Hiring QA Engineers: The Complete Guide

# QA Automation Engineer

**Location:** Austin, TX (Hybrid) · **Employment Type:** Full-time · **Level:** Mid-Senior

## About [Company]

[Company] is building the next generation of collaboration tools for product teams. Our platform helps companies streamline their product development lifecycle through intelligent workflows and real-time collaboration features.

We serve 2,000+ customers including Fortune 500 companies and fast-growing startups. Our platform processes millions of events daily with 99.95% uptime, and quality is at the core of everything we deliver.

**Why join [Company]?**

- Work on a platform used by 200,000+ users daily
- Join a 70-person engineering team with a strong testing culture
- Series B funded ($38M from top-tier VCs)
- Competitive compensation with meaningful equity

## The Role

We're looking for a QA Automation Engineer to own our test automation strategy and infrastructure. This is a test automation-focused role—you'll spend the majority of your time writing automated tests, building testing frameworks, and integrating quality into our CI/CD pipeline.

The ideal candidate writes code daily, thinks like a software engineer, and is passionate about preventing bugs through automation rather than finding them manually. You'll work closely with our engineering teams to shift testing left and build quality into every release.

**Note:** This is a test automation role, not a manual QA position. We're looking for someone who codes daily and treats test automation as software engineering.

## Objectives of This Role

- Build and maintain comprehensive automated test suites (unit, integration, E2E)
- Increase our automated test coverage from 65% to 85%
- Reduce regression testing time from 2 hours to 30 minutes through smarter automation
- Establish testing best practices and help developers write better tests
- Integrate automated testing into every stage of our deployment pipeline

## Responsibilities

- Write and maintain automated tests using Playwright, Cypress, and Jest
- Build and improve our test automation framework and infrastructure
- Design test strategies that prioritize automation over manual testing
- Integrate automated tests into CI/CD pipelines for continuous feedback
- Debug flaky tests and improve test reliability and performance
- Conduct code reviews for test code and mentor engineers on testing practices
- Perform targeted exploratory testing for complex features (10-15% of time)
- Track and report on quality metrics and test coverage trends
- Collaborate with developers to make our codebase more testable

## Required Skills and Qualifications

- 4+ years of experience in QA automation or software engineering with testing focus
- Strong proficiency with modern testing frameworks (Playwright, Cypress, or Selenium)
- Expert-level TypeScript/JavaScript skills—you'll write code daily
- Experience building and maintaining test automation frameworks
- Deep understanding of CI/CD integration and pipeline configuration
- Familiarity with API testing tools and techniques (Postman, REST Assured)
- Experience with test management and defect tracking systems
- Strong debugging skills and systematic approach to flaky test analysis

## Preferred Skills and Qualifications

- Experience with performance testing tools (k6, JMeter, or Artillery)
- Background in accessibility testing and WCAG compliance
- Familiarity with containerized testing environments (Docker, Kubernetes)
- Experience with visual regression testing tools
- Contributions to open-source testing tools or frameworks
- Background in SaaS or B2B product companies

## Tech Stack

- **Test Frameworks:** Playwright (primary), Cypress, Jest
- **Languages:** TypeScript, JavaScript
- **API Testing:** Postman, custom TypeScript test utilities
- **CI/CD:** GitHub Actions, CircleCI
- **Monitoring:** Datadog, Sentry
- **Infrastructure:** Docker, AWS (ECS, Lambda)
- **Collaboration:** Linear, Notion, Slack
- **Version Control:** GitHub

## Compensation and Benefits

**Salary:** $120,000 - $160,000 (based on experience and location)

**Equity:** 0.03% - 0.10% (4-year vest, 1-year cliff)

**Benefits:**

- Medical, dental, and vision insurance (100% covered for employees)
- Unlimited PTO with 15-day minimum encouraged
- $2,000 annual learning and development budget
- $1,000 home office setup allowance
- 401(k) with 4% company match
- 16 weeks paid parental leave
- Conference attendance budget for QA/testing conferences
- Flexible hybrid work (2 days in Austin office)

## Interview Process

Our interview process typically takes 2-3 weeks. We provide feedback at every stage.

- **Step 1: Recruiter Screen** (30 min) - We'll discuss your background, interests, and answer your questions about the role.

- **Step 2: Technical Screen** (60 min) - A conversation about test automation, testing strategies, and your past projects with one of our engineers.

- **Step 3: Take-Home Exercise** (2-3 hours) - Write automated tests for a small feature. We pay $200 for your time.

- **Step 4: Technical Deep Dive** (90 min) - Review the take-home together and discuss test architecture and automation strategy.

- **Step 5: Team Interviews** (2 x 30 min) - Meet potential teammates and discuss collaboration.

- **Step 6: Hiring Manager** (30 min) - Discuss career goals and next steps.

## How to Apply

Submit your resume and optionally include a link to your GitHub, any testing frameworks you've built, or blog posts about testing. We review every application and respond within 5 business days.

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*[Company] is an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees. We encourage applications from candidates who may not meet 100% of the qualifications—research shows underrepresented groups are less likely to apply unless they meet every requirement.*