Senior Software Quality Engineer

SkySpecs; Ann Arbor (MI); Hybrid; USD 100,000 - 150,000; Full time

Job summary

SkySpecs is seeking a Senior Software Quality Engineer to shape the Horizon platform and build end-to-end software quality systems. The role emphasizes quality as a platform discipline, with automation, observability, and AI-driven testing at the core.

The successful candidate will own quality infrastructure, tooling, and feedback loops, collaborate across engineering teams, and help define testable, observable acceptance criteria with strong judgment on AI-generated tests.

Qualifications

• 5+ years building and maintaining quality platforms, automated testing systems, or similar engineering systems for production software.
• Strong software engineering fundamentals and systems-thinking.
• Deep understanding of quality across testing, observability, performance, and production systems.
• Experience designing automated testing frameworks, quality infrastructure, CI/CD gates, and feedback systems.
• Experience developing automated quality solutions across frontend, backend, APIs, and production systems.
• Experience using production telemetry, performance monitoring, or session replay to prioritize quality improvements.
• Ability to drive quality initiatives independently from concept through implementation.
• Strong written communication and cross-functional collaboration.

Responsibilities

• Build and evolve our quality platform and related tooling and automation.
• Develop tooling for writing, executing, and maintaining effective tests.
• Improve CI/CD quality gates and release confidence.
• Create and maintain quality telemetry dashboards and alerting.
• Integrate quality signals into engineering workflows from tests and production telemetry.
• Leverage AI tools and autonomous agents to accelerate quality engineering.

Skills

Quality platform development

Automated testing

CI/CD

Observability

AI-assisted testing

Cross-functional collaboration

Strong written communication

Hands-on with AI tools

Tools

AWS

GitLab

Auth0

Grafana

Terraform

Kafka

Node.js

TypeScript

Apollo GraphQL

React

Ant Design

Vitest

Playwright

PostgreSQL

Job description

Senior Software Quality Engineer

What will I be getting myself into?

As a Senior Software Quality Engineer, you will help shape the future of our Horizon platform and the way we build software. Horizon is the platform behind SkySpecs' wind and solar inspection and asset-management business, and the work is hands‑on building, end to end.

As the cost of producing code falls, an engineer's impact comes more than ever from judgment, design, and outcomes, not volume. AI is central to how we work here, and we treat it as serious leverage: a force multiplier for engineers who already have strong instincts, not a substitute for them. We expect everyone to keep pushing what AI, automation, and agents make possible, and to bring the judgment that makes that leverage pay off.

We think about quality as a platform discipline, not a gate in the development process. Software Engineers own the quality of the software they build. Software Quality Engineers build the platform, tooling, automation, and feedback systems that enable engineering teams to ship software with confidence.

Software Quality Engineers help ensure software is not only testable, but also observable and measurable from the moment it is specified.

Our platform is built using AWS, GitLab, Auth0, Grafana, Terraform, Kafka, Node.js, TypeScript, Apollo GraphQL, React, Ant Design, and PostgreSQL. Our test suite includes Pytest, Vitest, and Playwright.

IN A GIVEN WEEK, YOU WILL:

[60%] Build and evolve our quality platform. Examples include:

• Building and maintaining quality infrastructure, automation, and developer tooling.
• Building tooling that enables Software Engineers to write, execute, and maintain effective tests.
• Improving CI/CD quality gates and release confidence.
• Building and maintaining application quality telemetry, dashboards, and alerting.
• Integrating quality signals from testing, production telemetry, application performance, and user behavior into engineering workflows.
• Leveraging AI tools and autonomous agents to accelerate quality engineering.

[20%] Partner on solution design and quality strategy. Examples include:

• Participating in specification, feature design, and implementation planning.
• Helping define clear, testable, observable, and measurable acceptance criteria.
• Identifying quality risks and opportunities to improve testability.
• Designing high‑signal testing strategies across unit, integration, end‑to‑end, and production environments.
• Using production telemetry, application performance metrics, and session recordings to identify user friction, regressions, and opportunities to improve future designs.
• Coaching Software Engineers on effective testing, observability, and quality practices.
• Reviewing implementation plans, testing approaches, and AI-generated tests.

[20%] Improve Horizon, our engineering systems, and the way we work. Examples include:

• Continuously improving how we measure user experience, application performance, and release health.
• Analyzing production issues and strengthening our quality systems.
• Building feedback loops that help engineering teams identify regressions before customers report them.
• Exploring new ideas, experiments, and prototypes that could improve Horizon or the way we build software.
• Expanding AI and agent capabilities.
• Reducing operational toil through automation.

Success is measured by the confidence we have in every release, not the number of tests written or executed.

Requirements

Core Expectations

• 5+ years building and maintaining quality platforms, automated testing systems, developer tooling, or similar engineering systems for production software.
• Strong software engineering fundamentals and systems‑thinking.
• Deep understanding of software quality across testing, observability, application performance, and production systems.
• Experience designing and maintaining automated testing frameworks, quality infrastructure, CI/CD quality gates, and engineering feedback systems.
• Experience developing and maintaining automated quality solutions across frontend applications, backend services, APIs, and production systems.
• Experience using production telemetry, application performance monitoring, session replay, or similar tools to identify and prioritize quality improvements.
• Ability to independently drive quality initiatives from concept through implementation.
• Strong written communication skills.
• Demonstrated ability to work within a cross‑functional team of technical and non‑technical contributors.
• Hands‑on experience with AI‑assisted and agentic development workflows, and a track record of evolving how you use them.
• Sound judgment when using AI tools, including reviewing and correcting agent‑generated tests and code.

Bonus Points for

• Familiarity with our stack: AWS, GitLab, Auth0, Grafana, Terraform, Kafka, Node.js, TypeScript, Apollo GraphQL, React, Ant Design, Vitest, Playwright, and PostgreSQL.
• Experience building internal engineering platforms, developer tooling, observability platforms, or quality platforms.
• Experience improving CI/CD pipelines and release engineering.
• Experience operating distributed systems at scale.
• Background in utility‑scale energy generation, with an emphasis on renewables.

What We Value

• Own outcomes, not assignments.
• Have strong opinions that are loosely held.
• Operate autonomously and are self‑accountable.
• Create clarity from ambiguity.
• Improve systems, not just features.
• Take initiative in identifying and addressing risks, improvements, and opportunities that increase the impact of their work.
• Continuously learn, adapt, and experiment with new technologies and ways of working.

Location & Logistics

This role may be remote or located in the SkySpecs Ann Arbor headquarters, depending on candidate location and preference. Remote applicants will be expected to attend team meetings primarily in the US Eastern timezone.

Relocation: This position does not offer financial support for relocation.

Sponsorship: Applicants must be currently located in the United States and legally authorized to work in the United States for this employer now and in the future, without the need for visa sponsorship. We are unable to sponsor or take over sponsorship of employment visas at this time.

Compensation: Base salary dependent on experience and location. Position is eligible for discretionary annual bonus.

SkySpecs is an equal opportunity employer. SkySpecs does not discriminate in employment with regard to race, color, religion, national origin, citizenship status, ancestry, age, sex (including sexual harassment), sexual orientation, marital status, physical or mental disability, military status or unfavorable discharge from military service or any other characteristic protected by law.