Abu Dhabi, UAE · Open to connect

Director of Quality Engineering

Quality leadership at scale.

22+ years leading quality engineering strategy across fintech, banking, and enterprise— building high-performing QA teams, AI-augmented delivery pipelines, and the culture that lets organisations ship with confidence.

22+
Years
25+
Teams Led
7
Global Banks
Pankaj Nakhat
Pankaj Nakhat
Director of Quality Engineering · Abu Dhabi
01 What I'm Doing Now

Directing quality strategy that organisations can actually measure.

22+ years building and leading quality engineering functions— setting the strategy, hiring and growing teams, implementing DORA metrics that stick, and deploying AI-augmented pipelines that cut defect escape rates.

Today I channel that experience into open frameworks, mentorship, and coaching that help QA leaders and their organisations level up.

🤖

AI-Powered Testing

Multi-agent systems for test automation using Playwright, MCP, and LLMs. Practical reliability over self-healing buzzwords.

📊

LLM Evaluation Pipelines

Building evaluation pipelines for RAG systems using DeepEval. Prompt regression testing integrated into CI/CD.

Release & Reliability

Release management, incident response, observability, and DORA metrics wired into how teams actually work.

🎯

Engineering Coaching

ICAgile-certified coaching (ICP-ACC, ICP-ATF) and 1:1 mentorship for engineers, leads, and managers.

02 Skills & Stack

22 years. Multiple stacks. One north star.

From trading system reliability at JP Morgan to AI-augmented engineering at enterprise scale—the tools evolve, the engineering principles don't.

Test Automation
Playwright TypeScript Selenium Cypress REST Assured Postman k6 JMeter BDD / Gherkin
AI & LLM Testing
DeepEval MCP Claude API OpenAI RAG Evaluation Prompt Testing Multi-Agent Systems LangChain
CI/CD & DevOps
Azure DevOps GitHub Actions Jenkins Docker Kubernetes DORA Metrics Grafana
Languages
TypeScript Python Java JavaScript Bash SQL
Engineering Leadership
Engineering Strategy Team Scaling Agile Coaching (ICP-ACC) Release Management Incident Management OKR Alignment Technical Roadmapping
Domains
Fintech PropTech Trading Systems Blockchain / DLT Banking Payments Real Estate Tech
05 Background

Built quality practices where failure isn't an option.

Trading systems, blockchain, financial services, real estate tech. Two decades directing how complex, high-stakes organisations think about quality— across four continents and some of the world's most demanding engineering environments.

Investment Banking Global Payments Blockchain / DLT Real Estate Tech Trading Systems Retail Banking
22+
Years directing quality engineering
25+
Engineers led across global teams
7
Tier-1 banks & financial institutions
4
Continents, one quality standard
ThoughtWorks JP Morgan · HSBC · Barclays · UBS R3 Corda Visa Independent
Mentorship & Coaching

Want to grow as an engineer or engineering leader?

I offer 1:1 mentorship for engineers and leads navigating AI in engineering, career transitions, platform reliability, or technical leadership challenges. Also available for team and organisational agile coaching (ICP-ACC, ICP-ATF).

Let's talk.

I write about engineering reliability, AI in software delivery, and building high-performing teams. Reach me on LinkedIn—or email directly.