Quality Assurance (QA) Lead

What you'll do:   Reporting to the Manager, Software Quality Assurance, the QA Lead is responsible for overseeing quality assurance activities across one or more projects. This role is critical in defining and implementing effective testing strategies, contributing to standards and processes, ensuring the delivery of high-quality products, and leading QA efforts end-to-end. The QA Lead brings a balance of leadership, strategic thinking, and hands-on testing expertise. They will champion consistent testing processes and be committed to quality across the organization.   Key Responsibilities and Accountabilities:   Define and drive the QA strategy for assigned projects, ensuring alignment with overall project goals and timelines. Develop detailed test plans that cover functional, integration, regression, and user acceptance testing. Act as the QA decision-maker on the project, providing guidance on quality-related trade-offs, risk mitigation, and ensuring the proposed architecture is testable. Manage and coordinate QA resources, including task assignment, progress tracking, and mentoring team members. Document and report bugs, issues, and enhancements using appropriate tracking tools, ensuring clear communication to development teams. Participate in hands-on QA activities such as test case creation, execution, defect reporting, triaging, and validation of fixes to ensure product quality. Interface with QA automation team to support efficient delivery of automated tests. Contribute to process and tooling improvement initiatives. Collaborate with cross-functional teams including Product, Operations, DevOps, and Security to drive a common quality practice. Support continuous improvement through process enhancement, training and mentoring, and leading change initiatives. Promote shift-left testing, test-driven development, and risk-based testing practices. Work effectively in a geographically dispersed environment with offshore software vendors. Participate in Agile/Scrum meetings and contribute to sprint planning, reviews, and retrospectives.   We encourage you to apply if you have:   Education and Experience Bachelor’s degree or college diploma/certification in Computer Science, Information Technology, Business Information Systems, or a related discipline, or equivalent experience. 5 years of experience in a software  quality assurance, testing or related discipline role; or an equivalent combination of education, experience and/training may be considered Proven experience leading QA efforts on software development projects. Strong understanding of software development life cycle (SDLC) and QA methodologies, test planning, and test execution. Experience working in hybrid development environments. Experience with GitLab CI/CD pipelines is an advantage. ISTQB certification is considered an advantage. Familiarity with automation tools and frameworks, cloud platforms and DevOps practices. Experience with performance and security testing. Background in enterprise or regulated environments is a plus. Knowledge of GIS software and Geoinformatics concepts is a plus.   Knowledge, Skills and Abilities Excellent communication, organizational, and decision-making skills Ability to balance strategic oversight with hands-on execution Passionate about data analysis and system automation Strong collaboration and interpersonal skills; capable of influencing and aligning teams without direct authority Comfortable working across geographically distributed teams and time zones. Ability and willingness to rapidly learn new technologies, programming languages, tools, and platforms Strong interpersonal skills and the ability to adapt in a complex and changing environment including an ability to manage multiple priorities, establish and reprioritize tasks, work independently, and meet deadlines A lifelong learner who is constantly striving to grow professionally