Lead QA – Xbox Game Studios (Reading, UK / Hybrid Working)

Be yourself and do what you love with a career in Xbox Game Studios working on the most exciting AAA games in the industry.  As the team who drives the quality of all titles that Xbox Game Studios release on Xbox and PC, we do our best work when we have a passionate and diverse team to deliver top quality titles that our players love!

We have an open position for a Lead QA who will work closely with the Quality Lead and team to guide our efforts and strategy for our latest and most popular games.

In the UK we are lucky enough to work on amazing franchises such as Forza Horizon, Sea of Thieves, Minecraft and more – and with these games being bigger and more complex than ever before, we don’t just rely on traditional testing techniques.  Join us and contribute your ideas around how we can use automation and data to understand the quality of our games, while giving our manual testers more time to focus on the player experience and fun factor.

Our team - Studios Quality – work as one with our internal games studios, from design to release, to influence quality.  We work directly with the creative talent and are recognised by them as experts in our field.

If you are looking to join a down to earth and diverse team of games industry professionals working at the cutting edge of the games industry, please apply!

Responsibilities

What will you be doing?

Games can take many years to build, and we work with the games studios to embrace quality from day one.  First, you will form a close partnership with the internal games studio that you are working with, and in doing so gain an excellent understanding of the game being built, its development approach, and how you can best be a part of it. 

During key stages of the game’s development lifecycle, you will implement and lead a quality strategy that uses manual testing, automation and data insights that will allow you to measure and communicate feature health effectively.

You`ll provide direction to the wider test team that will allow you to maintain an effective and efficient approach, while keeping a long-term view of your project to co-ordinate future needs effectively.  As the game iterates through development, your team may often end up in ambiguous or complex situations which require you to make confident decisions and find clarity in a timely manner.

You`ll take both successes and failures as learning opportunities that can be shared with the wider team so that we can all improve our approach to quality together throughout Xbox Game Studios.

Qualifications

Who do we need?

We are keen to hear from you if you have an excellent test aptitude, and a love of games, simulations, and the interactive entertainment industry – especially if you have shipped games or similar software in a lead role.

Having hands-on experience with scripting, querying and visualising data, and tool development to optimise the testing, evaluation and reporting on your project would really help you in this role.

Your good communication and collaboration skills are important, particularly with the ability to work well in a Hybrid work environment where many of us are working from home at times throughout the week.

We work hard to improve efficiency through people, process and technology - bring your experience in doing the same and help us further our efforts.

We want you to be comfortable bringing your authentic and fun self – we work in games after all!!

Microsoft is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran status, race, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or any other characteristic protected by applicable laws, regulations and ordinances. If you need assistance and/or a reasonable accommodation due to a disability during the application or the recruiting process, please send a request via the Accommodation request form.

Benefits/perks listed below may vary depending on the nature of your employment with Microsoft and the country where you work.