Sr Lead, SW Quality Eng

About Northern Trust

As a global leader in innovative wealth management, asset servicing, asset management and banking services, Northern Trust (Nasdaq: NTRS) is proud to guide the world’s most successful individuals, families, corporations and institutions.

Since 1889, we have aligned our efforts with our three guiding Principles That Endure: Service, Expertise, and Integrity. Together, they reflect the three cornerstones of business conduct which we strive to instill in our employees, whom we call partners, and to provide to our clients and the communities we serve worldwide.

With more than 135 years of financial experience and over 24,000 partners, we serve the world’s most sophisticated clients using leading technology and exceptional service.

Position Overview

We are seeking an experienced Senior Lead, Software Quality Engineering to provide technical leadership and drive quality across Salesforce solutions, custom-built applications, and web platforms. This role will define testing strategy, lead automation and continuous quality practices, and partner with engineering, product, architecture, and business teams to deliver secure, reliable, and high-performing solutions. The successful candidate combines hands-on quality engineering expertise with strong leadership, risk-based decision-making, and practical exposure to AI-assisted testing and engineering tools.

Key Responsibilities

- Own and evolve the end-to-end quality engineering strategy for Salesforce, custom applications, APIs, integrations, and responsive web applications.
- Lead test planning, estimation, execution, defect management, quality reporting, and release-readiness assessments across multiple initiatives.
- Design and implement scalable automation frameworks for user interface, API, integration, regression, and data-validation testing.
- Establish risk-based testing practices and quality gates within Agile delivery and continuous integration/continuous delivery pipelines.
- Validate Salesforce configurations and customizations, including workflows, security profiles, permissions, Lightning experiences, Apex-based functionality, integrations, and platform releases.
- Guide testing of custom and web applications across functional, cross-browser, accessibility, usability, performance, security, and resiliency dimensions.
- Partner with developers and architects to improve testability, shift quality left, strengthen code-level testing, and prevent defects.
- Apply service virtualization, test-data management, environment management, and observability practices to improve test reliability and speed.
- Use metrics and trend analysis to communicate product risk, automation effectiveness, defect leakage, and continuous-improvement opportunities to technical and business stakeholders.
- Evaluate and responsibly apply AI-assisted tools for test-case generation, automation development, defect analysis, test-data synthesis, requirements review, and engineering productivity.
- Mentor quality engineers, conduct technical reviews, define engineering standards, and foster a culture of ownership, learning, and continuous improvement.
- Coordinate with distributed teams, vendors, and business partners to ensure consistent quality practices and successful production releases.

Required Qualifications

- Bachelor’s degree in computer science, engineering, information systems, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.
- Typically 10 or more years of software testing or quality engineering experience, including at least 3 years in a technical lead or senior leadership capacity.
- Strong hands-on experience testing Salesforce solutions, custom enterprise applications, web applications, APIs, and system integrations.
- Demonstrated experience building or advancing test automation using modern programming or scripting languages and industry-standard frameworks.
- Strong understanding of software development life cycles, Agile delivery, DevOps, continuous integration/continuous delivery, and shift-left quality practices.
- Experience with functional, regression, integration, end-to-end, exploratory, performance, security, accessibility, and production-validation testing.
- Proficiency with API testing, database validation, source control, defect-tracking tools, test-management tools, and pipeline integration.
- Ability to analyze complex systems, identify quality risks, troubleshoot failures, and communicate clear recommendations.
- Proven ability to lead cross-functional teams, influence without direct authority, mentor engineers, and manage competing priorities.
- Strong written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to present quality status and technical risk to senior stakeholders.

Technical Competencies

- Salesforce: Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Lightning Experience, Apex, SOQL, platform security, release validation, and Salesforce APIs.
- Automation: Selenium, Playwright, Cypress, WebdriverIO, Cucumber, or comparable tools; API automation with tools such as REST Assured, Postman/Newman, or equivalent frameworks.
- Languages: Working proficiency in one or more languages such as Java, JavaScript/TypeScript, Python, or C#.
- DevOps: Git-based workflows and automated execution within tools such as Azure DevOps, GitHub Actions, Jenkins, or comparable platforms.
- Quality Practices: Test pyramid, behavior-driven or test-driven approaches, contract testing, data-driven testing, parallel execution, reporting, and root-cause analysis.
- AI-Assisted Engineering: Exposure to generative AI, coding assistants, intelligent test-generation tools, prompt design, output validation, privacy considerations, and responsible-use controls.

Preferred Qualifications

- Experience in a regulated, financial services, or other high-availability enterprise environment.
- Experience with Salesforce-specific automation platforms or release-management tools.
- Knowledge of cloud platforms, microservices, event-driven architectures, mobile testing, and containerized test environments.
- Familiarity with performance engineering, application security testing, accessibility standards, and site-reliability practices.
- Salesforce, quality engineering, cloud, Agile, or DevOps certifications.

Leadership Attributes

- Quality-first mindset with strong accountability for customer and business outcomes.
- Strategic thinker who remains comfortable working directly with technology and delivery teams.
- Collaborative, pragmatic, and able to balance speed, risk, scalability, and maintainability.
- Curious and adaptable, with a commitment to evaluating emerging technologies and improving engineering practices.

Salary Range:
$95,600 - 162,400 USD

Salary range is a good faith estimate of base pay. Northern Trust provides a comprehensive benefits package including retirement benefits (401k and pension), health and welfare benefits (medical, dental, vision, spending accounts and disability), paid time off, parental and caregiver leave, life & accident insurance, and other voluntary and well-being benefits. Northern Trust also provides a discretionary bonus program that may include an equity component.

Work Authorization

Applicants must be authorized to work in the U.S. without the need for employment-based visa sponsorship now or in the future. Northern Trust will not sponsor applicants for U.S. work visa status for this opportunity (no sponsorship is available for H-1B, L-1, TN, O-1, E-3, H-1B1, F-1, J-1, OPT, CPT or any other employment-based visa).

Working with Us

As a Northern Trust partner, you will be part of a flexible and collaborative work culture, which has a strong history of financial strength and stability. Movement within the organization is encouraged, senior leaders are accessible, and you can take pride in working for a company committed to an inclusive workplace and assisting the communities we serve.

Philanthropy is deeply rooted in Northern Trust’s history and is an essential element of our culture. Employees around the world give their time and talent to work for the greater good of their communities.

Reasonable Accommodation

Northern Trust is committed to working with and providing adjustments to individuals with health conditions and disabilities. If you need a reasonable accommodation for any part of the employment process, please email our HR Service Center at [email protected] , or alternatively you can discuss your individual requirements with the recruiter you are working with.