Test Manager

Test Manager

We are seeking an experienced Test Manager with strong General Insurance domain expertise and a proven track record of leading large-scale transformation programmes—specifically Duck Creek or Guidewire platform upgrades. The role is responsible for defining and delivering the end-to-end test strategy across multiple streams (functional, regression, integration, UAT, and non-functional). The ideal candidate brings a test engineering mindset, promotes shift-left practices, drives automation adoption (including Playwright), and enhances quality through continuous testing and robust test governance.

- Define and own the end-to-end test strategy for Duck Creek or Guidewire upgrade programmes, aligned with programme timelines, release plans, and business objectives. - Lead test planning, estimation, and scheduling across distributed teams and workstreams to ensure timely delivery. - Implement a risk-based testing approach; maintain a dynamic test risk register and ensure timely mitigation. - Design and implement the automation strategy across UI and API layers, including frameworks, CI/CD integration, and reusable assets. - Lead the adoption and implementation of Playwright for modern web UI automation, ensuring best practices around reliability, parallel execution, cross-browser coverage, and pipeline integration. - Define non-functional testing (NFT) strategy spanning performance, load, scalability, security, and accessibility testing, collaborating with platform and infrastructure teams. - Establish a robust Test Data Management (TDM) strategy including data profiling, synthetic data creation, masking, subsetting, and environment refresh cycles. - Drive test environment strategy, including provisioning, configuration management, and use of service virtualization or mocks for dependency testing. - Promote a Test Engineering culture through shift-left testing, testability by design, contract testing, and continuous feedback loops. - Manage stakeholders across business functions, product ownership, architecture, infrastructure, vendor partners, and third-party suppliers. - Coordinate and govern vendor/supplier testing activities, validating deliverables such as patches, fixes, and acceptance testing artifacts. - Oversee the defect management lifecycle, ensuring effective triage, prioritization, and resolution; establish and enforce quality gates. - Provide detailed reporting on quality metrics, coverage, defects, automation ROI, risks, and readiness to senior stakeholders and governance forums. - Build and mentor high-performing test teams, including test leads, automation engineers, performance specialists, and TDM experts. - Lead regression and upgrade-specific testing activities, including baseline regression packs, compatibility testing, data migration validation, cutover rehearsals, and post-go-live verification.

- Extensive experience in General Insurance testing with functional understanding of policy, billing, claims, rating, and endorsement processes. - Demonstrated delivery experience on Duck Creek or Guidewire upgrade programmes (major version upgrades, LOB migrations, patch upgrades). - Strong hands-on expertise with Playwright for web UI automation: designing scripts, debugging, parallelization, flakiness reduction, and CI integration. - Solid grounding in UI and API automation frameworks with experience integrating automated tests into CI/CD pipelines (Jenkins, Azure DevOps, GitHub Actions, etc.). - Experience with API testing tools (Postman, REST-assured, or equivalent) and service virtualization techniques. - Test Data Management experience including masking, synthetic data creation, subsetting, and TDM tooling. - Non-functional testing experience with performance/load testing tools (JMeter, LoadRunner, etc.) and general security testing awareness. - Familiarity with test management and defect tracking tools (e.g., JIRA) and modern reporting and orchestration tools. - Knowledge of cloud environments, containerization, and infrastructure-as-code concepts impacting test environments.

- Experience leading testing within large-scale transformation programmes involving multi-vendor ecosystems and geographically distributed teams. - Strong stakeholder management with the ability to communicate effectively with senior leadership and steering committees. - Proven capability to scale testing operations, implement best practices, and transform legacy QA approaches into engineering-led continuous testing models.

- Degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or equivalent professional experience. - Relevant certifications such as ISTQB Advanced/Expert, Agile testing certifications, ScrumMaster/Kanban certifications, or Duck Creek/Guidewire certifications (if available). - Playwright training or proven experience in implementing Playwright at scale is highly desirable.

- Reduced production defects associated with upgraded components and integrations. - Increased automation coverage across critical business and technical flows, demonstrating tangible automation ROI. - On-time completion of regression cycles and successful cutover rehearsals with minimal defects or rollbacks. - Effective mitigation of testing risks and timely stakeholder sign-off for releases. - Improved feedback loops through CI-driven continuous validation and quality gates.

- Comprehensive test strategy and test plan. - Automation strategy and Playwright framework implementation. - Non-functional testing (NFT) strategy and TDM strategy documentation. - Test schedules, estimates, resource plans, and traceability matrices. - Test cases, automated test suites, and environment/data preparation scripts. - Regular dashboards and reports on test progress, risks, defects, and quality.

- Strong analytical and problem-solving skills with an engineering-first mindset. - Excellent communication skills with the ability to articulate technical risks in business terms. - Collaborative and influential leadership style across cross-functional and vendor teams. - Resilient, adaptable, and able to thrive in high-pressure transformation environments.