Lead Quality Assurance Engineer

Work Schedule

Standard (Mon-Fri)

Environmental Conditions

Office

Job Description

As part of the Thermo Fisher Scientific team, you’ll discover meaningful work that makes a positive impact on a global scale. Join our colleagues in bringing our Mission to life every single day to enable our customers to make the world healthier, cleaner and safer. We provide our global teams with the resources needed to achieve individual career goals while helping to take science a step beyond by developing solutions for some of the world’s toughest challenges, like protecting the environment, making sure our food is safe or helping find cures for cancer.

DESCRIPTION:
Join our team at Thermo Fisher Scientific, where you'll help develop and test software for scientific instruments and laboratory solutions. As a Software Test Engineer III, you'll ensure the quality and reliability of our software products through comprehensive testing strategies. Working in an adaptable environment, you'll collaborate with teams to validate software for mass spectrometers, electron microscopes, and other analytical instruments that help make the world healthier, cleaner, and safer.

You'll participate in all phases of the software development lifecycle, from requirements analysis through final release. Your role includes designing and executing test plans, automating test procedures, documenting defects, and verifying resolutions. You'll work closely with developers, product owners, and stakeholders to ensure our software meets the highest quality standards while supporting continuous improvement in our testing processes.

Role Overview

We are looking for a highly experienced Lead Quality Assurance Engineer with 6–15 years of software testing and quality assurance experience, with strong expertise in functional testing, regression testing, test case design, defect management, and User Acceptance Testing (UAT) support. The role also requires strong hands-on test automation expertise, including Squish GUI Tester for desktop GUI automation and Playwright with Python/Pytest for web, end-to-end, and regression automation.

The ideal candidate should have extensive experience validating complex enterprise applications, defining comprehensive test strategies, managing test execution, and ensuring high-quality product releases. The candidate will work closely with product owners, business analysts, developers, UX teams, and other stakeholders to ensure that software solutions meet functional, business, and quality requirements. The candidate should be able to define and evolve maintainable automation frameworks, select appropriate automation coverage, and integrate automated regression suites into CI/CD workflows.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead and execute functional testing activities for complex software applications and business workflows.
• Define test approaches, test scenarios, and detailed test cases based on functional and business requirements.
• Perform comprehensive regression testing to ensure that application changes do not impact existing functionality.
• Review requirements, user stories, acceptance criteria, and design specifications to identify test scenarios and potential gaps.
• Develop and maintain reusable manual and automated test cases, test suites, test data, and traceability between requirements and tests.
• Design, develop, and maintain automated GUI tests using Squish GUI Tester for desktop applications, including robust object identification, synchronization, reusable components, and data-driven execution.
• Design, develop, and maintain end-to-end browser automation using Playwright with Python and Pytest for web application workflows.
• Build and evolve maintainable Pytest-based automation frameworks using fixtures, parametrization, markers, reusable utilities, page-object/component patterns, and clear test reporting.
• Integrate automated regression suites into CI/CD pipelines, support headless and parallel execution where appropriate, and analyze failures, flaky tests, and environment-related issues.
• Execute manual and automated tests, analyze results, and document test evidence and failures appropriately.
• Identify, document, prioritize, and track software defects throughout the defect lifecycle.
• Perform detailed defect analysis and work closely with development teams to facilitate timely resolution.
• Conduct defect triage meetings and support prioritization based on severity, business impact, and release requirements.
• Verify defect fixes and perform appropriate regression testing before closure.
• Support User Acceptance Testing (UAT) by preparing test scenarios, coordinating testing activities, and assisting business users.
• Analyze UAT findings and coordinate with product and development teams for issue resolution.
• Validate end-to-end workflows and integrations across multiple application components and systems.
• Participate in release planning and provide recommendations regarding application quality and release readiness.
• Monitor testing progress, defect trends, coverage, and overall quality metrics.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams throughout the software development lifecycle.
• Mentor QA team members and promote consistent testing standards and quality practices.

Required Skills

• 12–15 years of overall experience in software testing and quality assurance.
• Strong hands-on experience in functional testing of enterprise software applications.
• Extensive experience in regression testing and end-to-end system validation.
• Strong hands-on experience with Squish GUI Tester for desktop GUI automation, including object recognition, synchronization, reusable scripts/components, and maintenance of stable regression suites.
• Strong hands-on experience with Playwright for browser-based UI and end-to-end test automation, preferably using Python.
• Strong hands-on experience with Pytest, including fixtures, parametrization, markers, test organization, reusable utilities, and test reporting.
• Strong Python scripting skills for test automation, framework development, troubleshooting, and test-data utilities.
• Experience designing and maintaining scalable test automation frameworks with reusable abstractions, page-object/component patterns, configuration management, logging, and reporting.
• Experience integrating automated tests with CI/CD pipelines and version-control workflows, with the ability to diagnose automation, application, data, and environment failures.
• Strong expertise in designing effective test scenarios, test cases, and test data.
• Ability to analyze business requirements, functional specifications, and acceptance criteria from a testing perspective.
• Strong experience with defect identification, reporting, prioritization, tracking, and closure.
• Experience with defect and test management tools such as Azure DevOps, Jira, ALM, or equivalent tools.
• Strong understanding of the complete Software Testing Life Cycle (STLC).
• Good understanding of the Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC).
• Experience supporting and coordinating User Acceptance Testing (UAT).
• Experience validating complex business workflows and application integrations.
• Ability to perform root cause analysis and distinguish application defects from configuration, data, environment, and integration issues.
• Strong understanding of test coverage, requirements traceability, and risk-based testing.
• Experience working within Agile/Scrum software development environments.
• Ability to communicate testing status, quality risks, and release concerns clearly to stakeholders.

Testing & Quality Leadership Expectations

The candidate should be capable of operating beyond an individual contributor role and should:

• Provide testing and quality leadership for complex software products and projects.
• Define appropriate test strategies, test approaches, and quality standards.
• Define the test automation strategy across desktop and web applications, including automation scope, framework standards, maintainability, execution model, and CI/CD integration.
• Review automation architecture, test code, and framework changes; mentor engineers on Squish, Playwright, Pytest, Python, and automation engineering best practices.
• Identify testing risks early and recommend appropriate mitigation strategies.
• Review and improve test scenarios and test cases developed by team members.
• Ensure adequate functional, automated, and regression coverage for product releases.
• Establish effective defect-management and defect-triage practices.
• Coordinate testing activities across development, product, business, and other QA teams.
• Provide clear quality assessments and recommendations for release readiness.
• Mentor QA engineers and promote testing best practices across the team.
• Drive continuous improvement in testing processes, documentation, metrics, and overall product quality.
• Work effectively with globally distributed and cross-functional engineering teams.

Preferred Skills

• Experience testing large-scale enterprise, scientific, healthcare, engineering, or data-intensive applications.
• Experience testing complex web and desktop applications.
• Experience validating REST APIs and backend integrations.
• Familiarity with database validation and basic SQL queries.
• Experience with API testing tools such as Postman or equivalent solutions.
• Experience with API automation, automation reporting, test-result dashboards, parallel execution, and strategies for reducing flaky tests.
• Hands-on familiarity with CI/CD pipelines and continuous testing practices for executing Squish and Playwright/Pytest regression suites.
• Experience testing applications involving complex workflows, dashboards, configuration, or data visualization.
• Understanding of usability, accessibility, performance, and security testing concepts.
• Experience with requirements and test traceability in regulated or quality-driven environments.
• Experience collaborating with globally distributed development and business teams.

Behavioral Competencies

• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills.
• Excellent attention to detail and commitment to product quality.
• Strong communication and stakeholder-management skills.
• Ability to understand complex business workflows and translate them into effective test scenarios.
• Ability to identify risks and communicate quality concerns effectively.
• Strong ownership and accountability for testing deliverables.
• Ability to collaborate effectively with developers, business analysts, product owners, and end users.
• Strong mentoring and team-coordination capabilities.
• Ability to manage multiple priorities and testing activities across releases.
• Strong customer-focused and quality-oriented mindset.

Education

Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, Engineering, or a related discipline.