Group IT Test & Release Manager

Salary

£60,000 - 70,000 per year

• We are looking for significant experience in test management, release management, or quality engineering leadership.
• We need experience managing testing and releases across complex enterprise application landscapes.
• We value strong understanding of enterprise SaaS platforms such as Workday, Freshworks, ERP, or other integrated business systems.
• We require experience working in agile, hybrid, or fast-paced transformation environments.
• We need strong knowledge of ITIL change, release, and service transition principles.
• We value experience coordinating multiple concurrent releases and delivery streams.
• We require strong understanding of API testing, integration testing, data validation, defect management, environment management, and production readiness.
• We need excellent stakeholder management and communication skills.
• We require the ability to work across applications, infrastructure, security, data, suppliers and business teams.
• We value a practical approach to governance with the ability to maintain control without unnecessary bureaucracy.
• We require strong attention to detail, organisation and ownership.
• It would be helpful to have experience in operationally intensive or multi‑site businesses, large‑scale transformation programmes, ERP environments, Azure Dev Ops, Jira, Service Now, test automation, CI/CD practices, ITIL certification or ISTQB qualifications.

• We will rely on you to define, implement and improve the enterprise‑wide testing and release management framework.
• We will expect you to establish consistent testing standards, governance processes and quality gates across technology and transformation projects.
• We will need you to own end‑to‑end testing activities including test planning, SIT, UAT, regression testing, integration testing, release validation and production verification.
• We will expect you to ensure testing coverage across business processes, integrations, data flows and operational dependencies.
• We will ask you to introduce risk‑based testing approaches that support fast‑paced transformation delivery.
• We will need you to identify opportunities to introduce automation and improve quality, repeatability and delivery speed.
• We will rely on you to manage defect governance, including prioritisation, root cause tracking and remediation.
• We will ask you to own and govern the release management lifecycle across multiple platforms, suppliers and delivery teams.
• We will expect you to coordinate releases across critical systems including Workday, Freshworks and integrated enterprise platforms.
• We will need you to manage release calendars, dependencies, approvals, rollback plans and operational readiness.
• We will ask you to oversee environment governance, release readiness and refresh cycles.
• We will expect you to work with infrastructure, security, platform engineering and third‑party suppliers to support successful release delivery.
• We will need you to provide clear reporting on testing progress, release readiness, quality risks and delivery status.
• We will expect you to support agile delivery teams while maintaining strong governance and operational control.
• We will ask you to drive continuous improvement across testing, release and deployment processes.
• We will need you to support post‑implementation reviews and contribute to lessons learned following incidents or major releases.

• API
• Azure
• CI/CD
• Dev Ops
• ERP
• ISTQB
• Support
• ITIL
• JIRA
• Security
• Service Now
• Cloud
• Embedded

We are Panda, a leading resource recovery business with almost 3,000 people across multiple brands, and we are committed to protecting our people, supporting our customers and creating positive impact for the communities and environments we serve. We are going through a major business and technology transformation, and this UK‑based Group IT role sits within our Group IT function, reporting to the Head of Group IT Solutions & Data Platforms.

This is a key opportunity to shape how technology change is delivered across our organisation, build modern and scalable testing and release practices, and work closely with senior stakeholders on critical transformation programmes. We value people, excellence, ownership and trust and integrity, and we are committed to attracting and retaining a skilled and diverse workforce that reflects the communities in which we operate.

last updated 25 week of 2026