Lead Test Engineer

CGI•Fairfax, VA

About The Position

The Lead Test Engineer leads testing and quality strategy for a large, multi-team development effort supporting mission-critical client operations. The role establishes and drives a comprehensive testing approach across teams, emphasizing automation, end-to-end test coverage, requirements traceability, and actionable quality metrics to increase release confidence. The engineer partners with development and engineering teams to identify issues earlier, reduce delivery risk, and build a scalable, repeatable quality discipline supporting modernization efforts. The role leads planning and management of major testing assignments for enterprise applications, develops automated, integration, interface, and end-to-end testing strategies, and coordinates testing across development, integration, and business teams. It validates data exchanges and workflows across interconnected systems, APIs, interfaces, and external applications; analyzes results and integration risks; and recommends corrective actions. The Lead Test Engineer serves as a testing expert across projects, guides testing and integration-quality practices, supervises and mentors testing professionals, and recommends improvements to system quality and project success. The position requires 10–14 years of software testing and quality assurance experience, including hands-on automation and leadership of major testing assignments. Required technical experience includes enterprise test strategy and planning; system integration and end-to-end testing; Selenium or equivalent automation tools and reusable frameworks; REST API and database testing using tools such as Postman and SQL; performance and scalability testing; test data management; DevSecOps and CI/CD quality gates; defect management and quality metrics; requirements traceability; test readiness and governance; and Agile delivery. Preferred experience includes cloud testing, microservices and event-driven systems, security and federal compliance testing, accessibility, data pipelines, infrastructure resilience, AI-assisted testing, operational readiness, and multi-vendor integration. CGI Federal offers eligible professionals benefits beginning on their first day of employment. The stated U.S. compensation range is $79,600 to $194,000, with compensation decisions based on factors including skills, experience, training, and credentials. U.S. employment offers are contingent on successfully completing a background investigation.

Requirements

10–14 years of software testing and quality assurance experience.
Strong hands-on automated testing and implementation experience.
Experience with system-to-system, integration, interface, API, and end-to-end testing.
Ability to validate data exchanges and workflows across interconnected applications.
Experience planning and leading major testing assignments.
Ability to analyze test results, identify integration risks, and recommend corrective actions.
Experience coordinating testing across development, integration, and business teams.
Demonstrated technical leadership across complex or high-impact projects.
Experience with enterprise test strategy and planning, including test plans, test cases, test scenarios, test coverage, and quality gates.
Experience with end-to-end integration testing across multiple applications, systems, interfaces, and business processes.
Experience with Selenium or equivalent tools, UI/API automation, reusable test frameworks, and automated regression testing.
Experience with REST API testing, Postman or equivalent tools, SQL queries, database validation, and data reconciliation.
Knowledge of load, stress, endurance, and performance testing methodologies and tools.
Experience with test data strategy, provisioning, data quality management, synthetic or masked data creation, and data integrity validation.
Experience integrating automated testing within CI/CD pipelines and implementing automated quality gates.
Experience in defect triage, root cause analysis, defect tracking, resolution management, and quality metrics reporting.
Experience maintaining requirements-to-test-case traceability, test coverage reporting, and execution evidence.
Experience with Test Readiness Reviews, entry and exit criteria, test status reporting, and release readiness assessments.
Experience with Agile/Scrum methodologies, sprint-based testing, continuous testing practices, and cross-functional collaboration.

Nice To Haves

Cloud testing experience with AWS, Azure, and cloud-native applications.
Experience with Kafka, event-driven architectures, distributed systems, and asynchronous interfaces.
Security testing experience, including SAST, DAST, vulnerability scanning, authentication testing, and authorization testing.
Federal compliance experience with NIST 800-53, Authority to Operate (ATO), federal security controls, and compliance testing.
Accessibility testing experience with Section 508 and WCAG compliance.
Data pipeline testing experience, including ETL processes, data ingestion, transformation validation, and large-volume data testing.
Infrastructure testing experience involving resilience, failover, disaster recovery, and high availability.
AI-assisted testing experience, including AI-driven test automation, test case generation, and defect analytics.
Operational readiness experience, including Operational Readiness Reviews, production readiness assessments, and supporting evidence development.
Experience coordinating enterprise testing across multiple vendors, teams, and systems.

Responsibilities

Lead planning and management of major testing assignments for enterprise applications.
Develop and execute automated, integration, interface, and end-to-end test strategies.
Coordinate testing activities across development, integration, and business teams.
Validate data exchanges and workflows across interconnected systems, APIs, interfaces, and external applications.
Analyze test results, identify integration defects and risks, and recommend corrective actions.
Serve as a testing expert across multiple projects, guiding best practices for testing, data validation, and integration quality.
Supervise and mentor testing professionals and support team growth and capability development.
Recommend improvements that support system quality and project success.
Evaluate system performance and integration outcomes to ensure successful end-to-end processing.
Establish quality metrics, requirements traceability, test coverage, quality gates, and release-readiness practices.