Manager, QA

Atlantic Media; Washington (District of Columbia); On-site; USD 145,000 - 165,000; Full time

Job summary

The Atlantic seeks a hands-on, strategic QA Manager to build and own our engineering quality practice in Washington, DC. This player-coach role blends testing, automation, and process leadership across the org, including vendor relationships and offshore partnerships.

You’ll define testing standards, embed quality into cross-functional teams, and guide AI‑powered features testing while ensuring fast, reliable deployments and shared ownership of quality.

Qualifications

• 7+ years QA experience, with at least 2 years in a lead or senior QA role.
• Hands-on experience with test automation frameworks (Playwright, Selenium, Cypress, or similar).
• Experience managing QA contractors, vendors, or offshore testing teams.
• Experience developing or significantly improving QA processes and standards within an engineering organization.
• Strong understanding of software development lifecycles and agile/CI-CD practices.
• Experience integrating automated tests into CI/CD pipelines (GitHub Actions or similar).

Responsibilities

• Own the engineering quality practice: define testing standards, processes, and tooling.
• Manage the day-to-day relationship with our offshore QA partner and oversee five QA contractors.
• Work hands-on as a practitioner—design test strategies, write automated tests, and contribute directly to quality.
• Partner with multiple engineering teams to embed quality practices into workflows.
• Define and uphold quality standards for AI-powered features and LLM testing approaches.
• Integrate quality gates into CI/CD pipelines to enable fast deployments.
• Identify testing gaps and surface risks to engineering leadership.
• Track quality metrics and report trends to leadership and stakeholders.
• Foster a culture of shared ownership around quality across teams.
• Participate in on-call rotation to monitor production incidents.

Skills

QA leadership

Vendor management

QA process improvement

SDLC & CI/CD

On-call & incident response

Collaborative leadership

Communication

Tools

Playwright

Selenium

Cypress

CI/CD tooling (GitHub Actions)

AI testing tools

Visual regression tools

Accessibility testing

Observability tools (Datadog, Sentry)

Job description

The Atlantic is looking for a hands-on, strategic QA Manager to build and own our engineering quality practice. We aim to support a more thoughtful American public by powering and expanding our Pulitzer Prize-winning journalism - and we want the products we ship to be worthy of that mission. This is a player-coach role: you will work directly on testing and automation while also developing the processes, standards, and vendor relationships that raise the quality bar across the entire engineering organization.

Minimum Qualifications

• 7+ years of QA experience, with at least 2 years in a lead or senior QA role.
• Hands-on experience with test automation frameworks (Playwright, Selenium, Cypress, or similar).
• Experience managing QA contractors, vendors, or offshore testing teams.
• Experience developing or significantly improving QA processes and standards within an engineering organization.
• Strong understanding of software development lifecycles and agile/CI-CD practices.
• Experience integrating automated tests into CI/CD pipelines (GitHub Actions or similar).

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with JS/TS testing frameworks and React component testing.
• Familiarity with AI-assisted test generation tools and workflows.
• Background in consumer-facing web or mobile products.
• Experience building a QA practice from an early or low-maturity baseline.
• Familiarity with performance testing and Core Web Vitals monitoring.
• Experience with visual regression testing (Chromatic, Percy, or Applitools).
• Familiarity with accessibility testing standards (WCAG 2.2) and tooling.
• Experience using observability and monitoring tools (Datadog, Sentry) as quality signals in production.

As The Atlantic's QA Manager, you will:

• Own the engineering quality practice: define testing standards, processes, and tooling for the organization.
• Manage the day-to-day relationship with our offshore QA partner and oversee the work of a team of five QA contractors.
• Work hands-on as a practitioner - designing test strategies, writing automated tests, and contributing directly to quality.
• Partner with engineering teams across Reader Experience, Membership & Growth, Interactive, and Mobile to embed quality practices into their workflows.
• Define and uphold quality standards for AI-powered features, including test approaches for LLM-driven experiences and non-deterministic outputs.
• Integrate quality gates into CI/CD pipelines to enable fast, confident deployments.
• Identify testing gaps and systemic quality risks across the product and surface them to engineering leadership.
• Evaluate and recommend QA tooling and automation frameworks as the organization's needs evolve.
• Track and report on quality metrics and trends to the VP of Engineering.
• Help build a culture of shared ownership around quality - not just within dedicated QA, but across how teams work.
• Participate in on-call rotation (outside of standard business hours) to monitor, troubleshoot, and resolve production incidents, ensuring system reliability and uptime. The role will at times include night, early-morning, and weekend work.

As The Atlantic's QA Manager, you are:

• A practitioner and a strategist: You’re equally comfortable writing test automation and developing org-wide QA strategy. You don’t choose between doing the work and improving the system.
• AI-fluent: You understand how AI tools are reshaping Quality Engineering both as productivity multipliers in your own workflow and as new categories of features requiring thoughtful testing approaches.
• Process-minded: You know what a mature QA practice looks like and how to build toward it incrementally in an organization starting from a low baseline.
• An effective vendor partner: You’ve managed offshore or contractor QA relationships and know how to set expectations, maintain accountability, and get consistent quality output across time zones.
• Technically capable: You have hands-on experience with automation frameworks and can contribute directly to the codebase. You don’t need to be a full-stack engineer, but you can hold your own in a technical conversation.
• A collaborator: You embed naturally into engineering teams, earn their trust, and help them take ownership of quality rather than treating QA as someone else’s job.
• A strong communicator: You can articulate quality risk, test coverage gaps, and process recommendations clearly to both engineers and non-technical stakeholders.
• Adaptable: You’re comfortable working across different teams, tech stacks, and product areas with varying levels of QA maturity.
• An interest in the pursuit of truth: You believe in what The Atlantic does and want the products we ship to reflect that.

Salary minimum: $145,000; Salary maximum: $165,000

This role is based in Washington, D.C.

About The Atlantic: The Atlantic has, for more than 160 years, advanced ideas that matter and sparked global conversation on the most important issues of our time. We aim to bring clarity and original thinking to questions of consequence, on topics ranging from politics, the economy, and global affairs to technology, science, and culture. As the third-longest-running magazine in America, we find ourselves at a remarkable moment: one of both continuation and transformation, of upholding our legacy while continuously reinventing ourselves for the future.

The Atlantic Monthly Group LLC (\"The Atlantic\") is an Equal Opportunity Employer.

The Atlantic is committed to diversity and encourages members of traditionally underrepresented communities to apply, including women, LGBTQ people, people of color, and people with disabilities.

We do not discriminate against our applicants because of race, color, religion, sex (including gender identity, sexual orientation, and pregnancy), national origin, age, disability, veteran status, genetic information, or any other status protected by applicable law.

Job offers to work at The Atlantic are contingent upon the candidate’s successful completion of reference checks and compliance with The Atlantic’s COVID-19 vaccination policy.

The Atlantic requires all employees to be vaccinated against COVID-19, including subsequent boosters, and submit proof of vaccination status.

Employees who cannot receive the vaccine because of a disability/medical contraindication or sincerely-held religious belief may request an accommodation (e.g., an exemption) to this requirement.

At The Atlantic, our Work Experience is the combination of everything that’s unique about us: our culture, our core values, our commitment to advancing ideas that matter and sparking global conversation, but most importantly, it’s our people. Our employees are generous, hardworking, curious, trustworthy, humble, and truthful. They live for opportunities to collaborate and make a difference. The Atlantic looks for three \"pillar gifts\" in you, and everyone else. In all of us, these are more aspirational than actual, but they are central in our intentions.

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