Principal QA Engineer

Embrace Technology Group is our shared engineering, cloud, security, AI and quality function. It builds core capabilities once and makes them available to every portfolio company. As Principal QA Engineer, you will own the quality engineering practice across our portfolio. You will define the test strategy, build the reference automation framework, set the quality gates and metrics, and make sure test evidence stands up to regulated customers and auditors.

This is a senior, hands-on individual contributor role with no direct reports. QA engineers across portfolio companies work with you on a dotted line for standards, tooling and practice. You lead through the quality of the standard, working code and measured results. In your first year, you will write framework code, review test code and solve the hardest automation problems yourself.

1. Quality engineering strategy and standards

• Define and maintain the portfolio quality engineering strategy: test policy, risk-based test approach, test levels, and the expected balance across unit, service/API, integration, UI and end-to-end testing.
  
• Publish and maintain the quality engineering standard: test design conventions, definition of done for testing, defect severity and priority taxonomy, entry/exit criteria and release readiness criteria.
  
• Keep the standard as a versioned body of practice, with documented exceptions that each carry an owner and an expiry date.
  
• Build a quality engineering maturity model, assess each portfolio company against it, and agree a sequenced improvement plan with each company's technology leader.
  

2. Test architecture and reference automation framework

• Design and own the reference test automation architecture across web, API, mobile, desktop and data layers.
  
• Build and maintain the reference implementation, starter kits and templates so teams can adopt automation in days.
  
• Define the approach to contract testing, service virtualization and integration testing for products with heavy external integrations.
  
• Define the testing approach for legacy and mixed technology estates, including characterization tests that protect existing behavior before modernization, re-platforming or consolidation.
  
• Define the standard for data migration and reconciliation testing in modernization and consolidation programs.
  
• Stay hands-on: write and review framework code, review test code across the portfolio, and solve the hardest automation problems directly.
  

3. Toolchain, CI/CD and test environments

• Select and govern the QA toolchain (automation frameworks, test management, browser and device infrastructure, accessibility and performance tools, reporting), with a reference stack and approved alternatives where needed.
  
• Identify and recommend license and contract consolidation across companies where it reduces cost or duplication.
  
• Define CI/CD quality gates with the DevSecOps engineer who implements them, and set standards for test parallelization, execution time and flaky test management.
  
• Define test environment standards with the cloud platform team, including on-demand and ephemeral environments where supported.
  

4. Test data management

• Set the portfolio standard for synthetic data generation, masking and subsetting.
  
• Ensure, with the Security, Risk & Compliance lead, that production PHI, personal data, student records and financial data are not used in non-production environments without approved controls.
  

5. Non-functional and specialist testing

• Accessibility: Define the testing standard against WCAG 2.1/2.2 AA and Section 508, combining automated, manual and assistive technology testing. Own the evidence behind Accessibility Conformance Reports.
  
• Performance: Define the performance and load testing approach, baselines and release regression checks. Scope a dedicated performance engineering role when contractual latency or scale commitments require one.
  
• Security: Include dynamic security testing and security regression cases in test suites, within the scope set by the security function.
  
• Production signals: Use escaped defects, incident data, synthetic monitoring and observability data to decide where to focus testing effort.
  

6. Regulated quality evidence and traceability

• Define the requirements-to-test traceability standard so every release produces auditable evidence: what was tested, against which requirement, on which build, with what result and by whom.
  
• Align test and release evidence with SOC 2 change management, HIPAA and government and education buyer requirements, working with the security function.
  
• Define the validation approach and evidence package where a product or contract requires formal software validation.
  
• Support customer audits, buyer quality reviews and procurement questionnaires with test evidence.
  

7. Quality engineering for AI

• With the AI function, define how AI features are evaluated before and after release: evaluation datasets, acceptance thresholds, regression testing of model and prompt changes, non-deterministic output and human review for high-consequence workflows.
  
• Evaluate AI-assisted test generation, maintenance and agent-driven exploratory testing; adopt them where they measurably improve coverage or cycle time, and document where they are not yet reliable.
  
• Define test and acceptance requirements for code written by AI coding agents.
  

8. Quality metrics, reporting and release readiness

• Define and publish portfolio quality metrics: escaped defects by severity, automated regression coverage of critical workflows, regression cycle time, flaky test rate, change failure rate and time to detect defects.
  
• Maintain a portfolio quality dashboard and issue a quarterly quality report that non-technical executives can act on.
  
• Define release readiness criteria and the evidence needed to meet them, and advise company leadership on release risk.
  

9. Practice leadership and capability development

• Lead the portfolio QA community of practice through regular standards reviews, technical sessions and shared learning.
  
• Set the hiring bar for QA roles (role profiles, levels, interview loops, technical assessments) and take part in QA hiring decisions.
  
• Define the onboarding program for new QA engineers, the skills matrix for the discipline, and a growth path from manual testing to automation and SDET.
  
• Provide written input to the performance reviews of dotted-line QA engineers, and agree development plans with their line managers.
  

10. Acquisitions and delivery engagements

• Assess the quality engineering maturity of newly acquired companies and define the quality workstream of their integration plans.
  
• Set the quality approach for the Technology Group's embedded delivery engagements, and feed reusable test assets and lessons back into the reference framework.
  

• 12+ years in software quality engineering, test engineering or SDET roles, including 4+ years setting test strategy and automation architecture across multiple teams or products.

• A test automation framework you designed and built from scratch that multiple teams adopted, and the ability to explain its design trade-offs.

• Strong current coding skills in TypeScript/JavaScript, Python or a similar language.

• Depth in Playwright, Selenium or Cypress for UI testing, and REST Assured, Postman or Karate for API testing. Working knowledge of contract testing (e.g., Pact) and Appium.

• Experience integrating automated tests into CI/CD (GitHub Actions, Azure DevOps, GitLab or Jenkins), including quality gates, parallel execution and flaky test management.

• Applied risk-based test strategy and formal test design techniques on complex products.

• Test data management in environments with regulated or sensitive data.

• Testing in a regulated domain (healthcare, government, financial services or education), including requirements traceability and audit-ready evidence.

• Experience standardizing tooling and practice across teams with different tech stacks, including legacy .NET or Java applications and SQL Server databases.

• Proven ability to lead a quality practice across teams that report elsewhere, through influence rather than line authority.

• Experience defining quality metrics and reporting them to senior leadership.

• Experience hiring and developing QA engineers, including role profiles and interview loops.

• Excellent written and spoken English, including writing standards engineers follow.

Nice to have

• Evaluating AI/LLM features: evaluation datasets, acceptance thresholds and testing non-deterministic output.

• Production use of AI-assisted test generation or agent-driven testing tools.

• Accessibility testing against WCAG 2.1/2.2 AA and Section 508, including assistive technology testing and Accessibility Conformance Reports.

• Performance testing with k6, JMeter, Gatling or similar.

• Formal software validation (computer system validation, IEC 62304 or 21 CFR Part 11).

• Data migration and reconciliation testing in modernization programs.

• Security testing collaboration using OWASP ZAP or Burp Suite.

• Experience in private-equity-backed, multi-entity or acquisitive companies, including post-acquisition integration.

• ISTQB Advanced or Expert Level certification (considered alongside proven delivery, not as a substitute).