Performance Test Lead

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Role Overview

The Performance Testing Lead (Performance Engineering) will be responsible for driving end-to-end performance engineering initiatives across complex distributed systems. This role requires deep hands-on expertise in performance test planning, scripting, execution, and analysis, along with strong leadership, stakeholder management, and process establishment skills. The candidate will lead performance testing activities, identify bottlenecks, recommend optimization strategies, build Performance COE standards, and mentor team members.

Key Responsibilities

1. Performance Test Planning & Strategy Develop comprehensive performance test plans, test strategies, and performance NFR collection frameworks. Define performance KPIs such as response time SLAs, throughput targets, error thresholds, scalability, and stability criteria. Identify appropriate test scenarios and workload models based on production usage patterns. Drive detailed capacity planning discussions with architects and infrastructure teams.

2. Performance Scripting, Execution & Tools Expertise Lead the creation and enhancement of performance test scripts using: JMeter (primary) LoadRunner or Subject7 (good to have) Ensure correlation, parameterization, think times, cookies, session handling, and dynamic data management. Set up and execute Load, Stress, Endurance, Spike, Soak, Volume, and Scalability tests.

3. Performance Analysis & Bottleneck Identification Perform in-depth analysis of: Throughput Response times Concurrency behavior Error patterns Identify root causes of performance issues across: Application layer Middleware Database Network Infrastructure Conduct detailed bottleneck analysis, memory leak detection, deadlock identification, and thread utilization studies.

4. Monitoring & Diagnostics Expert-level experience in server resource monitoring, including: CPU, Memory, GC, Disk I/O, Network usage Thread dumps, Heap dumps, JFR profiles Hands-on with APM tools: Dynatrace, New Relic, AppDynamics, Elastic, or equivalent Monitor database performance: Deadlocks, slow queries, indexing issues, locking/blocking Experienced in monitoring Websocket, TCP/IP, RabbitMQ, and asynchronous messaging performance.

5. Technology & Protocol Expertise Experience working on complex, distributed, and real-time systems. Hands-on experience with testing: Web applications WebSockets TCP/IP protocols RabbitMQ queues REST/SOAP APIs Good to have: Material Handling / Warehouse Automation domain experience.

6. Reporting & Documentation Create detailed performance execution reports, trend analysis, and recommendation documents. Present performance findings, risks, and bottleneck analysis to senior stakeholders. Document test results using clear charts, graphs, trends, and actionable insights.

7. Leadership & Stakeholder Management Manage cross-functional communication across engineering, architecture, DevOps, product, and business teams. Drive stakeholder alignment on performance SLAs, risks, and release readiness. Mentor junior performance engineers, manage task allocations, and conduct technical reviews. Facilitate performance triage calls and lead war rooms for critical issues.

8. Performance Center of Excellence (COE) Define and implement performance testing best practices, frameworks, and reusable asset libraries. Establish organization-wide performance engineering processes, including: Shift-left performance practices CI/CD pipeline integration Early performance code profiling Drive the adoption of performance guidelines across application teams.

Required Skills & Qualifications

• 810 years of industry experience in Performance Testing & Engineering.
• Strong expertise in JMeter, LoadRunner, Subject7 or similar tools.
• Deep understanding of performance fundamentals, workload models, tuning, and optimization.
• Strong debugging and root-cause analysis capabilities.
• Knowledge of Linux/Unix commands, server performance utilities, and system profiling tools.
• Strong SQL skills and understanding of DB internals.
• Experience with microservices, distributed systems, cloud (AWS/Azure/GCP) is a plus.
• Excellent communication, documentation, and stakeholder management skills.
• Ability to lead, mentor, and grow a technical team.
• Good to Have Domain experience in Material Handling, Warehouse Management, Automated Systems, or Robotics.
• Knowledge of container platforms (Docker/Kubernetes).
• Experience integrating performance tests into CI/CD pipelines.

Soft Skills

• Strong analytical thinking and problem-solving capability.
• Comfortable handling high-pressure production performance issues.
• Strong leadership, mentoring, and communication abilities.
• Ability to influence without authority and drive performance engineering mindset across teams.