Staff QA Automation Engineer

POSITION SUMMARY

Empower is seeking a Staff QA Automation Engineer to serve as the enterprise technical authority for quality engineering, driving the architecture, governance, and evolution of scalable automation capabilities across the organization. This role owns the long-term strategy for automation frameworks, testing practices, and quality engineering standards that improve software reliability, accelerate delivery, and enable data-driven decision making. Leveraging AI as a force multiplier, the Staff QA Automation Engineer advances automation speed, scale, quality, and engineering productivity through intelligent tooling, predictive insights, and reusable platform capabilities. Operating with significant autonomy, this role influences engineering strategy across Empower's hyper-growth, highly regulated 503A and 503B environment, partnering with technology leaders to solve complex technical challenges while demonstrating exceptional strategic thinking, execution rigor, innovation, and continuous learning agility.

RESPONSIBILITIES

Automation Strategy

• Framework Ownership: Own the technical architecture, governance, and multi-year roadmap for Empower's enterprise automation ecosystem, ensuring scalable, reusable, and maintainable capabilities across UI, API, performance, accessibility, visual, and end-to-end testing. Leverage AI-assisted engineering, predictive analytics, and emerging automation technologies to accelerate framework evolution, improve engineering efficiency, and establish enterprise-wide quality engineering standards that support long-term business growth.
• Architecture Design: Define automation architecture and quality engineering strategy for new platforms, products, and enterprise initiatives before implementation begins. Establish scalable design patterns, reusable framework components, and engineering standards that enable consistent automation practices while improving delivery speed, software quality, maintainability, and cross-team collaboration throughout the software development lifecycle.
• Technology Innovation: Evaluate, pilot, and introduce emerging automation technologies, including AI-assisted test generation, self-healing automation, intelligent test optimization, and next-generation observability solutions. Continuously assess industry trends to modernize engineering capabilities, improve execution quality, reduce maintenance effort, and position Empower's automation ecosystem for future scalability.

Technical Excellence

• Framework Standards: Architect reusable framework components including Page Objects, API clients, authentication utilities, fixtures, reporting modules, test data management, and validation libraries that establish consistent engineering patterns across teams. Define coding standards, documentation, and governance processes that improve automation quality, maintainability, scalability, and long-term platform sustainability.
• Validation Strategy: Define enterprise strategies for API contract validation, response schema verification, database validation, Salesforce integration testing, and cross-platform data integrity. Resolve highly complex integration challenges while establishing repeatable validation methodologies that improve confidence in application behavior, data accuracy, and enterprise system reliability.
• Performance Engineering: Lead enterprise performance testing strategy using modern load testing frameworks, establishing methodologies for capacity planning, scalability assessment, stress testing, spike testing, and production readiness. Apply AI-driven analytics and performance intelligence to identify bottlenecks, predict capacity risks, and support informed architectural decisions before release.

Platform Reliability

• Pipeline Optimization: Own the technical health, architecture, scalability, and reliability of automated execution pipelines across Azure DevOps, GitHub, Docker, and cloud environments. Continuously optimize execution performance through automation, intelligent orchestration, AI-assisted diagnostics, and resilient engineering practices that improve deployment confidence and reduce operational risk.
• Quality Visibility: Define enterprise reporting strategies integrating Jira, Xray, Allure, Microsoft Teams, Prometheus, Grafana, and other engineering platforms to deliver trusted quality metrics and actionable operational insights. Ensure automation results provide meaningful visibility that supports leadership decision-making, release readiness, and continuous improvement across engineering organizations.
• Root Cause: Lead investigation of the organization's most complex automation failures, pipeline instability, flaky tests, performance degradation, and integration issues. Drive systemic engineering improvements by identifying underlying technical causes, implementing durable architectural solutions, and eliminating recurring quality risks rather than applying temporary fixes.

Technical Leadership

• Engineering Governance: Establish enterprise-wide automation governance through technical reviews, engineering standards, architectural guidance, and quality engineering best practices. Influence engineering decisions across multiple teams while ensuring consistent implementation of scalable automation patterns that strengthen software quality and accelerate product delivery.
• Technical Mentorship: Mentor senior and mid-level quality engineers by providing technical coaching, architectural guidance, and expert support for the organization's most challenging automation initiatives. Foster engineering excellence through knowledge sharing, design reviews, and continuous development that elevates technical capability across the quality engineering function.
• Strategic Partnership: Partner with engineering leadership, architects, product management, DevOps, and cross-functional stakeholders to align automation strategy with business objectives, product roadmaps, and technology investments. Represent quality engineering in architectural planning while communicating automation value, engineering metrics, AI adoption strategies, and return on investment to executive leadership.

KNOWLEDGE AND SKILLS

• Expert knowledge of enterprise test automation architecture, quality engineering principles, and modern software development practices, with advanced proficiency in Playwright, TypeScript, JavaScript, Node.js, API automation, CI/CD, and scalable automation framework design.
• Demonstrated ability to evaluate and implement AI-assisted engineering capabilities, predictive quality analytics, self-healing automation, and intelligent test optimization that improve engineering productivity, software quality, decision-making, and enterprise scalability.
• Advanced expertise in performance engineering, API contract validation, cloud-based development platforms, Git workflows, Azure DevOps, GitHub, SQL, enterprise integrations, and observability technologies, with the ability to solve highly complex technical challenges across distributed systems.
• Exceptional strategic thinking, technical leadership, communication, collaboration, and mentoring skills, with the ability to influence architecture decisions, establish enterprise engineering standards, build organizational consensus, and drive continuous improvement across multiple cross-functional teams.

EXPERIENCE AND QUALIFICATIONS

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Information Systems, or a related technical discipline, or an equivalent combination of education and progressive professional experience in software quality engineering, automation architecture, or software development.
• Twelve (12) or more years of progressive experience in software quality assurance, test automation, quality engineering, or software development in test, including demonstrated success leading enterprise automation strategy, architecting scalable frameworks, and influencing technical direction across multiple engineering teams without direct authority.
• Extensive hands-on experience designing enterprise automation frameworks using Playwright, TypeScript, JavaScript, and Node.js, with deep expertise in UI, API, integration, regression, end-to-end, contract, and performance testing, CI/CD pipeline architecture, cloud-native engineering practices, and enterprise system integrations.
• Preferred experience includes designing enterprise automation platforms from inception, implementing AI-assisted testing technologies, accessibility automation, containerized execution, cloud platforms, healthcare or other regulated industries, and industry-recognized certifications such as ISTQB Advanced or Expert Level, Test Automation Engineer, Microsoft Azure, AWS, GitHub, Salesforce, Agile, or DevOps professional certifications.