Global Head of Quality Assurance, Managing Director

Who We Are Looking For
We are seeking a Global Head of Quality Assurance to lead the strategic direction and operational excellence of QA across the State Street Alpha and Charles River Development Platform. This individual will play a pivotal role in ensuring consistent quality standards while optimizing for regional market requirements and regulatory compliance. The ideal candidate combines deep technical expertise in modern QA methodologies with strong leadership skills and an understanding of global financial markets and regulatory landscapes. This is an opportunity to influence the evolution of our platform while fostering innovation and collaboration across global QA teams. This role will report directly to the Chief Technology Officer.

What You Will Be Responsible For
Strategic Leadership

• Architect and implement a comprehensive QA strategy aligned with the organization's global expansion and platform sophistication.
• Drive modernization of the QA technology stack, emphasizing test automation, performance testing, and continuous testing integration.
• Establish Centers of Excellence (CoE) across NA, EMEA, and APAC regions, ensuring standardized methodologies while accommodating regional trading requirements.
• Develop risk-based testing strategies for critical trading functionalities, balancing speed, quality, and compliance.

Technical Innovation

• Lead the adoption of next-generation testing frameworks, focusing on AI-driven testing, predictive analytics, and real-time monitoring.
• Implement advanced performance testing strategies for high-frequency trading scenarios and mission-critical systems.
• Develop robust test data management and synthetic data generation capabilities to support comprehensive and efficient testing.

Organizational Development

• Build and mentor regional QA leadership teams, fostering a culture of innovation, accountability, and excellence.
• Align QA processes with regional regulatory requirements and global compliance frameworks as part of our enterprise software development lifecycle (eSDLC).
• Establish cross-regional collaboration frameworks and knowledge-sharing platforms to drive operational efficiency.

Quality Metrics & Governance

• Define and track global quality metrics, ensuring consistency and visibility across regions.
• Create governance frameworks for test environment management and release quality gates, ensuring only high-quality releases reach production.
• Implement risk-based and exploratory testing methodologies to identify critical gaps early in the software lifecycle.

Qualifications
Technical Expertise

• Extensive experience in leading QA for large-scale SaaS platforms with high availability and performance requirements.
• Proven expertise in modern QA practices, including test automation, performance testing, continuous testing, and shift-left testing strategies.
• Experience with AI-driven testing frameworks, predictive analytics, and advanced performance monitoring tools (e.g., Dynatrace, Splunk).
• Strong understanding of test data management techniques, synthetic data generation, and data privacy compliance.
• Familiarity with regulatory requirements for financial markets (e.g., SEC, MiFID II, ASIC).

Leadership & Organizational Skills

• Demonstrated ability to build and lead distributed teams, particularly across NA, EMEA, and APAC regions.
• Strong cross-functional collaboration skills, working with engineering, product management, and operations teams.
• Proven experience establishing Centers of Excellence (CoE) for QA and fostering global knowledge sharing and innovation.
• Exceptional communication and stakeholder management skills.

Process & Governance

• Experience implementing governance frameworks for release management, risk-based testing, and quality gates.
• Strong understanding of CI/CD pipelines and their integration with QA processes.
• Expertise in defining and tracking global quality metrics to measure performance and identify improvement opportunities.

Education & Experience

• Bachelor's degree in engineering, computer science, or a related field; advanced degree preferred.
• 10+ years of experience in QA leadership roles, with 5+ years in a global capacity.

Why this role is important to us
The Global Head of Quality Assurance is a critical role within our organization, ensuring that our platform operates at the highest standards of quality and performance. Your leadership will drive innovation, ensure compliance with global regulatory standards, and enable seamless collaboration across regions. This is a rare opportunity to shape the future of QA in a fast-growing and highly dynamic industry.

About State Street
What we do. State Street is one of the largest custodian banks, asset managers, and asset intelligence companies in the world. From technology to product innovation, we're making our mark on the financial services industry. For more than two centuries, we've been helping our clients safeguard and steward the investments of millions of people. We provide investment servicing, data & analytics, investment research & trading, and investment management to institutional clients.

Work, Live, and Grow. We make all efforts to create a great work environment. Our benefits packages are competitive and comprehensive. Details vary in locations, but you may expect generous medical care, insurance, and savings plans among other perks. You'll have access to a flexible Work Program to help you match your needs. And our wealth of development programs and educational support will help you reach your full potential.

Inclusion, Diversity, and Social Responsibility. We actively work toward creating a more inclusive, diverse workplace through internal initiatives, employee resource groups, and external partnerships. We truly believe our employees' diverse backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives are powerful contributors to creating an inclusive environment where everyone can thrive and reach their maximum potential while adding value to both our organization and our clients. We warmly welcome candidates of diverse origin, background, ability, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, and personality. You will have tools to help balance your professional and personal life, paid volunteer days, matching gift programs, and access to employee networks that help you stay connected to what matters to you.

State Street is an equal opportunity and affirmative action employer.

Discover more at

Job ID: R-772484