Lead Test Engineer

This role is available across our London, Bristol and Manchester locations

Job summary

The Government Digital Service (GDS) is the digital centre of government. We are responsible for setting, leading and delivering the vision for a modern digital government.

Our priorities are to drive a modern digital government, by:

1. joining up public sector services
2. harnessing the power of AI for the public good
3. strengthening and extending our digital and data public infrastructure
4. elevating leadership and investing in talent
5. funding for outcomes and procuring for growth and innovation
6. committing to transparency and driving accountability

We are home to the Incubator for Artificial Intelligence (I.AI), the world-leading GOV.UK and at the forefront of coordinating the UK's geospatial strategy and activity. We lead the Government Digital and Data function and champion the work of digital teams across government.

We're part of the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) and employ more than 1,000 people all over the UK, with hubs in Manchester, London and Bristol.

The Government Digital Service is where talent translates into impact. From your first day, you'll be working with some of the world's most highly-skilled digital professionals, all contributing their knowledge to make change on a national scale.

Join us for rewarding work that makes a difference across the UK. You'll solve some of the nation's highest-priority digital challenges, helping millions of people access services they need

Job description

Join us as a Grade 6 Lead Test Engineer, where you'll lead Test Engineering in cross-product delivery (both functional and non-functional) and other quality engineering initiatives, ensuring seamless integration and delivery of high quality products. You will be part of the specialist testing centre within the One Login program. This role offers the opportunity to innovate in testing methodologies, mentor team members and drive quality engineering practices throughout our software development lifecycle.

As a Lead Test Engineer, you'll:

• champion an approach to engineering that builds in quality from the beginning, prioritising testability and a holistic view of quality alongside functional requirements
• govern and oversee quality standards across all product delivery teams, using a Site Reliability Engineering approach based on SLOs and other empirical measures to focus quality assurance effort
• define and maintain the test strategy and test architecture for One Login, covering both functional and non-functional quality goals (Performance testing, Operational Acceptance Testing, Accessibility testing, Resilience testing etc), and influencing the product roadmap at programme and team level to ensure that quality goals are met
• identify opportunities for process improvement and optimisation in quality practices, focused on modern automation practices and an overall 'shift left' strategy
• maintain an active community of practice around quality engineering that builds alignment amongst the engineering community including developers, architects, site reliability engineers and quality specialist
• collaborate with cross-functional teams, including tech leads, developers and delivery managers
• develop and implement automated engineering solutions to improve testing processes, evaluate quality, and report results effectively.

Person specification

We're interested in people who have:

• demonstrable experience across the entire testing lifecycle, from ideation to monitoring; a deep understanding of testing methodologies (both functional and non-functional), various test types, and industry best practices, including a critical awareness of the advantages and disadvantages of different approaches
• proven experience in leading and managing large scale test delivery with multiple 3rd party suppliers in a collaborative environment, with an understanding of the benefits of agile and multi-disciplinary approaches
• strong experience with test automation, test innovation, test tools and frameworks, including Playwright, Cypress, TypeScript, Jest along with experience working in a continuous deployment environment
• a keen interest in researching and learning new testing techniques and sharing their skills with others
• experience in solving complex issues and developing solutions, drawing upon a broad knowledge of web technologies and awareness of technologies used for cloud based web applications, such as databases, backups, CDNs, containerisation, and serverless computing
• strong understanding of modern software development practices including TDD, pair programming and continuous delivery

Please note that this role requires SC clearance, which would normally need 5 years' UK residency in the past 5 years. This is not an absolute requirement, but supplementary checks may be needed where individuals have not lived in the UK for that period. This may mean your security clearance (and therefore your appointment) will take longer or, in some cases, not be possible.