Quality Assurance Engineer

OB Collective is a UK technology business working on independent verification and evidence for information moving between organisations and systems. We work primarily in regulated and public-sector environments, combining software engineering, systems assurance and operational evidence to help organisations understand the state of information before it is relied upon.

We're looking for a Senior Test, Evaluation & Measurement Lead for an initial six-month software-intensive technical programme.

The role owns how the system is tested and how conclusions are supported by evidence. You will work with the engineering team to define test conditions, reference data, metrics and evaluation methods, while retaining sufficient independence to challenge the system and the assumptions behind it.

This is broader than software QA. We need someone comfortable designing evaluations for complex systems where performance, failure behaviour and the limits of the evidence matter as much as functional correctness.

The work starts from an existing software prototype and will cover system integration, testing, failure conditions, performance and resilience, and the evidence needed to support future operational use.

Roles are UK-based, outside IR35, and primarily remote with occasional travel for workshops and technical activity.

Responsibilities

• Own the programme's test and evaluation approach.
• Turn technical and operational questions into measurable test conditions.
• Define reference conditions, test oracles and valid measurement denominators.
• Establish metrics for detection, false positives, timing, performance and resilience.
• Design and control selected fault and challenge scenarios.
• Define repeatability, uncertainty and appropriate limits on inference.
• Work with engineers to ensure the test environment is sufficiently instrumented.
• Analyse test results and identify where the evidence does or does not support a conclusion.
• Ensure negative and inconclusive results are retained and reported properly.
• Support formal technical reviews and final evidence synthesis.
• Maintain independence from the engineer principally responsible for the verification implementation.

Experience we need

• Strong systems Test & Evaluation, V&V or experimental engineering background.
• Experience designing test programmes, rather than only executing pre-written scripts.
• Quantitative measurement and analysis.
• Ground-truth, reference-condition or test-oracle design.
• Performance, resilience, reliability or fault testing.
• Good judgement around uncertainty, sample size and what can legitimately be inferred.
• Ability to challenge experienced engineers constructively.

Useful experience

• Aviation, PNT/GNSS, defence, autonomous systems, communications or safety-critical engineering.