Automation Test Lead

Job Summary

We are looking for an experienced Test Automation Lead with 9 - 14 years of software testing experience, with test automation as the primary focus. The candidate must have strong hands-on expertise in designing, developing, maintaining, and executing automated test solutions, along with proven experience in leading automation activities and guiding a testing team. Strong knowledge and understanding of functional/manual testing and API testing is required to ensure effective end-to-end test coverage. The role requires close collaboration with development, product, business, and QA teams and regular coordination with French/Front Office colleagues for requirement clarification, planning, status reporting, risk and blocker communication, and issue resolution.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead automation testing activities and own the overall test automation strategy, approach, framework, and implementation.
• Remain hands-on in designing, developing, executing, debugging, and maintaining automated test scripts and test suites.
• Design, enhance, and maintain scalable, reusable, and maintainable test automation frameworks using Robot Framework, Selenium, Cypress, or equivalent tools.
• Identify suitable test scenarios for automation and continuously improve automation coverage, execution efficiency, and regression effectiveness.
• Review automation scripts and framework changes and ensure adherence to automation coding standards, design patterns, and best practices.
• Guide and mentor automation engineers/testers, provide technical direction, and support resolution of complex automation issues.
• Monitor automated test execution, analyze failures, identify flaky or unstable tests, and drive corrective actions to improve test-suite reliability.
• Integrate and maintain automated test suites as part of CI/CD pipelines and enable effective execution across multiple environments.
• Analyze business requirements, functional specifications, technical documents, and user stories and translate them into effective test strategies, scenarios, and automation coverage.
• Maintain strong functional testing knowledge and perform/review functional, regression, integration, system, smoke, sanity, and exploratory testing where required.
• Conduct API testing using Postman, including validation of REST APIs, request/response payloads, HTTP methods, status codes, headers, and error handling.
• Define test strategy, test approach, scope, estimates, timelines, test coverage, and quality objectives.
• Identify, log, analyze, prioritize, track, retest, and close defects using defect/test management tools such as JIRA.
• Coordinate closely with French/Front Office colleagues and other international stakeholders for requirement clarification, test planning, priorities, dependencies, and issue resolution.
• Provide clear and timely communication on automation progress, test status, quality risks, blockers, and dependencies.
• Collaborate with developers, business analysts, product owners, and QA teams to ensure end-to-end product quality.
• Participate actively in sprint planning, daily stand-ups, reviews, retrospectives, and test status reporting.
• Provide test and automation effort estimates and input for sprint commitments.
• Promote automation best practices, quality processes, and continuous improvement across the testing team.

Required Skills & Qualifications

Test Automation & Technical Skills

• 9 - 14 years of overall software testing experience, with strong hands-on expertise in test automation.
• Proven experience in a Test Automation Lead / Senior Automation Engineer role, leading automation activities and providing technical guidance to a testing team.
• Strong hands-on experience with test automation frameworks and tools such as Robot Framework, Selenium, Cypress, or equivalent.
• Strong knowledge of automation framework architecture, reusability, maintainability, scalability, programming/scripting, test data management, and CI/CD integration.
• Proficiency in one or more scripting/programming languages such as Java, JavaScript, Python, or similar.
• Ability to develop and execute automated test suites across multiple environments.
• Strong understanding of automation design patterns and best practices, including Page Object Model and Data-Driven Testing.
• Capability to independently debug and troubleshoot automation framework, script, and execution issues.
• Strong knowledge of version control systems (Git) and CI/CD pipeline integration for test automation.
• Hands-on experience with API testing using Postman, including validation of REST APIs, JSON responses, and HTTP/HTTPS protocols.
• Ability to identify automation opportunities and drive improvements in automation coverage, execution reliability, and testing efficiency.
• Technical development skills sufficient to work independently with automation frameworks and scripts; a software development background is not required.

Functional Testing & QA Competencies

• Strong knowledge and practical understanding of functional/manual testing, including functional, regression, integration, system, smoke, and sanity testing.
• Strong understanding of STLC, SDLC, Agile/Scrum methodologies, and QA processes.
• Ability to analyze business and technical requirements and translate them into clear, detailed, reusable, and risk-based test cases and scenarios.
• Ability to define test strategy, test approach, scope, timelines, resource allocation, estimates, and quality objectives.
• Proficiency in defect management and test management tools, including defect analysis, prioritization, tracking, and reporting.
• Strong analytical, problem-solving, and quality-focused skills with a continuous-improvement mindset.

Leadership & Communication

• Demonstrated ability to lead, guide, and mentor automation/test engineers and provide technical direction.
• Ability to coordinate automation and testing activities across multiple teams and stakeholders.
• Strong verbal and written English communication skills, with the ability to work effectively with French/Front Office colleagues and international teams.
• Ability to clearly communicate automation progress, test status, risks, dependencies, and blockers to technical and business stakeholders.
• Ability to work independently, manage multiple priorities, and take ownership of automation deliverables.
• Autonomy, operational leadership, and strong collaboration with the France teams.

AI/ML Interest & Innovation (Nice to Have)

• Interest in exploring AI-powered testing tools and methodologies.
• Willingness to experiment with AI-driven test generation, intelligent test selection, and predictive testing.
• Ability to evaluate emerging tools and technologies and propose improvements to testing processes.
• Mindset oriented towards continuous learning and innovation in test automation.

Good to Have

• Strong knowledge of SQL for data validation.
• Familiarity with CI/CD pipelines, DevOps practices, and cloud-based testing platforms/environments.
• Basic understanding of non-functional testing concepts (performance, security, usability).
• ISTQB certification (Foundation Level or higher).
• Certification in test automation tools (Robot Framework, Selenium, Cypress, or equivalent).
• Knowledge of Telecom domain and telecom solutions.
• Basic understanding of IVR (Interactive Voice Response) systems and call flow mechanisms.
• AI/ML knowledge or exposure will be considered an added advantage.

Education

Bachelors degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field (or equivalent practical experience)