Lead QAE Consultant - Walter Everett : Job Details

About Us:

Walter Everett is a recruitment company partnering with a global consultancy to find a highly skilled Head of Automation - Framework Architect..

Key Responsibilities:

• Consultancy Experience: Client-facing, advocating for automation testing, involved in SOW (Statement of Work) creation, providing leadership, designing architecture, handling RFPs (Request for Proposals), and demonstrating excellent stakeholder management skills.

• Shift-Left Testing: Drive an engineering-led approach to test early in the software development lifecycle, ensuring that automation is integrated from the beginning.

• Test Automation Design: Lead the design and development of advanced test automation frameworks for various types of testing including unit, integration, UI, and end-to-end testing. You'll work with frameworks like WebdriverIO, Cypress, and Playwright.

• Mentorship & Leadership: Mentor and train your team on the latest testing tools, frameworks, and best practices to elevate overall quality engineering. You will lead by example and help build a strong, skilled team.

• Quality Metrics: Take ownership of defining, tracking, and improving quality metrics such as defect density, test pass rate, and mean time to detect/resolve issues. Strive for continuous improvement in test coverage and quality.

• Collaboration with Cross-Functional Teams: Work closely with Software Engineers, Product Owners, and Business Analysts to ensure effective test coverage and align automation strategies with business goals. You will participate in retrospectives, planning sessions, and other agile ceremonies to drive best practices and foster collaboration.

• Strategic Automation Implementation: Develop detailed strategies for automation, collaborating with clients, developers, and engineers to ensure that automation fits within the high-level architecture of the system.

• Code Review & Process Leadership: You will oversee the code review process, mitigate conflicts, and ensure high-quality work is merged into the main branch. You will also proactively identify opportunities for improvement in the team’s approach to testing.

• Integration with CI/CD Pipelines: Have a deep understanding of CI/CD pipelines and work on integrating automation tests seamlessly into them. Ensure that automation efforts align with continuous integration and continuous deployment workflows.

• System Design & Interaction: Leverage your deep understanding of enterprise software development lifecycles, ensuring that you can evaluate system architectures, how data flows through the system, and where and how automation fits. You will have a keen eye for detail and be able to work with complex, enterprise-level applications.

• Non-Functional Testing: Bring an understanding of non-functional testing aspects such as performance, accessibility, compatibility, and security into your test automation strategy.

Experience & Skills:

Management of Large Automation Teams: Led and coordinated large teams of automation professionals, ensuring efficient project delivery and high-quality outcomes.

Automation Framework Developer: Developed and implemented automation frameworks for multiple clients, tailoring solutions to specific project needs and requirements.

Client Liaison & SOW Involvement: Acted as the primary client liaison, playing a key role in the SOW (Statement of Work) process from a business development perspective, ensuring alignment between client expectations and project deliverables.

• Framework Expertise: Proven experience building advanced and feature-rich test automation frameworks from scratch using object-oriented and scripted languages such as JavaScript/TypeScript, Java, C#, or Python.

• OOP Knowledge: Deep understanding and practical application of Object-Oriented Programming (OOP) principles. You will apply SOLID principles, Dependency Injection, Design Patterns, and other software engineering best practices to the test automation framework.

• Agile Experience: Strong experience working in Agile environments, collaborating with cross-functional teams, and contributing to the design and execution of automated tests for user stories according to defined acceptance criteria.

• Test Assurance: Ability to assure test quality and coverage, ensuring that automated tests provide adequate assurance that the software is functioning as expected.

• API/Microservices Testing: Expertise in API and microservices testing, including integration with back-end services and ensuring proper test coverage for microservice-based architectures.

• UI Testing: Experience with web UI testing across multiple browsers, leveraging frameworks like WebdriverIO, Cypress, and Playwright.

• Mobile Automation: Experience with mobile automation and testing is a plus.

• Cloud & Web Applications: Experience working across different application domains including Cloud and Web Applications.

• CI/CD Understanding: Familiarity with CI/CD processes and how to integrate automated tests into pipelines. Knowledge of GitHub Actions, GitLab pipelines, Azure DevOps, or Jenkins is a plus.

• Contract Testing (PACT): Experience or knowledge in Contract Testing frameworks, preferably PACT, would be beneficial.

• Collaboration and Consultancy Experience: Ability to work both as part of a team and independently. A consultancy background will be beneficial, as you will be required to interact directly with clients to define and deliver automation strategies.

Nice to Have:

• Cloud & AWS Knowledge: Familiarity with cloud-based technologies, especially AWS, is a plus.

• Mobile Testing: Experience with mobile automation would be beneficial, including frameworks like Appium or similar.

Diversity & Inclusion Statement:

We are committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment. We encourage applicants from all backgrounds to apply. If you require any reasonable adjustments throughout the recruitment process or during employment, please let us know, and we will accommo