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West Coast University · 1 day ago

Senior Manager, Quality Assurance

Irvine, CA

Full-time

Onsite

Senior Level

$134K/yr - $187K/yr

7+ years exp

West Coast University is an educational institution focused on guiding students in their healthcare careers. The Senior Manager, Quality Assurance will lead the QA strategy and execution across multiple campuses and systems, ensuring the quality of AI-enabled experiences and modern web applications while building a high-performing QA team.

Higher Education

Responsibilities

Own the QA strategy and roadmap across ACC, WCU, and Administration; align with institutional goals, portfolio priorities, and release calendars. Define risk‑based testing approaches, entry/exit criteria, and go/no‑go standards; establish OKRs/KPIs and publish executive‑ready scorecards. Standardize test plans, traceability, defect taxonomy/severity, and root‑cause analysis across value streams

Lead QA for AI features (student services chatbot/copilot, RAG policy/catalog search, document intake/extraction, content generation). Implement evaluation methods, partner with Security/Compliance to operationalize Responsible AI guardrails (Azure AI Content Safety, PII controls, approval workflows) and model telemetry

Scale automation for UI, API, contract, and integration testing. Build CI/CD quality gates in Azure DevOps or GitHub Actions; maintain stable, versioned test environments and synthetic test data. Drive shift‑left quality with component/contract tests, mocking, and testability guidelines for engineers

Establish SLIs/SLOs and load/performance practices (k6/JMeter, Azure Load Testing) to ensure peak‑enrollment readiness. Integrate observability (Application Insights/OpenTelemetry) for release health, error budgets, and regression detection; lead incident and post‑incident quality improvements

Ensure accessibility compliance (WCAG 2.2/Section 508) via automated checks (axe/Pa11y) and targeted manual audits. Champion FERPA‑aligned test data management, secrets management, and secure SDLC (SAST/DAST, dependency scanning)

Hire, lead, and coach a blended onshore–offshore QA team (managers and ICs); define roles, career paths, and quality standards. Implement follow‑the‑sun operations, overlap hours, and disciplined handoff playbooks; track productivity and quality with transparent dashboards. Foster an inclusive, collaborative, high‑accountability culture focused on outcomes

Lead QA engagement with vendors/partners; define SOWs, SLAs, acceptance criteria, and governance cadences (weekly checkpoints, QBRs). Validate third‑party deliverables and integrations meet functional, performance, security, privacy, and accessibility standards

Coordinate QA delivery across multiple concurrent initiatives and value streams (Student Experience, Enrollment/Financial Aid, Academics/LMS, Administration/Shared Services). Translate technical quality topics into business terms; present risks, mitigations, and go/no‑go recommendations to executives and academic leaders. Collaborate with Architecture, Data/AI, and Operations to align scope, timelines, and success metrics

Qualification

QA strategyTest automationCI/CDAI quality assuranceWeb stacksAccessibility complianceVendor managementAnalytical skillsCustomer serviceCommunication skills

Required

Bachelor degree in computer science, information systems, electronics engineering, voice/data communications, public/business administration, or a related field required

7+ years of progressive QA experience, including 3+ years managing teams and running QA across multiple concurrent initiatives/value streams

Hands-on expertise with Web stacks: React/TypeScript & Azure Services

Test automation: Playwright or Cypress; SpecFlow/NUnit/xUnit; Postman/Newman; contract testing with Pact

CI/CD and environments: Azure DevOps or GitHub Actions; familiarity with IaC

Demonstrated QA leadership for AI, including safety and evaluation practices

Experience leading onshore–offshore QA delivery and managing vendors/partners

Strong communication and stakeholder management skills; ability to influence executives, academic leaders, and technical teams

Working knowledge of FERPA, accessibility (WCAG 2.2), and secure test data practices

Excellent analytical and organizational skills

Strong communication skills, both written and verbal. Must be able to communicate technical matters into messages that can be broadly understood across the organization

Strong customer service skills

Ability to self-direct, self-pace, multi-task, and function well under pressure of deadlines and conflicting priorities

Willingness to work a flexible schedule

Ability to travel/drive locally on a weekly, daily and/or on an as needed basis

Preferred

Master's degree preferred

Experience with CampusVue, Salesforce CRM, Oracle HCM and Great Plains preferred

Previous experience with higher education strongly preferred

Demonstrates a high level of understanding of enterprise architecture discipline. Has in-depth knowledge of current and planned Information Technology systems portfolio

Demonstrates a high level of business knowledge

Ability to manage and work effectively in a highly ethnic and culturally diverse student and associate community