Lead Quality Engineer - (POS Modernization)

Lead Quality Engineer (Python)

Our client is a national convenience & fuel retailer—is rebuilding their point-of-sale (POS) platform. We're seeking a Lead Quality Engineer (Python) to own the test strategy, automation architecture, and quality outcomes for cloud-native, event-driven microservices powering store operations.

What You'll Do

• Own quality end-to-end: Define the test strategy across services, data streams, and UIs (API, integration, contract, performance, reliability).
• Lead a small team: Mentor 2–3 QEs/SDETs; shape the backlog, write test charters, break down work, and drive sprint quality gates.
• Build the automation platform: Implement Python-based frameworks (pytest + fixtures, Testcontainers, internal libs, CLI tools).
• API & microservices testing: Create robust API suites, schema validation (Avro/JSON Schema), idempotency checks, and resiliency scenarios.
• Event-driven validation: Test Kafka (or Pulsar) pipelines—consumer lag, DLQs, retries/backoff, compaction, retention policies.
• Data quality: Validate relational and NoSQL stores (SQL Server/Postgres + DynamoDB/MongoDB/Cassandra); ensure correctness, consistency, and performance.
• Performance & reliability: Establish SLAs/SLOs; run load/soak/chaos scenarios (e.g., Locust/k6, fault injection); analyze bottlenecks.
• Edge & store scenarios: Design offline-first tests, network-flap simulations, payment/EMV flows, device integrations (scanners, printers, pinpads).
• Shift-left quality: Integrate linting, unit/contract tests, and security checks into CI; champion quality metrics and dashboards.
• Compliance & security: Support PCI and privacy standards; implement data masking, secrets handling, and auditability.
• Cross-functional collaboration: Partner with developers, product, security, and store ops; coordinate with offshore teams to deliver at pace.

What You'll Bring

• 8+ years in Quality Engineering with strong Python automation experience; 3+ years leading QEs/SDETs or quality programs.
• Expertise with pytest, fixtures/parametrization, and requests/httpx; solid understanding of OOP and test design patterns.
• Proven hands-on with microservices and REST/gRPC testing; contract testing (e.g., Pact) and schema evolution strategies.
• Kafka/Pulsar testing experience: producers/consumers, DLQs, exactly/at-least-once semantics, and reprocessing strategies.
• Cloud & containers: Experience on any major cloud (AWS/GCP/Azure) with containers and orchestration (Docker, Kubernetes: deployments, resources, health checks).
• CI/CD: GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, Jenkins, or similar; test orchestration, artifacts, parallelization, and environment provisioning with IaC.
• Data skills: SQL proficiency (joins, indexes, query plans) and NoSQL validation patterns; familiarity with data migration testing.
• Observability: Logs/metrics/traces (OpenTelemetry, Prometheus/Grafana, and cloud-native APM such as Datadog/New Relic/CloudWatch/Cloud Trace) to detect regressions and flakiness.
• Security awareness: OAuth2/OIDC flows, secret management, and PCI touchpoints across payment paths.
• Retail/POS or payments domain experience is a strong plus (EMV, tokenization, settlement, offline queues).

Nice to Have

• UI automation with Playwright (web) and/or lightweight mobile testing for store devices.
• Testcontainers, WireMock/mock servers, and service virtualization.
• Chaos engineering basics; blue/green, canary, and feature-flag testing.
• Experience with DDD/event sourcing and data versioning strategies.

This is a full-time, onsite-only role, and the client does not offer sponsorship.