and accountability; you treat assigned deliverables as your responsibility, not your manager’s. You proactively communicate progress and blockers.
• Adaptable under shifting priorities, comfortable navigating ambiguity in a client-facing outsourcing environment. You can handle multiple projects and adjust to changing requirements.
• Demonstrated ability to collaborate across time zones and with diverse, cross-functional teams. You are respectful of cultural differences and flexible with meeting schedules.
• Growth mindset, actively seeks feedback, reflects on past work, and continuously raises the quality bar. You are eager to learn new technologies and improve your craft.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience in a software outsourcing or consulting environment managing multiple client codebases simultaneously. This demonstrates ability to context-switch and maintain code quality under varied standards.
• Contributions to open-source projects with meaningful merged PRs. This shows initiative and ability to collaborate with external communities.
• Familiarity with microservices architecture, event-driven systems, or message brokers like Kafka or RabbitMQ. Understanding distributed systems principles is highly valued.
• Knowledge of system design principles including load balancing, caching strategies, horizontal scaling, and CAP theorem. You should be able to design systems for reliability and performance.
• Certification in a cloud platform such as AWS Solutions Architect, Google Associate Cloud Engineer, or Azure Administrator. Certifications validate your cloud proficiency.