Quality Engineering Architect

• Reporting into the QE Architect Lead, defining and implementing the quality engineering approach for assigned domains and products.
• Driving adoption of quality engineering frameworks, standards and automation-first practices across delivery teams.
• Hybrid working: 80% homeworking and 20% from Stratford-upon-Avon.

About the role:

Join NFU Mutual as we continue to build our Quality Engineering Centre of Excellence. This is an exciting opportunity to help transform how quality is embedded throughout the product lifecycle, enabling delivery teams to improve speed, confidence and customer outcomes.

We're looking for a Quality Engineering Architect to provide technical leadership across assigned domains and products. Working closely with Engineers, Product Teams, Architects and Quality Engineers, you'll help design and implement modern quality engineering approaches, and automation strategies that support scalable, secure and reliable delivery.

You will play a key role in evolving and embedding the Quality Engineering Framework, creating patterns, standards, guardrails and reusable assets that enable teams to integrate quality into every stage of change lifecycle. You'll support the adoption of automation-first approaches, contribute to the evaluation of emerging technologies including AI and GenAI, and help shape the future direction of quality engineering across NFU Mutual.

Working across multiple teams, you'll provide expert guidance on quality engineering architecture, automation frameworks, tooling and technical approaches. You'll partner with Senior Quality Engineers and delivery teams to address complex quality challenges, manage technical dependencies and improve engineering effectiveness through coaching, mentoring and technical leadership.

A key aspect of the role is using data-driven insights to identify trends, risks and opportunities for improvement. You'll help delivery teams measure quality outcomes, improve automation effectiveness and support compliance, governance and regulatory requirements through clear, evidence-based recommendations.

This is a Stratford-upon-Avon based role with 80% homeworking and 20% office presence.

About you:

You're an experienced Quality Engineering professional with a strong background in test architecture, automation and modern software engineering practices. You are passionate technical leader, improving quality outcomes through technical innovation, coaching and collaboration.

You bring excellent communication and stakeholder management skills, building trusted relationships across delivery, engineering and architecture communities. You are comfortable influencing without direct authority, balancing strategic thinking with pragmatic delivery and driving adoption of best practice across complex environments.

You'll also bring (essential)

• Proven experience designing and implementing quality engineering frameworks, automation strategies and test architecture approaches.
• Strong understanding of modern engineering practices including CI/CD, test automation and DevOps.
• Experience with automation frameworks and tools such as Playwright, Selenium, Rest Assured or equivalent.
• Strong knowledge of software development lifecycles, systems integration and quality engineering practices.
• Experience providing technical coaching, mentoring and guidance to engineers and quality professionals.
• Ability to analyse quality metrics, identify trends and use data to influence decision making.

At NFU Mutual, we support an inclusive workplace and value all the differences that make us unique. We celebrate the creativity and innovation that comes from diverse perspectives and experiences and share a common vision of doing the right thing for our customers and employees.

We recognise that some candidates may experience barriers during the recruitment process. So, we encourage candidates to discuss any adjustments or accommodations they need to be the best they can be throughout our recruitment process.

We're proud to be a Disability Confident Employer, a Race at Work and Women in Finance Charter signatory and welcome applications from people of all backgrounds, regardless of age, ethnicity, disability, neurodiversity, gender, religion, marital status, sexual orientation, or socioeconomic background.

Benefits and Rewards:

• Salary - Circa £65,000
• Annual bonus (up to 17.5% of salary)
• Contributory pension scheme, up to 20%, including your 8% contribution
• 25 days annual leave + bank holidays + buy/sell/save holiday trading scheme
• A Family Friendly policy that helps you balance your work and family responsibilities
• Access to savings at High Street brands, travel and supermarkets
• £20 contribution to a monthly gym membership – subject to T&Cs
• Health and wellbeing plan - cashback for dentist, opticians, physio and more
• Access to voluntary benefits, including health assessments, private medical insurance and dental insurance
• Employee Volunteering - volunteer in the community for one day each year
• Unlimited access to Refer a Friend £500 bonus scheme
• Life Assurance cover of 4 x salary
• Employee discounts of 15% on a range of NFU Mutual insurance policies.
• Salary sacrifice employee car scheme - subject to eligibility

Working at NFU Mutual:

We’re one of the UK’s leading general insurance and financial services organisations, and for over 110 years we’ve put our customers at the heart of everything we do. Our people are just as important to us, so we’re proud to be recognised as “a great place to work”.

Our Gallup Exceptional Workplace 2026 award was not only awarded with Distinction, but it also marked us as the first UK based company to earn a Gallup Exceptional Workplace award for eleven consecutive years. We’ve also been consistently recognised by Glassdoor. We appeared in the Glassdoor Best Places to Work UK list in 2023, 2024 and 2026 — and in 2026, we were the highest ranked insurance business in the UK, highlighting our strong employee experience and the positive feedback our people share on the platform.

Additionally, we were named in the LinkedIn Top Companies 2026 list of “Best midsize employers to grow your career in the UK”, and we’ve been certified as a UK Top Employer by the Top Employers Institute in 2023, 2024, 2025 and 2026.

We offer a supportive and empowering culture where people are inspired to perform, given opportunities to grow, and recognised and rewarded for their contribution. Our people are proud to work for a company that respects them and their communities, and they trust us to be financially sustainable—so we’re successful now and in the future.