Senior QA Automation Engineer (P-176)

SMASH, Who we are?

We are agents for tech professionals in Costa Rica and Colombia that help them build careers in the United States.

We believe in long-lasting relationships with our talent. We invest time getting to know them and understanding what they seek as their professional next step.

We aim to find the perfect match. As agents, we pair our talent with our US clients, not only by their technical skills but as a cultural fit. Our core competency is to find the right talent fast.

We purposefully move away from the “contractor” or “outsourcing” type of relationship. Our clients don’t want contractors or “just a service.” Neither does our talent.

Our Benefits

• Wellness Coverage
• Remote Work
• Birthday day off
• Recognition and rewards system
• Referrals Program
• Business skill coaching
• English classes for Smashers and relatives
• Learning opportunities

This position is Remote to work with a US Company; you will require to have Citizenship or a work permit from Costa Rica to apply for this role.

Role summary

We are looking for an experienced Senior QA Automation Engineer to own and continuously improve software quality across the development lifecycle.

This role combines hands-on test automation, functional and regression testing, non-functional testing, quality engineering, and release/change management. The ideal candidate will be capable of building and maintaining automation frameworks, defining comprehensive testing strategies, analyzing code changes, and partnering closely with Software Engineers and Product Owners to ensure reliable production releases.

The position also requires technical leadership, with responsibility for mentoring other engineers, promoting QA best practices, and driving continuous improvement across testing and engineering processes.

Responsibilities

• Perform comprehensive functional and regression testing across applications and systems.
• Perform non-functional testing, including accessibility, performance, load, and stress testing, to identify system limitations, bottlenecks, and potential points of failure.
• Develop, maintain, and continuously improve automated testing frameworks and testing tools.
• Design automation solutions that improve test coverage, reliability, and engineering efficiency.
• Develop detailed test strategies, test plans, test scenarios, and test cases based on product and technical requirements.
• Collaborate with Software Engineers and Product Owners to establish appropriate software development and testing plans.
• Participate in product requirement reviews to clarify expected outcomes, acceptance criteria, dependencies, and testing requirements.
• Provide testing estimates and support engineering teams with planning and prioritization.
• Monitor automated and manual test coverage and work with engineering teams to understand its impact on defect volume and severity.
• Analyze merge requests and code changes to verify that modifications are appropriately scoped and do not introduce unintended changes.
• Identify software defects, document issues accurately, and collaborate with engineering teams through resolution.
• Recommend and implement defect-prevention and quality-improvement strategies.
• Maintain clear technical documentation covering automation frameworks, testing processes, deployment processes, deployment artifacts, and issue reporting.
• Review production changes to ensure adherence to established change management and deployment processes.
• Support Change Advisory Board (CAB) processes when additional review and approval are required.
• Maintain awareness of the business domain and take ownership of quality-related activities when needed.
• Challenge and continuously improve established QA and engineering practices rather than simply following existing processes.
• Balance development speed with appropriate quality, reliability, and risk controls.
• Drive improvements to QA metrics, test coverage, defect prevention, and overall software quality.
• Identify and recommend improvements to engineering and QA workflows.
• Mentor QA and engineering team members on testing methodologies, automation, and quality practices.
• Conduct technical knowledge-sharing and brown-bag sessions on testing tools, frameworks, emerging technologies, and engineering practices.
• Stay current with technology trends and adapt testing approaches as organizational technology requirements evolve.

Requirements – Must-haves

• Strong professional experience in Software Quality Assurance / Quality Engineering.
• Hands-on experience with test automation and automation framework development.
• Experience designing, building, maintaining, and improving automated testing frameworks.
• Strong experience with functional and regression testing.
• Experience developing comprehensive test plans, test cases, and testing strategies.
• Experience with non-functional testing methodologies, including performance, load, stress, and/or accessibility testing.
• Strong understanding of software development and testing lifecycles.
• Experience collaborating directly with Software Engineers and Product Owners throughout the SDLC.
• Experience reviewing requirements and translating acceptance criteria into effective testing scenarios.
• Experience with defect tracking, root-cause analysis, and issue management.
• Understanding of code repositories, merge/pull requests, and modern software development workflows.
• Experience measuring and improving test coverage and software quality metrics.
• Understanding of release, deployment, and change management processes.
• Strong documentation skills, including technical testing and deployment documentation.
• Ability to identify opportunities for defect prevention and continuous quality improvement.
• Strong analytical, troubleshooting, and problem-solving capabilities.
• Ability to balance delivery speed with software quality and production risk.
• Strong communication and cross-functional collaboration skills.
• Experience mentoring or providing technical guidance to other QA or engineering team members.

Nice-to-haves (optional)

• Experience with enterprise Change Advisory Board (CAB) processes.
• Experience implementing performance and scalability testing strategies for enterprise applications.
• Experience with accessibility testing standards and tools.
• Experience integrating automated testing into CI/CD pipelines.
• Experience defining QA metrics, dashboards, and engineering quality KPIs.
• Experience delivering technical training, workshops, or brown-bag sessions.
• Previous experience acting as a QA technical lead or automation subject matter expert.

Languages

• English C1
• Spanish C1