People Technology Testing and Release Lead

About the Role

As the Testing and Release Lead in People Technology, you will bridge the gap between technical system configuration and end-to-end business process integrity across global People Tech initiatives. Sitting within the People Tech team, you will act as the quality lead responsible for ensuring complex, high-sensitivity platform rollouts execute flawlessly without disrupting core HR workflows. Because People Tech changes are often bundled into broader People Team initiatives that impact employee experience, rollouts cannot always happen incrementally or iteratively. Working in an environment without dedicated Business Analysts, you will independently navigate unstructured environments, define testing requirements from scratch, and actively handhold non-technical business stakeholders through every stage of execution. In this role, you will directly own and execute the end-to-end testing strategy, establish quality metrics and signals, and govern strict entry and exit criteria across project phases to safeguard software releases across our People Tech stack (including Workday, SmartRecruiters, and Absorb).

What You’ll Do (Responsibilities)

• Define & Own E2E Strategy: Define, own, and execute the overall People Tech testing strategy, methodology, and test approach across implementation and enhancement projects.
• Lead Lifecycle Testing: Lead end-to-end testing activities across project phases, including System Integration Testing (SIT), User Acceptance Testing (UAT), regression testing, integration testing, end-to-end testing, and post-production validation.
• Develop Test Artifacts: Develop comprehensive test plans, test scenarios, test cases, test scripts, test data, and traceability matrices based on business and technical requirements.
• Provide Hands-On Guidance: Provide direct, hands-on guidance to non-technical business stakeholders, handholding them through test execution and bridging functional and technical requirements in the absence of dedicated Business Analysts.
• Drive Defect Management & Root Cause Analysis: Lead defect management from initial identification through triage, resolution, retesting, and closure using Jira. Analyze defect trends and identify root causes to prevent recurring quality risks.
• Partner with Functional & Technical Teams: Collaborate directly with Workday functional consultants, People Tech engineers, and technical teams to validate fixes, resolve issues, and ensure all requirements are met.
• Establish Signals & Quality Metrics: Establish quality metrics and signals to monitor test progress, evaluate software quality, and communicate testing risks and status to project leadership.
• Enforce Governance & Maintain Standards: Define and enforce strict entry and exit criteria across project testing phases while coaching team members and maintaining comprehensive test repositories and runbooks in Confluence.