SME Quality Assurance Specialist

GovCIO is seeking a SMEQuality Assurance Specialist to support a critical government computer system for the U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) Software Yard – Product Delivery Service. This role is primarily responsible for writing, refining, and translating customer operational needs into clear, testable, and actionable requirements for applications developed by platform-aligned Product Teams. This position will be located in Kearneysville, WV, and will be a hybrid position.

As a SME Quality Assurance Specialist, you will serve as a primary technical resource for ensuring delivered software products meet user needs, achieve operational adoption, and sustain mission performance. You will ensure that all requirements provide a solid foundation for user-centric design, robust testing, and rapid deployment. Key responsibilities include:

• Facilitate user engagement sessions and workshops to capture operational needs, clarify ambiguities, and translate them into actionable software requirements.
• Write, refine, and maintain comprehensive customer requirements documents, user stories, and acceptance criteria.
• Ensure all requirements are testable, traceable, and aligned with mission objectives to support robust automated and manual quality assurance testing.
• Assist Product Owners and end users in articulating their functional needs and prioritizing requirements based on operational impact and urgency.
• Collaborate closely with development teams and platform-aligned Product Teams to ensure requirements are technically feasible and accurately incorporated into product backlogs.
• Maintain rigorous requirements documentation and matrices that support test planning, user acceptance testing (UAT), and user training frameworks.
• Support modern software delivery models within the Software Yard to enable reliable, secure, and rapid deployment of mission-critical software.
• Ensure all documented requirements and product baselines comply with federal software standards and government compliance regulations.

High School with 9+ years (or commensurate experience)

Required Skills & Experience 

• Proven experience facilitating user discovery sessions and translating complex operational workflows into structured functional requirements.
• Comprehensive operational understanding of software testing lifecycles, traceability matrices, and defining clear, testable criteria for developers.
• Strong experience collaborating with Product Owners, end users, and engineering teams to refine, manage, and prioritize product backlogs.
• Proficiency using modern Agile tools (such as Jira, Azure DevOps, or ServiceNow) to document, track, and manage requirements throughout the software development lifecycle.
• Strong foundational understanding of diverse IT domains, user-centric design principles, software quality gating, and release planning. 

Clearance Required: Active Secret Clearance

Preferred Skills & Experience

• Experience supporting U.S. Coast Guard, Software Yard, or Department of Homeland Security (DHS) programs.
• Familiarity with USCG mission software systems, maritime operational contexts, or PEO C5I environments.
• Relevant professional certifications preferred (e.g., Certified Software Quality Analyst (CSQA), ISTQB Certified Tester, or Agile/Scrum certifications like PMI-PBA or PSPO).
• Experience transitioning programs from legacy workflows to modern DevOps/DevSecOps software delivery models.
• Understanding of automated testing frameworks and how requirements feed into behavioral-driven or test-driven development processes.