Location
The ONS operates a flexible hybrid working model across the UK, with colleagues linked to one of our contractual locations working between office and remote throughout the week. The locations for this role are Newport, Titchfield (Fareham) and Manchester.
All colleagues are required to work from their contractually allocated site for at least 40% of their working time.
The induction process for the role will be conducted in person.
About the job
Job summary
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) is the UK’s largest producer of official statistics, covering a range of key economic, social and demographic topics. These include measuring changes in the value of the UK economy, estimating the size, geographic distribution and characteristics of the population, and providing indicators of price inflation, employment, earnings, crime and migration.
Are you ready to shape the future of testing at ONS? We are looking for an experienced Senior Test Engineer to lead the way in delivering high impact, high quality data solutions, innovate, influence and make a difference.
You will be responsible for system, integration, End to End (E2E) and acceptance testing, helping to refine our services through iterative design. If you're passionate about precision, innovation, and making a real impact then this is your opportunity to lead with purpose.
Job description
As a Senior Test Engineer you will undertake activities including shaping requirements, the planning, design, creation, execution and results analysis of test and the identification and management of defects.
You will define and deploy suitable test methods as part of a broader risk-based approach. They are responsible for the design and delivery of system, system integration, End to End (E2E) and acceptance testing frameworks and activities, to enable ONS to deliver data and analysis of high quality and accuracy, whilst ensuring that the iterative design of the service or product is in order.
You will work with a variety of operational users, third party suppliers and in-house development teams and develop effective working relationships with each. You will be responsible for a range of test activities. These include test harness design, test automation, writing, debugging, and refactoring test code, adapting approaches and frameworks appropriately and in line with any changes, business, and end user needs. You will help to grow the sustainability, quality and reach of the test services offered by ONS.
Responsibilities
- Identify and raise awareness of risks arising from the automation test results.
- Identify new and implement existing test frameworks to improve confidence in testing.
- Be proficient in a range of coding languages (you may be an expert in only one).
- Coach and mentor testers in good testing practices.
- Enable delivery of QAT functional services for programmes and projects by working closely with software developers to reach a collective understanding of system architecture, system functionality and business requirements, leading to the required test coverage at system, system integration, E2E, and project/business level.
- Understand and bring together both functional and non-functional requirements of an application, enabling complex and meaningful testing for projects to be executed in a consistent way.
- Effectively communicate with projects and business stakeholders to support the control of integrations, dependencies, and risks.
- Source, collect and extract data that is accurate and fit for purpose, working with developers to configure, test and update configurations.
- Working with the wider ONS testing teams and ONS testing communities to ensure that the latest testing approaches are adopted across ONS.
- Deliver at pace using the most appropriate delivery methodologies and adopting agile principles.
- Assist decision makers in gathering information to make informed decisions.
- Actively participate in the Testing community and broader communities to refine and develop standards, working practices, sharing of knowledge, and understanding.
- Where appropriate and in line with divisional organisation practice, Line management of Test Engineers within the ONS community.
Person specification
Essential Criteria:
- Communicating between the technical and non-technical (Practitioner) - Listen to and interpret the needs of technical and non-technical stakeholders, and manage their expectations, manage active and reactive communication and support or host difficult discussions within the team or with diverse senior stakeholders.
- Designing and executing tests (Practitioner) - Influence and guide the use of appropriate test types and techniques to mitigate risk early, lead others in designing, building, maintaining and executing tests that align to user needs and requirements, contribute to developing and implementing standards for designing and executing tests and improve test types and techniques through a structured process.
- Managing, reporting and resolving defects (Practitioner) - Contribute to developing standards for defect management processes, manage and escalate dependencies, defects and risks across teams, contribute to mitigation and contingency plans across teams, use defect patterns and trends to make recommendations on testing and quality approaches, with support and manage stakeholder expectations and communications during defect resolution.
- Test analysis (Practitioner) - Lead work with stakeholders across teams to determine which functional and non-functional quality characteristics add value, determine if an approach needs to change based on effort and risk, ensure test needs are implemented early, use multiple techniques to analyse complex information to identify risks and coach others in test analysis.
- Test and quality planning (Practitioner) - Work with teams to develop and implement appropriate quality testing approaches, plans and strategies, contribute to organisational quality testing strategies, implement ways to capture data to drive continuous improvement of quality testing approaches, plans and strategies and advocate for full team ownership of quality testing activities, encouraging early engagement.
