Performance Test Lead - Sheffield/Hybrid - £500.00 Per Day PAYE

Role Summary

We are looking for a highly skilled Performance & Non-Functional Testing Lead with strong expertise in validating the scalability, resilience, and operational readiness of complex, cloud-based services (eg, Google Cloud Platform).

This role focuses on defining and delivering a programme-wide Performance & Non-Functional Testing strategy, translating non-functional requirements into measurable outcomes, and executing robust testing across load, stress, volume, failover, high availability, and disaster recovery scenarios.

Using a quality-first, engineering-led approach, you'll collaborate closely with Scrum teams, Architects, DevOps, Product, and support teams to embed Performance & Non-Functional Testing into delivery pipelines, provide clear risk-based reporting, and drive performance insights and remediation that enable safe, scalable releases.

Key Responsibilities:

• Own the overall programme's Performance & Non-Functional Testing capability end-to-end.
• Own and maintain the Performance & Non-Functional Testing strategy and roadmap for the programme.
• Define and execute Performance & Non-Functional Testing strategies across services, mentor testers, and collaborate with Scrum teams, Architects, DevOps, and support teams to ensure systems are scalable, reliable, and performant under load.
• Bring deep test management expertise, including Performance & Non-Functional Testing processes and standards, with experience defining long-term strategy (tooling, environments, and resourcing) and gathering non-functional requirements for complex, global transformation programmes.
• Propose tooling selection and approach and make recommendations for proving functionality through proof of concept (PoC) where required.
• Deliver Performance & Non-Functional Testing for cloud-based applications (eg, GCP).
• Plan Performance & Non-Functional Testing coverage and test frequency across the programme.
• Oversee delivery and execution of Performance & Non-Functional Testing, including progress and completion reporting, metrics/dashboards, and end-to-end defect management.
• Monitor, analyse, and report key non-functional KPIs during the test process.
• Analyse test execution using profilers, logs, and system statistics; identify bottlenecks and recommend remediation actions.
• Collaborate cross-functionally with product managers, designers, and engineers to define requirements, devise solution strategies, and ensure seamless integration and alignment with business objectives.
• Maintain a strong team-player mindset and contribute positively to delivery outcomes.
• Produce high-quality documentation, visualisations, and presentations that provide clear insight into landscape quality and readiness.
• Ensure audit and log retention testing is planned and executed.
• Prepare and present test reports and analysis to stakeholders, providing clear insight into quality, risk, and release readiness.
• Ensure integration of Performance & Non-Functional Testing tools and results into CI/CD pipelines and reporting frameworks.

Required Skills:

• Proven experience delivering high-volume Performance & Non-Functional Testing in complex global environments, including load, stress, volume, disaster recovery, high availability, resilience, and failover testing.
• Experience selecting and recommending test tools based on assessment of the environment/landscape.
• Experience defining a comprehensive Performance & Non-Functional Testing strategy covering approach, environments, scope, risks, and resourcing.
• Strong understanding of cloud (eg, GCP) Performance & Non-Functional Testing approaches and methodologies.
• Experience delivering within both Agile and Waterfall methodologies.
• Ability to review and provide feedback on complex architecture, solution, and integration documentation.
• Clear, open, and timely communication and reporting skills, including accurate status, risks, and issues.
• Ability to recognise risks and issues and raise/escalate appropriately and promptly.
• Ability to lead other Performance & Non-Functional Testing engineers when required.
• Expert knowledge of JMeter, Gatling, LoadRunner, NeoLoad (or similar) for load, stress, and volume testing, including licensing considerations, configuration, dashboards, and reporting.
• Expert-level knowledge of Performance & Non-Functional Testing for containerised, serverless, and cloud-native applications, leveraging security, monitoring, alerting, and Infrastructure-as-Code (IaC) tools.
• Strong coding/Scripting skills (eg, Python, Java, Cypher, Scala).
• GDBMS performance analysis: database performance tuning, query optimisation, connection pooling, and use of database monitoring tools.
• Experience testing graph database management systems (GDBMS).
• Graph platform engineering experience, including Neo4j basics, backups, recovery and disaster recovery, GDS/APOC, and observability.
• Message queue performance experience: testing and analysing throughput, ingestion, integration layer velocity, consumer lag, and event-driven architecture performance.
• Familiarity with ServiceNow, Active Directory, and AWS/Azure integrations.
• Experience testing functions and decision points as code (eg, policy-as-code).
• Exposure to GitOps repositories; hands-on experience is highly desirable.
• Hands-on experience with API testing, API gateway testing, batch/ETL testing, test data generation, and mocking.
• Good understanding of security vulnerabilities and non-functional considerations including disaster recovery, failover, operational acceptance testing, volume, and compliance testing.
• Proven team leadership and management capability, including mentoring and developing engineers.

Desired Skills:

• Experience testing Identity & Access Management applications/infrastructure or other complex end-to-end infrastructure platforms.
• Experience running PoCs for new and emerging tooling.
• Experience with APM and monitoring tools (eg, AppDynamics, Datadog, GCP monitoring suite, or equivalent).
• Ability to integrate Performance & Non-Functional Testing into GitLab CI/CD pipelines and implement shift-left practices.
• Experience with Pub/Sub and MQ technologies.
• Experience with GCP cloud testing approaches and methodology.
• Experience with SaaS testing approaches.
• Understanding of Docker/Kubernetes performance implications, resource limits, and orchestration impact on application performance.
• Ability to establish Performance & Non-Functional Testing standards, best practices, and governance frameworks across an organisation.
• Exposure to DevSecOps ways of working.