Lead QA Engineer at Absa Group Limited (Absa)

Job Summary

• The Lead QA Engineer plays a pivotal role in ensuring the quality, performance, and reliability of software products before they reach End Users. This position demands a proactive leader who can drive quality assurance across complex, enterprise-level solutions.

Key Responsibilities:

• Take full ownership of end-to-end quality assurance processes, encompassing front-end, back-end, integration, performance, scalability, and regression testing.
• Lead the design, development, and execution of test scripts across a wide range of technical platforms and services, including Web, Data, and Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) applications.
• Ensure robust protection of complex and interdependent systems across the technology landscape through measurable test coverage and actionable quality metrics.
• Champion best practices in QA methodologies and continuously improve testing strategies to align with evolving business and technical requirements.

Job Description

• As the Lead QA Engineer, you will serve as the automation and manual testing expert within one or more agile squads. You will play a critical role throughout the entire solution development lifecycle, ensuring the delivery of high-quality, scalable, and reliable software products and services.

Key Responsibilities:

• Lifecycle Involvement: Actively contribute to all phases of the solution development lifecycle as a key member of one or more squads, with a focus on automation testing.
• Requirements Analysis: Participate in the analysis of technical requirements during the early stages of product and service development, maintenance, and optimization across squads and tribes.
• Automation Strategy: Continuously identify and evaluate opportunities for automation across the suite of technical products and services.
• Framework Design: Utilize a strong understanding of solution architecture and infrastructure to design and implement holistic automation testing frameworks tailored to identified needs.
• Test Development & Execution: Develop and execute automated test scripts using a variety of tools and technologies, ensuring alignment with user stories and business requirements.

Accountability & Ownership: 

• Own and drive the end-to-end testing strategy as the single point of accountability for all testing frameworks. Ensure the integrity, scalability, and effectiveness of these frameworks in validating comprehensive solutions—including commercial off-the-shelf applications integrated with custom-built components. Take full ownership of regression testing and provide structured support for User Acceptance Testing (UAT), ensuring that all testing activities align with business objectives and deliver high-quality outcomes
• Comprehensive Testing: Perform testing at multiple levels, including user story validation, black-box testing, scalability testing, and full integration testing.
• Test Design & Analysis: Apply critical and predictive thinking to define both positive and negative test scenarios. Create and analyse test data to support robust testing outcomes.
• CI/CD Integration: Leverage your knowledge of CI/CD pipelines to configure and integrate automated test suites into test management systems and custom test harnesses.
• Manual Testing Support: When necessary, create, coordinate, and execute manual test cases and plans. Review functional specifications and user stories to design effective test strategies.
• Collaboration: Work closely with developers to implement test hooks and ensure seamless automation integration. Collaborate across teams to troubleshoot software and environment issues.
• Reporting & Metrics: Develop custom QA metrics and reporting solutions to track quality trends and support continuous improvement.
• Goal Setting & Delivery: Set clear product delivery goals and ensure timely achievement of milestones in fast-paced, ambiguous environments.
• Innovation & Research: Stay current with emerging tools and techniques in automation testing. Proactively research and introduce new solutions to enhance testing capabilities

DevOps

• Champion Engineering Best Practices: Promote and uphold engineering excellence by mentoring team members on modern testing strategies, DevOps principles, and automation-first mindsets.
• Build Automation Testing Capability: Develop the team’s proficiency in automation testing tools and frameworks, fostering a culture of continuous learning and quality ownership.
• Code-Driven Testing Design: Utilize expertise in multiple programming languages to architect and implement robust, scalable test solutions tailored to specific products and services.
• System-Level Understanding: Demonstrate a deep understanding of the entire technical solution under test. Take initiative to run, observe, and validate the system, ensuring that test cases reflect real-world usage and code viability.
• Shift-Right Accountability: Guide the team from feature-focused testing to full product ownership—encouraging accountability for quality throughout the delivery pipeline, from development to deployment and monitoring in production

People Management

• Capability Development: Foster the growth of team members by building their expertise in designing and executing automated and manual test scripts using a variety of modern testing tools and technologies.
• Mentorship & Coaching: Provide structured mentorship and ongoing guidance to interns and junior QA engineers, supporting their technical development and career progression within the testing discipline.
• Quality Oversight: Ensure the quality and consistency of both automated and manual testing deliverables across the broader engineering teams by implementing robust review and validation processes.
• Peer Collaboration & Review: Lead peer reviews and collaborative problem-solving sessions within the QA community, promoting knowledge sharing and continuous improvement across teams.
• Talent Acquisition Support: Act as a technical subject matter expert in the recruitment process, helping to attract, assess, and onboard high-caliber QA professionals aligned with the organization’s quality standards.
• Strategic Team Development: Contribute to the planning and development of the wider product engineering team by offering QA insights and aligning testing capabilities with long-term business and technical goals.

Risk and Compliance

• Policy Compliance & Governance: Ensure all testing activities strictly adhere to the organization’s Service Engineering, Risk, and Governance policies, maintaining compliance throughout the development and testing lifecycle.
• Security & Architecture Alignment: Align all testing frameworks, tools, and scripts with Group Architecture and Security standards to minimize vulnerabilities and ensure secure, scalable solutions.
• Risk Accountability: Assume full accountability as the single point of contact for risks arising from testing design failures post-deployment, ensuring swift resolution and continuous improvement.
• Operational Resilience Participation: Actively engage in Business Continuity Planning (BCP), Disaster Recovery (DR), and Incident Management processes. Lead root cause analysis and implement mitigation strategies to prevent recurrence of critical incidents.
• Post-Incident Realignment: Continuously refine and realign testing frameworks, monitoring tools, and automation scripts in response to risk-related events or incidents, ensuring adaptive and resilient testing practices

Skills and Experience Required:

• 5+ years relevant experience in a similar role
• Relevant degree
• ISTQB Certification required
• Scripting skills and knowledge
• Proficient in automation testing tools and frameworks

Education

• Bachelor's Degree: Information Technology