How to hire a lead development engineer

How to hire a lead development engineer, step by step

Here's a step-by-step lead development engineer hiring guide:

• Step 1: Identify your hiring needs
• Step 2: Create an ideal candidate profile
• Step 3: Make a budget
• Step 4: Write a lead development engineer job description
• Step 5: Post your job
• Step 6: Interview candidates
• Step 7: Send a job offer and onboard your new lead development engineer
• Step 8: Go through the hiring process checklist

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1. Identify your hiring needs

   Before you post your lead development engineer job, you should take the time to determine what type of worker your business needs. While certain jobs definitely require a full-time employee, it's sometimes better to find a lead development engineer for hire on a part-time basis or as a contractor.

   Determine employee vs contractor status

   Is the person you're thinking of hiring a US citizen or green card holder?

   Yes

   No

   You should also consider the ideal background you'd like them a lead development engineer to have before you start to hire. For example, what industry or field would you like them to have experience in, what level of seniority or education does the job require, and how much it'll cost to hire a lead development engineer that fits the bill.

   The following list breaks down different types of lead development engineers and their corresponding salaries.

   Type of Lead Development Engineer	Description	Hourly rate
   Lead Development Engineer	Software developers are the creative minds behind computer programs. Some develop the applications that allow people to do specific tasks on a computer or another device... Show more	$42-71
   Engineer Lead Quality Assurance Lead	Engineer Lead Quality Assurance Leads are responsible for managing the designing and operations of hardware or software testing. Their duties include developing testing plans, implement risk mitigation strategies, communicate process improvements to cross-teams such as marketing and engineering, resolve the conflict between teams, and ensures product or software adheres to the organization and industry standards... Show more	$40-68
   Software Engineer Lead	A Software Engineer Lead is focused on developing and testing software programs. They manage a team of software engineers that design enterprise software products and operating systems.	$44-80

   Show more

2. Create an ideal candidate profile

   Common skills:

   • Java
   • Python
   • API
   • Code Reviews
   • CSS
   • GIT
   • Front End
   • Jenkins
   • HTML
   • Linux
   • Html Css
   • JQuery
   • IP
   • Product Development

   Check all skills

   Responsibilities:

   • Lead the design and development of a web-base platform construct in JAVA and MySQL.
   • Manage and provide consultation to GEC teams in china for coding, testing, and debugging the code.
   • Manage application delivery projects using background in SDLC and project management methodology.
   • Front end applications are developed using HTML, CSS, jQuery, AJAX.
   • Create UI using JSP, XSLT, JavaScript & HTML.
   • Act as Unix consultant for other developers.

   More lead development engineer duties

3. Make a budget

   Including a salary range in the lead development engineer job description is a good way to get more applicants. A lead development engineer salary can be affected by several factors, such as the location of the job, the level of experience, education, certifications, and the employer's prestige.

   For example, the average salary for a lead development engineer in Connecticut may be lower than in California, and an entry-level engineer typically earns less than a senior-level lead development engineer. Additionally, a lead development engineer with lots of experience in the field may command a higher salary as a result.

   Average lead development engineer salary

   $114,658yearly

   $55.12 hourly rate

   ---

   Entry-level lead development engineer salary

   $88,000 yearly salary

   Updated December 15, 2025

   Average lead development engineer salary by state

   Rank	State	Avg. salary	Hourly rate
   1	California	$161,477	$78
   2	Washington	$134,006	$64
   3	New York	$122,735	$59
   4	Massachusetts	$115,623	$56
   5	Virginia	$115,024	$55
   6	Utah	$112,401	$54
   7	South Carolina	$111,290	$54
   8	Alaska	$110,941	$53
   9	New Jersey	$109,392	$53
   10	North Carolina	$107,530	$52
   11	Georgia	$107,409	$52
   12	Minnesota	$104,808	$50
   13	Michigan	$104,528	$50
   14	Ohio	$103,625	$50
   15	Florida	$103,481	$50
   16	Texas	$101,460	$49
   17	Illinois	$101,147	$49
   18	District of Columbia	$95,077	$46

   Average lead development engineer salary by company

   Company

   Rank	Company	Average salary	Hourly rate	Job openings
   1	Netflix	$150,207	$72.21	22
   2	Rivian	$142,168	$68.35	33
   3	En Masse Entertainment	$140,957	$67.77
   4	MUFG EMEA	$138,768	$66.72
   5	Infinera	$137,862	$66.28
   6	Deutsche Bank	$135,962	$65.37	8
   7	Bed Bath & Beyond	$135,826	$65.30
   8	Amazon	$134,428	$64.63	1,151
   9	JPMorgan Chase & Co.	$130,633	$62.80	1,078
   10	Best Buy	$130,473	$62.73
   11	CyberCoders	$128,059	$61.57
   12	Target	$128,050	$61.56	34
   13	Randstad North America, Inc.	$128,004	$61.54	39
   14	Robert Half	$127,296	$61.20	260
   15	AFGlobal	$124,497	$59.85
   16	Thomson Reuters	$124,467	$59.84	79
   17	PNC	$123,392	$59.32	119
   18	The Prudential Insurance Company of America, Inc.	$122,991	$59.13
   19	Glidewell	$121,897	$58.60	3
   20	Microsemi	$121,631	$58.48

4. Writing a lead development engineer job description

   A lead development engineer job description should include a summary of the role, required skills, and a list of responsibilities. It's also good to include a salary range and the first name of the hiring manager. Below, you can find an example of a lead development engineer job description:

   Lead development engineer job description example

   TransUnion's Job Applicant Privacy Notice
   
   What We'll Bring:
   At TransUnion, we strive to build an environment where our associates are in the driver's seat of their professional development, while having access to help along the way. We encourage everyone to pursue passions and take ownership of their careers. With the support of colleagues and mentors, our associates are given the tools needed to get where they want to go. Regardless of job titles, our associates have the opportunity to learn new things and be a leader every day.
   
   Come be a part of our team - you will work with great people, pioneering products and cutting-edge technology.
   
   Crypto Security Engineering is a relatively new DevOps team building first-of-its-kind security products and services for TransUnion's enterprise and cloud environments. This is an individual contributor role focused on integrating vendor products and open source technologies as well as developing our own custom applications to drive cloud-native solutions and services.
   
   What You'll Bring:
   3+ years of software development and/or full-stack engineering experience Proficient with popular scripting and programming language frameworks such as python, golang and bash Advocate of CI/CD best practices and robust experience working with technologies such as git, jenkins, terraform and ansible Notable experience with successfully designing, developing and maintaining complex code and immutable architecture Ample experience operating in cloud environments and with cloud-native technologies Knowledge and application of secrets management, data encryption, key management, PKI and tokenization -- experience with HashiCorp Vault is a major plus Passionate about innovation and enjoys the challenges of creating something new Displays strong technical and thought leadership skills Not only identifies potential problems, but is quick to present options to overcome or bypass those issues Stays current with evolving technologies and can effectively communicate trends and opportunities Continuously looks for opportunities to simplify and optimize technology and processes Enjoys working in a collaborative environment and finds value and methods for up-skilling others Serve as a coach and mentor for junior team members Self-starter that demonstrates a solid understanding of the impact of own work Strong written and verbal communication skills
   
   Impact You'll Make:
   Construct and scale a global enterprise secrets management service that securely and dynamically manages credentials through various supported auth methods Develop a governance and orchestration solution that enables/enforces continuous and consistent encryption key management policies across our enterprise cloud environment Contribute to the technical direction of modernized PKI and encryption key management services in the form of strategy, architecture, development and governance Improve critical security capabilities to simplify compliance and provide value-added security enhancements for enterprise IaaS, PaaS and SaaS
   
   #LI-KJ1
   #DICE
   
   We are an equal opportunity employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability status, veteran status, marital status, citizenship status, sexual orientation, gender identity or any other characteristic protected by law.
   
   TransUnion's Internal Job Title:
   Lead Engineer, Info Sec Engineering

   Copy this example

   

5. Post your job

   There are various strategies that you can use to find the right lead development engineer for your business:

   • Consider promoting from within or recruiting from your existing workforce.
   • Ask for referrals from friends, family members, and current employees.
   • Attend job fairs at local colleges to find candidates who meet your education requirements.
   • Use social media platforms like LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter to reach potential job candidates.

   To find lead development engineer candidates, you can consider the following options:

   • Post your job opening on Zippia or other job search websites.
   • Use niche websites that focus on engineering and technology jobs, such as dice, engineering.com, stack overflow, it job pro.
   • Post your job on free job posting websites.

6. Interview candidates

   Recruiting lead development engineers requires you to bring your A-game to the interview process. The first interview should introduce the company and the role to the candidate as much as they present their background experience and reasons for applying for the job. During later interviews, you can go into more detail about the technical details of the job and ask behavioral questions to gauge how they'd fit into your current company culture.

   It's also good to ask about candidates' unique skills and talents to see if they match your ideal candidate profile. If you think a candidate is good enough for the next step, you can move on to the technical interview.

   If your interviews with lead development engineer applicants aren't enough to make a decision, you should also consider including a test project. These are often the best, most straightforward, and least bias-prone ways of determining who will likely succeed in the role. If you don't know how to design an appropriate test, you can ask someone else on the team to create it or take a look at these websites to get a few ideas:

   • TestDome
   • CodeSignal
   • Testlify
   • BarRaiser
   • Coderbyte

   The right interview questions can help you assess a candidate's hard skills, behavioral intelligence, and soft skills.

7. Send a job offer and onboard your new lead development engineer

   Once you have selected a candidate for the lead development engineer position, it is time to create an offer letter. In addition to salary, the offer letter should include details about benefits and perks that are available to the employee. Ensuring your offer is competitive is vital, as qualified candidates may be considering other job opportunities. The candidate may wish to negotiate the terms of the offer, and it is important to be open to discussion and reach a mutually beneficial agreement. After the offer has been accepted, it is a good idea to formalize the agreement with a contract.

   It's equally important to follow up with applicants who don't get the job with an email letting them know that the position has been filled.

   To prepare for the new lead development engineer first day, you should share an onboarding schedule with them that covers their first period on the job. You should also quickly complete any necessary paperwork, such as employee action forms and onboarding documents like I-9, benefits enrollment, and federal and state tax forms. Finally, Human Resources must ensure a new employee file is created for internal record keeping.

8. Go through the hiring process checklist

   • Determine employee type (full-time, part-time, contractor, etc.)
   • Submit a job requisition form to the HR department
   • Define job responsibilities and requirements
   • Establish budget and timeline
   • Determine hiring decision makers for the role
   • Write job description
   • Post job on job boards, company website, etc.
   • Promote the job internally
   • Process applications through applicant tracking system
   • Review resumes and cover letters
   • Shortlist candidates for screening
   • Hold phone/virtual interview screening with first round of candidates
   • Conduct in-person interviews with top candidates from first round
   • Score candidates based on weighted criteria (e.g., experience, education, background, cultural fit, skill set, etc.)
   • Conduct background checks on top candidates
   • Check references of top candidates
   • Consult with HR and hiring decision makers on job offer specifics
   • Extend offer to top candidate(s)
   • Receive formal job offer acceptance and signed employment contract
   • Inform other candidates that the position has been filled
   • Set and communicate onboarding schedule to new hire(s)
   • Complete new hire paperwork (i9, benefits enrollment, tax forms, etc.)

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