Senior Test Engineer (MI5)

About Us 

MI5 keeps the country safe from serious threats like terrorism and attempts by states to harm the UK, its people and way of life.  We carry out investigations by obtaining, analysing, and assessing intelligence, and then work with a range of partners including MI6 and GCHQ to disrupt threats.  Through our protective security arm, we provide advice and guidance to government, businesses, and other organisations about how to keep themselves safe.  A role in MI5 means you’ll do unique and challenging work in a supportive and encouraging environment, making a real difference to UK national security. 

The Role                           

As a Senior Test Engineer, you could lead testing across several multidisciplinary teams or take responsibility for a particular testing specialism, where you’ll act as a subject matter expert. Either way, you’ll help to ensure MI5 is always ahead in a rapidly evolving digital world. 

You’ll set the test direction and support decision-making. while setting the standard for what good test engineering looks like. Working closely with product owners and other specialists to build and run secure products, you’ll champion the importance of accessibility and usability testing. 

You’ll also find ways to constantly improve yourself and your team, building effective relationships across our customer teams and the wider organisation. Sharing innovative ways of working and mentoring less experienced colleagues, you’ll promote best practice, participate in guilds, and encourage cross-organisation initiatives to help build our community of engineers. 

In addition, you’ll contribute to a development, security, and operations (DevSecOps) environment, where our teams automate, run and support what we build. For example, you could be testing a platform to enable the analysis of data systems to track the progress of our investigations, or compliance services to ensure we’re operating legally, or tooling to improve our developer experience. 

Our engineers have access to a career where they can move between teams to build experience in a wide number of technologies or develop a deep specialism. You’ll set the standard for what good looks like, sharing digital and innovative ways of working with the team and across DDaT (Digital, Data and Technology progression capability framework) skills community.

The nature of our work presents unique and fascinating engineering challenges – the likes of which you won’t have seen before.   

About You 

You’re an experienced Test Engineer, and you’ve worked with a broad range of testing techniques. You’re able to make technical decisions across multiple teams, and take responsibility as an expert for a particular specialism.

It’s important that you’re able to develop tests in at least one common language, because our tech stacks vary between products (Java, C#, React.js, Oracle, Mongo, Elastic Search and Hadoop to name a few). We make use of cloud technologies (such as AWS and Azure), and we use agile methodologies to deliver products that are core to MI5 operations. So you also need to demonstrate an understanding of these different tools and techniques, and know how to implement them with security in mind.   

Crucially, we value good communication and collaboration skills. You’ll understand how to communicate complex messages clearly, working collaboratively to ensure the team owns and drives forward the solution that delivers the right results. In addition, you’re able to actively encourage engineers to learn about our mission. 

Training and Development 

Learning and development is central to our engineering ethos. That’s why we invest heavily in our people. Here, you’ll have the opportunity to move between teams, build experience in a wide number of technologies or develop a deep specialism. 

As part of your MI5 career, we’ll support you in broadening and deepening both your technical and non-technical skills. We use The Digital Data and Technology (DDaT) capability framework as a compass to provide the guidance, tools and support that will enable you to progress in your career. 

Through the various learning and development opportunities we offer, you could:

• Attend conferences and hackathons
• Have up to 20% innovation and personal development time
• Be involved with our internal communities
• Benefit from our internal development programmes
• Become certified or maintain your certification, such as AWS Certifications
• Access a wide variety of classroom and online learning
• Gain professional membership and accreditations such as Institute for Engineering and Technology (IET) and the British Computing Society (BCS) 
• Enjoy opportunities to try mission-related training

Rewards and Benefits

You’ll receive a starting salary of £68,461- 83,629 dependent on skills, experience and location plus other benefits including:

• 25 Days annual leave automatically rising to 30 days after 5 years' service, and an additional 10.5 days public and privilege holidays
• Opportunities to be recognised through our employee performance scheme
• Personal Learning Budget 
• Interest-free season ticket loan
• Excellent pension scheme
• Cycle to work scheme
• Facilities such as a gym, restaurant, and on-site coffee bars (at some locations)
• Paid parental and adoption leave.

Equal opportunities

At MI5 diversity and inclusion are critical to our mission. To protect the UK, we need a truly diverse workforce that reflects the society we serve. This includes diversity in every sense of the word: those with different backgrounds, ages, ethnicities, gender identities, sexual orientations, ways of thinking and those with disabilities or neurodivergent conditions. We therefore welcome and encourage applications from everyone, including those from groups that are under-represented in our workforce such as women, those from an ethnic minority background, people with disabilities and those from low socio-economic backgrounds.

Find out more about our culture, working environment and diversity on our website:

https://www.era.gov.uk/careers/diversity

We’re Disability Confident

MI5  is proud to have achieved Leader status within the DWP’s Disability Confident scheme.  This is aimed at encouraging employers to think differently about disability and take action to improve how they recruit, retain, and develop disabled people.  Being Disability Confident, we aim to offer a person-to-person interview to any candidate who self-identifies as disabled and meets the essential criteria for the role.  This is our ‘Offer of Interview’ (OOI). To secure an interview for this vacancy, the essential criteria (in order of application process) are: 

• You’ll be invited to upload your CV and complete an online application form.
• We’ll then sift your application, looking for your motivation and skills, knowledge and experience that match the role
• If you pass, you’ll be invited to an interview where you will be asked questions relating to your motivation, our core competencies and technical skill-based questions aligned with the DDaT (Digital Data and Technology) capability framework for the role.
• If you pass, you’ll start our vetting process.

What to Expect

Our recruitment process is fair, transparent, and based on merit. Here is a brief overview of each stage, in order:

• You’ll be invited to upload your CV and complete an online application form.
• We’ll then sift your application, looking for your motivation and skills, knowledge and experience that match the role
• If you pass, you’ll be invited to an interview where you will be asked questions relating to your motivation, our core competencies, and technical skill-based questions, aligned with the DDaT (Digital Data and Technology) capability framework for the role.
• If you pass, you’ll start our vetting process

Please note, you must successfully pass each stage of the process to progress to the next. Your application may take around 6 - 9 months to process including vetting, so we advise you to continue any current employment until you have received your final job offer.

Before You Apply

To work at MI5, you need to be a British citizen or hold dual British nationality. You can read our full eligibility criteria here. (Penna link to appropriate website Eligibility sections)

This role requires the highest security clearance, known as Developed Vetting (DV).  It’s something everyone in the UK Intelligence Community undertakes.  You can find out more about the vetting process here (Penna link to org website vetting page).

Please note we have a strict drugs policy, so once you start your application, you can’t take any recreational drugs and you’ll need to declare your previous drug usage at the relevant stage.

The role is based in Central London or Greater Manchester, so you’ll need to live within a commutable distance.  Please consider any financial implications and practicalities before submitting an application.  An interest-free loan via our benevolent fund is available to assist with relocating into privately rented accommodation to take up the offer of employment.

Please note, you should only launch your application from within the UK. If you are based overseas, you should wait until you visit the UK to launch an application. Applying from outside the UK will impact on our ability to progress your application. You should not discuss your application, other than with your partner or a close family member. 

Right to Withdraw Statement: 

Please be aware that we withhold the right to bring forward the closing date for this role from the original closing date once a certain number of applications have been received. Please be mindful of this and submit your application at your earliest convenience to avoid disappointment.