QA Engineering Lead / Test Transformation Lead

Apex Systems; Chicago (IL); Remote; USD 140,000 - 190,000; Full time

Job summary

Everforth Apex is seeking a senior, hands-on QA Engineering Lead / Test Transformation Lead to drive the technical evolution of QA for a complex banking technology program. You will act as player‑coach, balancing strategic direction with hands‑on automation engineering across multiple workstreams.

The role requires leading distributed QA teams, building robust automated test frameworks, applying AI-enabled testing, and delivering rapid, high‑quality production releases while improving regression

Qualifications

• Ten+ years of software quality engineering experience with leadership of QA teams.
• Proven track record transforming underperforming QA organizations and optimizing regression.
• Strong hands-on automation design across API, integration, and end‑to‑end testing.

Responsibilities

• Define and execute the QA strategy, standards, and engineering practices across multiple development workstreams.
• Lead and mentor distributed QA teams, establishing unified, technically rigorous ways of working.
• Assess and optimize regression testing to reduce execution time while maximizing coverage.
• Identify quality gaps causing production defects and implement corrective actions.
• Establish risk-based testing across unit, API, integration, UI, and end‑to‑end levels.
• Design, build, review, and troubleshoot scalable automated test frameworks and scripts.
• Increase API and service‑level automation to minimize reliance on UI testing.
• Integrate automated testing into CI/CD pipelines and reduce flaky tests with parallel execution.
• Introduce AI and generative AI capabilities for test generation, failure analysis, and regression optimization.
• Define and track QA metrics like regression duration, coverage, defect leakage, and release quality.

Skills

QA leadership

Automation framework design

Playwright

Cypress

Selenium

API testing

CI/CD

AI‑assisted testing

Regression optimization

Distributed teams

Tools

Playwright

Cypress

Selenium

REST Assured

Postman

Pytest

JUnit

Azure DevOps

GitHub Actions

Jenkins

GitHub Copilot

Job description

QA Engineering Lead / Test Transformation Lead

Job# 3057914

Location: Chicago, Illinois (Remote)

Role Overview

We are seeking a senior, hands‑on QA Engineering Lead / Test Transformation Lead to drive the technical evolution of the QA function for a complex banking technology program. This critical role requires a technical leader who acts as a player‑coach, combining strategic direction with hands‑on automation engineering. The successful candidate will lead distributed QA teams across multiple workstreams to establish consistent engineering standards, design robust automated test frameworks, and implement practical AI‑enabled testing capabilities to ensure rapid, high‑quality production releases.

Key Responsibilities

• Define and execute the QA strategy, standards, and engineering practices across multiple development workstreams.
• Lead and mentor distributed QA teams, fostering accountability and establishing unified, highly technical ways of working.
• Assess, redesign, and optimize the existing regression testing approach to significantly reduce execution time while maximizing coverage.
• Identify quality gaps responsible for production defect leakage and implement robust corrective measures.
• Establish a comprehensive, risk‑based testing strategy covering unit, component, API, integration, UI, and end‑to‑end testing.
• Design, build, review, debug, and troubleshoot scalable automated test frameworks and script suites.
• Increase API and service‑level automation to minimize reliance on slower, UI‑based regression testing.
• Integrate automated quality gates and testing suites directly into CI/CD pipelines.
• Enhance the reliability of automated suites by reducing flaky tests and enabling parallel execution.
• Introduce practical AI and generative AI capabilities within QA, including test generation, failure analysis, and regression optimization.
• Define and track critical QA metrics, including regression duration, functional coverage, defect leakage, and release quality.
• Personally investigate complex defects, automation failures, test-data issues, logs, and APIs.

Required Qualifications

Experience: Ten or more years of software quality engineering experience, including demonstrated leadership of QA teams. Proven experience transforming or materially improving underperforming QA organizations is required. Candidates must have current, active experience leading distributed teams across multiple workstreams and a strong track record of successful regression optimization.

Technical Skills: Advanced hands‑on experience designing, writing, debugging, and refactoring test automation frameworks is required. Proficiency with modern automation technologies such as Playwright, Cypress, Selenium, REST Assured, Postman, Pytest, or JUnit is essential. Strong expertise in API, integration, database, and end‑to‑end testing is required, alongside experience integrating automated testing with CI/CD platforms like Azure DevOps, GitHub Actions, or Jenkins. Familiarity with GitHub Copilot or equivalent AI‑assisted development tools is highly preferred.

Preferred Qualifications

• Financial services or retail banking technology experience.
• Strong defect and root‑cause analysis skills paired with system log investigation capabilities.
• Deep understanding of modern software test architecture and the test pyramid.

Candidate Profile

This position is designed for a technical QA leader who is highly comfortable setting engineering standards and personally executing technical tasks. The selected professional must be capable of writing automation scripts, querying databases, analyzing application logs, and troubleshooting pipeline failures. Candidates whose experience is limited to high‑level coordination, project management, or administrative team governance without recent, direct automation programming experience will not align with the technical demands of this role.

Everforth Apex is a world‑class IT services company that serves thousands of clients across the globe. When you join Everforth Apex, you become part of a team that values innovation, collaboration, and continuous learning. We offer quality career resources, training, certifications, development opportunities, and a comprehensive benefits package. Our commitment to excellence is reflected in many awards, including ClearlyRateds Best of Staffing® in Talent Satisfaction in the United States and Great Place to Work® in the United Kingdom and Mexico.

Everforth Apex Benefits Overview

Everforth Apex offers a range of supplemental benefits, including medical, dental, vision, life, disability, and other insurance plans that offer an optional layer of financial protection. We offer an ESPP (employee stock purchase program) and a 401K program which allows you to contribute typically within 30 days of starting, with a company match after 12 months of tenure. Everforth Apex also offers a HSA (Health Savings Account on the HDHP plan), a SupportLinc Employee Assistance Program (EAP) with up to 8 free counseling sessions, a corporate discount savings program and other discounts. In terms of professional development, Everforth Apex hosts an on‑demand training program, provides access to certification prep and a library of technical and leadership courses/books/seminars once you have 6+ months of tenure, and certification discounts and other perks to associations that include CompTIA and IIBA. Everforth Apex has a dedicated customer service team for our Consultants that can address questions around benefits and other resources, as well as a certified Career Coach. You can access a full list of our benefits, programs, support teams and resources within our ‘Welcome Packet’ as well, which an Everforth Apex team member can provide.

Equal Opportunity

Everforth Apex Systems is an equal opportunity employer.

We do not discriminate or allow discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, creed, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, breastfeeding, or related medical conditions), age, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, ancestry, citizenship, genetic information, registered domestic partner status, marital status, disability, status as a crime victim, protected veteran status, political affiliation, union membership, or any other characteristic protected by law.

Everforth Apex will consider qualified applicants with criminal histories in a manner consistent with the requirements of applicable law.

Everforth Apex is an equal opportunity employer.

We do not discriminate or allow discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, creed, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, breastfeeding, or related medical conditions), age, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, ancestry, citizenship, genetic information, registered domestic partner status, marital status, disability, status as a crime victim, protected veteran status, political affiliation, union membership, or any other characteristic protected by law.

Everforth Apex will consider qualified applicants with criminal histories in a manner consistent with the requirements of applicable law.

Accommodation for ADA

If you require an accommodation under the Americans with Disabilities Act to participate in an interview with a virtual recruiter or to use our website for a search or application, please contact our Benefits Department at [email protected] or 804-523-8228. Please note that this contact information is strictly to be used for medical ADA accommodations and that no other inquiries will be answered.