Lead Test Engineer - HMRC - G7

Location

Cardiff, East Kilbride, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Liverpool, Manchester, Telford, Worthing

About the job

Job summary

Discover a career in your hands at HMRC. Whether you're seeking purpose, growth, or a workplace that gives you a true sense of belonging, hear from some of our employees as they share their story about what it’s really like to work at HMRC.

Visit our YouTube channel to watch the full series and come and discover your potential.

Discover a career with purpose at HMRC. Whether you're seeking professional growth, meaningful work, or a workplace where you truly belong, HMRC offers a supportive, inclusive environment where your contributions matter. You’ll help deliver services that millions rely on, while growing your career in a supportive, forward-thinking organisation that values innovation, inclusion, and impact.”

At HMRC, you'll be at the heart of one of the UK’s most ambitious digital transformation programmes. As part of our Service Validation and Testing team (SV&T), you’ll help shape the future of digital services across HMRC, ensuring they are robust and secure through the adoption of a shift-left, risk-based approach to quality

Do you have strong test and quality assurance experience and thrive in collaborative environments, building and maintaining positive relationships?
We are looking for a strong leader who can focus on complex problem solving, provide technical understanding and support product and platform teams and influence the members of the Service Central organisation.

Within HMRC’s Chief Digital & Information Office (CDIO), you will be part of the SV&T leadership team, playing a key role in shaping test governance and best practice across a complex technology landscape.

SV&T plays a pivotal role in driving consistent, high-quality testing practices across HMRC’s diverse technology landscape. As we transition to a multi-supplier model and adopt AI-assisted tooling, this role will help embed a shift-left, risk-based approach to testing—ensuring quality is built in from the outset.

Job description

You will work across multiple programmes and platforms, providing strategic test leadership, supporting delivery teams, and influencing senior stakeholders to embed best practice and continuous improvement
Key Responsibilities
As a Lead Test Engineer, you will play a strategic role in shaping and embedding consistent testing best practices across HMRC’s complex digital ecosystem. Your responsibilities will include:

Leadership & Collaboration

• Lead, coach, and mentor test engineers across programmes, fostering a culture of continuous improvement and professional development.
• Collaborate with product, platform, and delivery teams to ensure testing is integrated early and effectively within agile workflows.
• Influence and engage with senior stakeholders across HMRC and supplier organisations to drive quality outcomes.

Test Strategy & Implementation

• Define and implement risk-based, shift-left testing strategies across diverse platforms (e.g., ServiceNow, SAP, Pega).
• Ensure testing approaches align with business priorities, technical architecture, and delivery timelines.
• Promote consistent standards and practices across internal teams and third party suppliers.

Technical Excellence & Problem Solving

• Apply advanced testing techniques to solve complex technical challenges and improve delivery confidence.
• Provide expert guidance on functional, non-functional, and automation testing, including performance, security, and accessibility.
• Identify and drive opportunities for innovation and efficiency in testing processes.

Tooling & Governance

• Evaluate, implement, and optimise test tooling, including AI-assisted solutions, to support continuous integration and delivery.
• Establish governance frameworks for supplier-led testing activities, ensuring alignment with HMRC standards and compliance requirements.
• Support tooling integration with platforms such as ServiceNow and CI/CD pipelines.

Quality Assurance & Risk Management

• Ensure quality is built in from the outset by validating requirements and test coverage across the lifecycle.
• Lead retrospectives and continuous improvement initiatives to enhance test effectiveness and reduce delivery risk.
• Produce clear, actionable test reports and insights to inform decision-making and assurance activities.

Person specification

We’re looking for a disciplined and dynamic test leader with proven experience in strategic test management. You’ll bring strong analytical skills to guide testers and developers, shaping test direction that aligns with delivery goals. You must be confident engaging and reporting across all levels of stakeholders and third-party partners, with a clear ability to influence and drive quality outcomes.

You will:

• Advise, design, and execute functional test cases. You can assess and peer-review the work of others. You can coach and mentor others.
• You can design and execute non-functional test cases using standard testing techniques.
• Understand the hierarchy of test environments and the phases of testing as the product moves through levels of maturity to Production.
• You can demonstrate a good working knowledge of different tools and techniques and can train others. You can advise others on testing techniques and frameworks.
• You can analyse and review data to identify problems and opportunities and make informed recommendations in line with strategic business objectives.
• You can communicate test approaches and make recommendations to influence senior stakeholders.
• You will be comfortable operating in a fast-paced, agile environment and have the confidence to challenge constructively, influence decisions, and drive quality outcomes.”
• You can solve complex problems, applying logical reasoning.
• Actively hold (or be willing to obtain) SC Clearance

Essential Criteria:

To be successful in this role, you will need to demonstrate practical experience and capability across the following areas, aligned to Civil Service Success Profiles:

Leadership - Proven experience leading test teams and initiatives across complex programmes and platforms. Ability to coach, mentor, and develop others, fostering a culture of continuous improvement and high performance. Confidence to challenge constructively and drive strategic quality outcomes across organisational boundaries.

Communicating and Influencing - Strong communication skills with the ability to tailor messages to technical and non-technical audiences. Experience influencing senior stakeholders and cross-functional teams to embed best practice and drive change. Ability to present test strategies, risks, and recommendations clearly and persuasively.

Delivering at Pace - Demonstrated ability to manage and prioritise multiple testing activities in fast-paced, agile environments. Experience coordinating test efforts across diverse teams, platforms, and suppliers to meet delivery milestones. Commitment to continuous improvement and efficiency in testing processes.

Making Effective Decisions - Skilled in applying risk-based approaches to testing, making informed decisions based on data, insight, and business priorities. Ability to assess complex problems, evaluate options, and recommend solutions that balance quality, risk, and delivery. Experience using test metrics and reporting to support decision-making and assurance.

Desirable Criteria:

Ideally you will also have experience and understanding of:

• Test tool automation.
• Experience working in a multi-supplier environment or contributing to test strategy across organisational boundaries is highly desirable.”
• Multiple platforms e.g. Client/Server / Web / Unix / VME etc.
• A range of tools e.g. Zephyr, JIRA, SOAP UI, Selenium, Postman, JMeter, Cucumber.
• CI/CD and relevant tools i.e. Ansible, Puppet, Chef, Jenkins.
• Working within Agile/Scrum team.
• Working knowledge of ITIL 4.