Senior Configuration Engineer, Quality Assurance

The job responsibilities outlined in this document are not exhaustive and may evolve over time and be reviewed according to business needs.

ROLE DESCRIPTION SUMMARY

• The Senior Configuration Engineer (QA) ensures the integrity, consistency, and traceability of integrated systems across Development, QA, and Production environments. Operating at the intersection of software engineering, systems integration, and DevOps disciplines, the role serves as the configuration authority and primary liaison between development, operations, and quality assurance teams within satellite or ground infrastructure programmes. The ideal candidate combines a rigorous QA mindset with hands-on configuration management expertise, a solid understanding of software versioning and deployment toolchains, and familiarity with space and ground segment architectures.

PRIMARY RESPONSIBILITIES / KEY RESULT AREAS

Environment Configuration & Integration

• Define, maintain, and enforce configuration baselines across Dev, QA, and Production environments for integrated software and hardware systems.
• Define, validate, and control application configuration parameters per environment (e.g., runtime variables, feature flags, service endpoints, credential references), ensuring the correct parameter sets are applied, baselined, and traceable through approved configuration control.
• Ensure environment parity and full traceability of configuration items (CIs), documenting all deviations and managing change requests through formal configuration control processes.
• Collaborate with DevOps and infrastructure teams to automate configuration management using tools such as Ansible, Puppet, Git, or equivalent.
• Track and manage system dependencies, interface control documents (ICDs), and CIs throughout the program lifecycle.

Version Control & Artifact Management

• In collaboration with Release Management and Change Management, establish and maintain version control conventions for configuration items (CIs), ensuring full auditability and reproducibility of deployed configurations—coordinating with (but not replacing) the development team’s branching practices.
• Ensure that all software artifacts promoted through Dev, QA, and Production are uniquely identified, stored in managed repositories, and traceable to their corresponding configuration baseline.
• Enforce immutability of release artifacts post-baseline to prevent uncontrolled changes from propagating into downstream environments.

CI/CD & DevOps Toolchain (Collaboration & Validation)

• Work with DevOps to define configuration validation requirements and acceptance criteria for CI/CD gates, and support troubleshooting when promotions between environments fail due to configuration issues.
• Review and validate infrastructure-as-code (IaC) definitions (e.g., Ansible, Terraform), actively detecting and resolving configuration drift between declared and actual system states across all environments.
• Support DevOps in validating observability and monitoring setup for each environment following deployment (log aggregation, metrics, alerting), confirming operational readiness before handover to operations.
• Support DevOps and Release Management by reviewing, documenting, and validating rollback and recovery procedures for failed or non-conformant deployments, ensuring the team can rapidly restore a known-good baseline.

Post-Release Validation

• Lead and execute post-release validation activities, verifying runtime application configuration parameters and environment data alignment against approved baselines and acceptance criteria.
• Conduct functional and regression configuration checks following production deployments, coordinating with test and operations teams to resolve discrepancies.
• Produce and maintain post-release validation reports, anomaly logs, and corrective action records.
• Support lessons-learned reviews and feed findings back into configuration and quality improvement processes.

Cross-Team Interface & Coordination

• Act as the primary configuration liaison between software development, hardware engineering, systems integration, quality assurance, and operations teams.
• Chair or participate in Configuration Control Boards (CCBs) ensuring configuration changes are communicated, reviewed, and approved.
• Translate configuration requirements between hardware and software domains, ensuring alignment across multidisciplinary teams.
• Maintain a clear audit trail of configuration decisions and communicate change impacts to stakeholders in a timely and structured manner.

Quality Assurance

• Ensure required test data is loaded and environment configuration is valid for planned test campaigns.
• Provide hands-on support during test campaigns to resolve environment and configuration-related data issues.
• Develop and maintain configuration quality procedures, work instructions, and checklists aligned with applicable standards.
• Identify and report non-conformances, drive root-cause analysis, and monitor corrective and preventive actions (CAPAs) to closure.
• Support internal and external audits related to configuration management and system integrity.
• Perform other configuration and QA-related tasks as required.

COMPETENCIES

• Ability to work in an agile, fast-paced environment and adapt to changing priorities across multiple simultaneous releases.
• Ability to understand and analyze interactions between subsystems (e.g., payload, ground segment, TT&C, software, RF) within a satellite or ground infrastructure ecosystem.
• Strong sense of ownership and accountability for configuration integrity, artifact traceability, and deployment outcomes.
• Demonstrated analytical and problem-solving skills for complex, multi-system and multi-environment scenarios.
• Detail-oriented with a methodical approach to configuration tracking, deployment validation, and documentation.
• Strong cross-functional collaboration skills; able to work effectively with software development, hardware engineering, DevOps, and operations teams.
• Self-motivated with a "doer mentality" and willingness to take initiative without supervision.
• Clear and concise written and verbal communication skills.
• Fluency in spoken and written English; additional languages are considered an asset.

QUALIFICATIONS & EXPERIENCE

• Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Satellite Engineering, SatCom, Ground Engineering, Software Engineering, Electronics, or a related field.
• 3+ years of proven experience in configuration management for complex integrated systems, ideally in satellite, ground segment, or aerospace domains.
• Strong knowledge of configuration management standards and methodologies
• Experience with interface control documents (ICDs), data flows, and integration points between hardware and software components.
• Demonstrated QA experience including quality procedure authoring, conducting audits, and managing non-conformances and CAPAs.