Test Manager / Verification and Validation Manager

Description About Leidos Australia At Leidos Australia, our work goes beyond a job title. We design, build, operate and support the systems, services and capabilities that help protect and advance the Australian way of life. Backed by a global organisation of more than 40,000 people, our Australian team of around 2,000 has partnered with government, defence and national security customers for more than 30 years. We deliver mission-critical solutions where reliability, trust and purpose matter. Leidos is a destination for people who want their work to have purpose, their contribution to be recognised, and their career to grow without needing to fit a single mould. Meaningful work is supported by benefits, flexibility and career pathways that help you grow while balancing life outside work. This includes: Flex Your Way - Tailor work to your life with options including Life Days (up to 12 extra days off per year), part-time arrangements, job sharing, and compressed hours. Wellbeing That Matters - Free access to Headspace and MeQuilibrium, plus dedicated wellness spaces to support your mental, physical, and emotional wellbeing. Learn Without Limits - Access over 120,000 on-demand courses, alongside technical, project management, leadership, and professional development opportunities. Work That Makes an Impact - Contribute to nationally significant projects that matter, solve complex challenges, and accelerate your career through unique growth opportunities. Build Your Future - Whether you're deepening technical expertise or preparing for leadership, we'll invest in your development every step of the way. And Much More - These are just a few of the ways we invest in our people and help them thrive. About the Team You'll join a team where people work with integrity, inclusion, innovation, agility, collaboration and commitment. In practice, that means sharing ownership, solving complex problems together and staying connected to the customer context, the purpose behind the work and how each role contributes to meaningful outcomes. Mission Software Systems (MSS) brings together expertise across intelligence, software, and cloud to deliver end-to-end capability supporting the full intelligence lifecycle, from planning through to dissemination and feedback. The team fosters a culture of innovation, leveraging modern engineering practices and shared infrastructure to rapidly build, test, and deploy software solutions across a range of environments, including cloud. MSS also plays a key role in advancing technology modernisation within Government, delivering scalable and adaptable solutions for complex enterprise challenges. The Opportunity As the Test Manager / Verification and Validation Manager, you will be the senior technical authority responsible for establishing and leading the verification, validation and testing approach for a complex Defence capability. Working across engineering, delivery, quality, customer and supplier teams, you will ensure system requirements are supported by objective evidence, technical risks are understood, and delivered solutions are assessed against their intended purpose and acceptance criteria. In this role, you will: Lead the development and governance of the program's Verification, Validation and Test (V&V) strategy, establishing a structured, traceable and auditable framework that supports the delivery of a complex Defence capability. Provide technical leadership across all phases of testing, including system, subsystem, software, hardware, interface, integration and operational testing, ensuring requirements are verified through controlled evidence and clear acceptance pathways. Drive test readiness and assurance activities by defining entry and exit criteria, leading readiness reviews, assessing defects and technical risks, and providing evidence-based recommendations on quality, release readiness and customer acceptance. Partner with customers, delivery teams, engineering disciplines, subcontractors and suppliers to coordinate complex testing activities, improve assurance practices, strengthen V&V capability and help deliver mission-critical outcomes. About You You are an experienced testing and assurance leader who combines technical expertise with the ability to influence stakeholders, navigate complexity and provide objective advice in support of critical engineering outcomes. You enjoy building structure, leading multidisciplinary teams and ensuring decisions are grounded in evidence, quality and risk-based thinking. Essential for this role: Extensive experience leading verification, validation, testing or systems assurance activities within large-scale or technically complex programs, including the development and governance of test strategies, master test plans and integrated V&V frameworks. Comprehensive understanding of the testing lifecycle, including planning, design, preparation, execution, reporting and closure, together with experience defining test readiness revi