Director, Software Engineering in Test; SET

Position: Director, Software Engineering in Test (SET)
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* Job Description:

** Pacific Life is investing in bright, agile, and diverse talent to contribute to our mission of innovating our business and technology to support a superior customer experience. We are actively seeking a talented Director of Software Engineering in Test (SET) to join our Pacific Life Technology team. This new role will report to the VP, Engineering Excellence.

The role is based in Newport Beach, CA (hybrid), and works with a diverse group of business and technology leaders ensuring delivery teams have the direction and tools needed for success.

As a Director of Software Engineering in Test within Pacific Life Technology, you will play a key role in Pacific Life’s growth and long-term success, developing and executing upon the overall strategy and roadmap for the ecosystem of technology driving quality assurance engineering excellence across Pacific Life.

The Director of Software Engineering in Test does more than test software. Principally, they embrace the "automate everything" philosophy and function well in changing environments along with driving ‘quality by design’ as a central tenet of software development at Pacific Life. They take the lead in performance and security testing to build resilient systems and use automated and manual testing to efficiently test system functionality without compromising quality.

This leader is a champion of engineering excellence at Pacific Life, owning and driving best-in-class quality engineering activities, processes, and people across the organization globally. In addition, they establish and advance software engineering in test (SET) practices, ensuring that testing is an integral part of the development lifecycle by embedding test automation and quality checks within the software engineering process.

The Director also leverages AI to provide intelligent automation for QA and SET approaches to accelerate defect detection, optimize test coverage, and continuously improve testing efficiency and effectiveness, keeping Pacific Life at the forefront of technology-driven testing and quality assurance
** How you will make an impact**:
** Standardization & Automation
*** Engineer and maintain automation frameworks that support both manual and automated testing, integrating best practices from software engineering in test (SET).
* Lead the development of standardized testing frameworks and environments to enable functional, integration, system, and scale testing across PL Engineering
* Ensure performance and quality products are in line with best practices and standards on testing, engineering excellence and quality management, and evaluate emerging trends for potential implementation
** QA Enablement & Engineering Culture
*** Foster a federated engineering culture that empowers teams through centralized solutions for standardized SET and QA practices and tools.
* Drive mindshare and collaboration for efficiency via reusability and knowledge sharing.
* Champion communication to validate and clarify context and alignment across engineering teams. Champion quality, driving increased efficiency and effectiveness while partnering with enterprise programs to develop test strategies, benchmark and monitor team performance, and assist teams in solving problems
* Ensure software engineering standards and practices related to quality are ingrained in all design and development
* Prioritize and deliver iteratively in a continuously changing environment
* Work with Operations to set practices, policies, processes, frameworks to run tests in production environments after deployment
** AI-Assisted QA and SET Engineering
*** Advance the adoption of AI-powered testing practices, including agent-based automation for test generation, code reviews, incident triage, and self-healing test frameworks.
* Experiment with and deploy AI/ML-driven solutions to analyze legacy applications, optimize test coverage, and orchestrate SDLC workflows with minimal human intervention.
* Lead the transition from basic automation to intelligent, adaptive assurance, leveraging AI maturity models to guide strategic transformation.
** Quality Metrics & Continuous Improvement
*** Establish and…