Job Description & Details
This is a hands-on technical leadership contract for a Senior Quality Engineering Lead to take ownership of API testing and automation frameworks for enterprise systems in Toronto. You won't just be executing test scripts; you'll be architecting automation from scratch and integrating AI-enabled quality practices into the SDLC. If you enjoy solving complex architectural testing bottlenecks and driving shift-left methodologies across agile teams, this gig offers a lot of technical autonomy.
What You'll Actually Be Doing
Your days will be split between high-level strategy and deep technical execution. You will spend time reviewing API contracts, microservice architecture designs, and business requirements to ensure bulletproof test coverage. Beyond planning, you'll be coding and maintaining robust automation frameworks from the ground up, writing comprehensive test scenarios for REST and event-driven architectures, and embedding those tests directly into CI/CD pipelines. You'll also act as a mentor, guiding other engineers and running root-cause analyses when production anomalies slip through.
The Core Tech Stack
You need to be completely fluent in building API automation frameworks using tools like Rest Assured, Karate, or Postman/Newman, paired with deep expertise in testing microservices and event-driven setups. Because the role heavily emphasizes shift-left testing and modern quality engineering, strong experience integrating tests into CI/CD pipelines and working with OpenAPI/Swagger contracts is non-negotiable.
Interview Expectations
Expect the hiring team to test your architectural knowledge of automation frameworks; they'll likely ask you to explain how you would design a scalable API automation framework from scratch for a high-throughput microservices architecture, listening closely to how you handle test data management and isolation. They will also grill you on your experience with contract testing and handling asynchronous event-driven validation, wanting to see how you troubleshoot complex integration failures.
Application Advice
To get past the ATS, make sure your resume explicitly highlights phrases like 'API automation frameworks from scratch', 'REST Assured', 'Karate', and 'CI/CD pipeline integration'. Don't just list tools—detail the scale of the microservices environments you've tested and emphasize your experience driving quality metrics and shift-left testing initiatives.