Senior Software Engineer in Test (SET) New London

Red Badger; Greater London; Hybrid; GBP 90,000 - 130,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Hybrid working

Job summary

Red Badger is seeking a Senior Software Engineer in Test (SET) to shape quality strategy for platform and infrastructure-level products in London. You will lead testability at the architecture level, automate validation across environments, and manage delivery risk in distributed systems.

You will define standards for testing distributed systems, enable observability-driven debugging, automate validation of availability and latency, and contribute to security posture.

Qualifications

• Proven experience in quality or software engineering focusing on platforms, infra or backend systems.
• Deep understanding of distributed systems fault tolerance and testing.
• Hands-on with infrastructure-as-code (Terraform) and cloud-native platforms (AWS).
• Strong programming skills in Kotlin, Java, Go or Python with a testing mindset.
• Experience with CI/CD, observability tooling and security validation.

Responsibilities

• Define and implement test strategies for complex, cloud-native platform components.
• Build test frameworks and tooling to support integration testing and service validation.
• Drive shift-left testing and ensure testability is baked into architecture and pipelines.
• Lead fault injection, resilience testing and production-readiness validation.
• Collaborate with engineers, SREs and product leads to ensure reliability in distributed systems.

Skills

Platform/infrastructure/backend

Kubernetes

AWS

Terraform

GitHub Actions

OpenTelemetry

Grafana

Kotlin

Java

Go

Python

Test automation mindset

Tools

Terraform

Kubernetes

AWS

GitHub Actions

OpenTelemetry

Grafana

Job description

Join Red Badger

We recognise our people are the best thing about Red Badger and that a truly diverse workplace where people are free to be themselves is essential for great culture and great outcomes. If you like solving difficult problems, working with great people and making a real impact, join us and become a Badger.

At Red Badger, our purpose is to make a positive impact on the world around us. Our mission is to transform blue-chips into next generation digital product organisations.

We believe in creating opportunities for all. We benefit from diversity. That said, we're far from perfect – we want to be more diverse and representative. Join us and help make that happen.

Senior Software Engineer in Test (SET)

London

We are looking for a Senior Software Engineer in Test (SET) to join Red Badger’shigh-performing engineering teams. In this role, you’ll define and drive quality strategy forplatform and infrastructure-level products — from container orchestration and microservices to observability tooling and CI/CD pipelines.This is a hands‑on engineering position within cross‑functional teams where quality iseveryone’s responsibility but you’ll lead the way in making it systematic, scalable and secure.You’ll help shape testability at the architecture level, automate deep validation acrossenvironments, and play a key role in managing delivery risk across distributed systems.

Key Responsibilities

Own Platform Reliability and Integration Confidence

• Define and implement test strategies for complex, cloud-native platform components
• Build test frameworks and tooling that support integration testing, contract testing andsystem validation across multiple layers (infra, data, APIs, services)
• Drive shift-left testing practices and ensure testability is baked into architecture,CI/CD pipelines and infrastructure-as-code
• Lead fault injection, resilience testing, performance benchmarking andproduction-readiness validation
• Collaborate with engineers, SREs and product leads to ensure the platform behavesreliably under real-world conditions

Be a Technical Leader in Quality Engineering

• Establish standards and practices for testing distributed, event-driven systems
• Enable observability-driven debugging by working closely with platform and service teams
• Automate validation of operational characteristics like availability, latency, throughput and recoverability
• Contribute to security posture through continuous validation of access controls, data protection and policy enforcement

What You Bring

• Proven experience in a quality or software engineering role focused on platforms, infrastructure or backend systems
• Deep understanding of system testing, failure modes and fault‑tolerant design indistributed systems
• Hands‑on experience with infrastructure-as-code (Terraform), Kubernetes,cloud‑native platforms (AWS), service meshes, CI/CD (e.g. GitHub Actions) and
• observability tooling (e.g. OpenTelemetry, Grafana)
• Strong programming skills in a modern backend language (e.g. Kotlin, Java, Go, or Python) with a test automation mindsetm
• Familiarity with resilience patterns, chaos testing, synthetic traffic and platform health metrics
• A product mindset — you care about the user experience of developers, not just the green test bar

Why Red Badger

At Red Badger, we work on complex, business-critical digital platforms where quality isn’tnegotiable. You’ll be surrounded by senior practitioners, embedded in empowered teams,and supported in driving meaningful, secure and resilient engineering outcomes.We value thoughtful problem solving, clarity over complexity and doing things the right waywith strong defaults, open collaboration and clear purpose.

Hybrid working

We work in person 2/3 days a week from our London Office or client office (London-based)

Red Badger Values

People people
We respect and care for each other, giving us the space to be our true selves.

Find a way
We’re comfortable with uncertainty and want to take ownership of outcomes, which we proactively deliver.

Always learning
We’re curious. It’s how we learn and grow as individuals, continuously testing and improving what we do, and how we do it.

Open & Fair
We build trust by telling it like it is, being open, and seeking fair and equitable outcomes.

Collaborative
We are united by our desire to get to the best ideas. We are generous with our knowledge, actively listen to each other, and are open-minded.

Diversity & Inclusion

Red Badger is committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment, and is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. We hire, employ, train, promote and compensate regardless of gender, gender identity, race, disability, sexual orientation, age, creed and colour. We are fully focused on equality, and we believe that the fascinating differences that make us all unique enable us to continue doing amazing work for our clients.

Employee Benefits

We make sure our team is well looked after with generous salaries and a great benefits package which includes:

4th Floor,
2 Old Street Yard,
London EC1Y 8AF

(Featherstone Street entrance)