OctoberJob Title: Quality Assurance Manager
Directorate: War Data Platform (WDP) – Mission Execution
JOA: CDAO-2026-000115
Pay Scale: $139,395-$197,200
Open Date: 9 October 2026
Close Date: 23 October 2026
About the Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Office
The Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Office (CDAO) mission is to accelerate the adoption of data, analytics, and artificial intelligence (AI) across the Department of War (DoW). The CDAO works across the Military Departments and Services, Joint Staff, Combatant Commands (CCMDs), Office of the Secretary of War (OSW), and other DoW Components to design, develop, field, and scale technologies, capabilities, strategies, policies, and other guidance related to data, analytics, and AI in support of DoW's warfighting and business functions, including responding to crises and emerging challenges. The CDAO has three broad goals of enabling, speeding, and scaling adoption of AI in the DoW.
The CDAO’s role in facilitating the rapid adoption of frontier AI and autonomy will enable the DoW’s national security objectives by informing future investments into policies, partnerships, and infrastructure, enabling the adoption of AI at scale throughout the department.
As the Quality Assurance Manager for the War Data Platform (WDP) within the Mission Execution Division, you will serve as the senior technical authority and institutional leader responsible for architecting and directing WDP's enterprise data-quality governance, automated quality controls, and compliance oversight functions. Sitting at the intersection of data engineering, platform operations, and enterprise governance, you will establish and enforce rigorous quality standards to ensure that mission-critical data powering applications across the Department of War are accurate, consistent, reliable, available, and fully traceable.
The Quality Assurance Manager will direct a cross-functional quality organization tasked with monitoring complex, cloud-based system-of-systems architectures. They will institute automated data-quality controls across continuous integration/continuous delivery (CI/CD) and data engineering pipelines, lead deep root-cause remediation, enforce vendor and contractor performance against service-level agreements (SLAs), and uphold strict audit readiness and compliance standards (including SOC-1/SOC-2 and BA-08 requirements). Their leadership will ensure that warfighters, senior leadership, and analytical systems can trust every data point across the enterprise platform and leverage them for mission-critical capabilities.
This position is covered by the Department of War (DoW) Civilian Acquisition Workforce Personnel Demonstration Project (AcqDemo). The position is located in Washington, DC. The pay plan for this role is NH-0343-IV, which is equivalent to the GS-14/15 grade level. This role will close for submissions at 11:59pm on October 23rd, 2026.
- Establish and lead WDP's enterprise governance, policy, and compliance oversight functions across the entire platform ecosystem.
- Develop, implement, and enforce enterprise data quality standards, data governance frameworks, and operational performance measurement architectures.
- Lead, mentor, and direct a high-performing, cross-functional quality team to deliver program objectives and sustain an enduring culture of technical rigor and operational accountability.
- Design, deploy, and maintain automated quality controls, integrity validations, and circuit breakers across WDP's cloud-based system-of-systems architecture.
- Integrate comprehensive quality, security, and service-management practices directly into platform engineering processes and continuous integration/continuous delivery (CI/CD) pipelines.
- Ensure all operational and business datasets supporting downstream analytics, dashboarding, and AI models are accurate, consistent, reliable, available, and traceable.
- Establish, govern, and manage continuous-monitoring protocols and alerting systems for data ingestion pipelines, platform microservices, cross-domain interfaces, and end-user application performance.
- Track, evaluate, and report on enterprise-grade performance metrics, including service-level agreements (SLAs), first-call resolution, aging reports, queue management data, escalation trends, and composite system-health indicators.
- Detect and isolate data quality, reliability, and performance anomalies; conduct systemic root-cause investigations; and enforce corrective-action and remediation efforts.
- Conduct recurring quality evaluations, compliance reviews, and financial/technical, data, security and audit-readiness assessments across all WDP software, data, and platform environments.
- Supervise contractor and vendor quality, technical deliverables, and accountability against established SLAs, Performance Work Statements (PWS), and mission-delivery milestones.
- Document contractor performance issues, guide corrective-action plans, and support formal evaluations within federal performance-evaluation systems (e.g., CPARS).
- Coordinate seamlessly across engineering, cybersecurity, acquisition, business stakeholders to proactively manage and mitigate operational, technical, quality, and compliance risks.
- Engage senior leaders across the Department of War, Military Departments, DISA, CDAO, industry partners, OIG, GAO and other reporting and auditing/compliance bodies to report and communicate quality standards, resolve technical escalations, negotiate remediation, and achieve executive alignment.
- Formulate and present authoritative decision memorandums, executive briefings, comprehensive quality reports, technical trade studies, and policy recommendations to senior flag officers and Senior Executive Service (SES) leadership.
- U.S. Citizenship is required.
- Candidate is encouraged to provide e-portfolio, project samples, Github, etc. to their submission package.
- Males born after 12-31-59 must be registered or exempt from Selective Service
- This position is subject to provisions of the WHS/OSW Priority Placement Program (please see details below)
- A three-year trial period may be required if not previously completed a trial or probationary period in the excepted or competitive service
- Must be determined suitable for federal employment.
- Required to participate in the direct deposit program.
- This position is subject to pre-employment and random drug testing.
- We may use this announcement to fill additional vacancies within 90 days of the closing date.
- Recruitment, relocation, or retention incentives may be authorized based on the availability of funds.
- This position requires a Top Secret/ Sensitive Compartmented Information (SCI) security clearance.
- If you are a veteran claiming veteran's preference, as defined by Section 2108 of Title 5 U.S.C., you must submit documents verifying your eligibility with your application package.
- This position may require work other than normal duty hours, which may include evenings, weekends, and/or holidays and/or mandatory overtime.
- This position may occasionally require travel away from the normal duty station via military or commercial aircraft.
Priority Placement Program Details
Military Spouse Preference (MSP) Eligible: Military Spouse Preference applicants, must be selected and placed at the highest grade level for which they have applied and been determined best qualified up to and including the full performance level. You must include a completed copy of the Military Spouse PPP Self-Certification Checklist dated within 30 days along with the documents identified on the checklist to verify your eligibility for Military Spouse Preference.
Military Reserve (MR) and National Guard (NG) Technicians PPP Eligible: MR and NG technicians PPP applicants must be selected and placed at the full performance level if determined well qualified. You must include a completed copy of the Military Reserve and National Guard Technician PPP Self-Certification Checklist to verify your eligibility for Military Reserve and National Guard Technician preference.
Military Reserve (MR) and National Guard (NG) Technicians Receiving Disability Retirement PPP Eligible: MR and NG technicians receiving disability retirement PPP applicants must be selected and placed at the full performance level if determined well qualified. You must include a completed copy of the Military Reserve and National Guard Technician Disability PPP Self-Certification Checklist to verify your eligibility for Military Reserve and National Guard Technician Disability preference.
Retained Grade PPP Eligible: Retained Grade PPP applicants, must be selected and placed at the full performance level if determined well qualified. You must include a completed copy of the Retained Grade PPP Self-Certification Checklist to verify your eligibility for Retained Grade preference.