Quality Assurance Manager

Kensington delivers the world’s most personal travel experiences. We bring to life each client’s desire to travel in a way that’s tailored specifically for them, in the company of local private guides who ensure that they enjoy the authentic best of their destination. The result is a unique journey rich in memories that last a lifetime.

We achieve this because of our extraordinary people, experts with deep knowledge of their destinations. For over 120 countries worldwide, and across each of our brands – Tours, Cruises, Villas, Yachts, Jets, and Air – their expertise powers our steadfast promise: See the world, differently.

To learn more about Kensington, visit kensingtontours.com 

Job Overview

Kensington is seeking an experienced Quality Assurance Manager to join our technology team.  This is a hands-on position, responsible for establishing and overseeing all aspects of our testing and quality assurance program, ensuring that all platforms and products meet the highest standards of quality and compliance while fulfilling the business need for innovation.

The Quality Assurance Manager is responsible for establishing and managing the organization’s quality assurance program, working closely with platform and product teams to understand development processes, establishing benchmarks and standards for quality, defining relevant test processes and procedures, and operationalizing a best-fit testing program.

In the short term, our Testing / QA function will be staffed by a committee of subject matter experts from across the various business units (Product, Marketing, Sales and Support) with selective use of contracted testing resources.  The Quality Assurance Manager will help define areas where this strategy should evolve over time.

The ideal candidate has a great attitude, possesses the ability to learn quickly, exercises creative problem-solving skills and can quickly pivot when challenges arise.  You are someone that has a strong attention to detail and while possessing exacting standards, you know how and where to make compromises that meet the greater good.  You possess abundant amounts of enthusiasm, are comfortable in a rapidly evolving environment and with being responsible for building up a quality assurance discipline from scratch.  You can be relied upon to take accountability and deliver great technology in partnership with a multidisciplinary team.  Critically, you are a hands-on testing professional, willing and able to perform testing and QA related tasks at all levels and are someone who takes pride in learning the ins and outs of the products and platforms they help support.

This role requires a strong background in quality management, testing, relationship building and effective communication skills with both technical and business audiences.

What You'll Do

• Establish collaborative relationships with key partners including business teams, IT teams and external SaaS partner teams
• Participate in Planning and DevOps processes to identify early scopes for testing associated with planned software changes / releases
• Develop and implement testing / QA policies and procedures based on best practices but tailored for the needs of the organization. These would be expected to evolve over time, with greater organizational maturity
• Collaborate with technology partners to build and manage fit-for-purpose testing environments, also ensuring that profiles and accounts are built to support testing needs, while also monitoring, troubleshooting and resolve issues arising.
• Build out test practices and test cases that allow for fulsome, relevant testing for all key platforms and services, with each release or major change
• Identify and implement testing automation tools, reports and dashboards to ease the manual burden of testing and QA activities and elevate outcomes
• Prepare Training and/or Job Aids that educate testing resources on how to access environments, validate profiles / accounts, execute test cases correctly and to capture the required test results at the right level of detail and format
• Maintain the online repository of all testing / QA artefacts
• Coordinate and participate in testing and QA activities, including building and overseeing schedules for tester / testing activity.    
• Identify and analyzes issues, bugs, defects, and other problems, and recommend and facilitate solution identification amongst stakeholder teams
• Deliver documented testing outcomes in the established format / level of detail, analyzing results and delivering recommendations on suitability of changes for release to the production environment
• Collaborate with key stakeholders to identify areas for ongoing improvement in production systems
• Maintain a historical record of quality in delivered product / software – including KPIs - to aid in continuous improvement activities

Requirements

• Completion of a 3 or 4-year degree/diploma, preferably in Computer Science, Engineering, Information Systems, Quality Assurance or an equivalent field
• 7+ years’ experience in a hands-on Testing / Quality Assurance role, preferably in a software development environment and/or an environment with extensive systems integration testing, including at least 3+ years leading / managing a team of Testing/QA resources
• Strong knowledge of quality assurance methodologies, including software testing / QA processes, and a demonstrated ability to build a Testing/QA function
• Excellent analytical skills with the ability to interpret complex data
• Proficient in project/task management principles and practices
• Strong communication skills, both verbal and written, with the ability to work collaboratively across departments
• Detail-oriented with a commitment to maintaining high-quality standards, yet able to thoughtfully advise on approaches to maintain velocity while minimizing business risk
• Ability to generate precise and concise functional testing metrics and measures of quality
• Experience in a SaaS environment that has an agile development process is a huge plus
• A strong preference for candidates with a recognized Quality Assurance certification (completed or materially complete) based on ASQ or QAI standards (or similar), or a from a recognized institution offering QA certification programs

Nice to Have

• Domain knowledge in the Travel and Tours industry
• Familiarity with industry regulations and compliance requirements pertaining to PII, PCI-DSS, HIPPA and GDPR is preferred.
• Experience with Atlassian products such as Jira and Confluence
• Comfortable operating in a mixed Agile – Waterfall – Hybrid environment
• Lean Six Sigma Green Belt Certification or Six Sigma Black Belt Certification

We are committed to providing employment accommodation in accordance with the Ontario Human Rights Code and the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act. If you require accommodation due to a disability at any stage of our hiring process, please advise us when completing your application.

We thank all candidates for their interest however only those selected for an interview will be contacted.