Quality Engineering Lead

About the Company:

Dots Africa is one of South Africa's leading background screening firms, dedicated to ensuring that businesses hire with confidence. With cutting-edge technology and rigorous processes, we offer our clients unparalleled insights into potential hires. Our mission is to foster trust, security, and transparency in professional relationships, ensuring a safer business environment for all.

Who You'll Be Joining?:

As a Quality Engineering Lead at Dots Africa, you'll be a pivotal part of our growing tech team. Comprising a dynamic mix of developers, data scientists, and IT professionals. Our team is not only tech-savvy but also passionate about our mission. Our work culture thrives on innovation, collaboration, and mutual respect. We challenge each other to push boundaries while providing a supportive environment where you can thrive and bring your best self to work.

What Do We Offer?:

• Competitive Compensation: Market-leading salary, commensurate with experience.
• Benefits Package: Comprehensive health coverage, generous paid time off, and a wellness program to help you strike the right work-life balance.
• Growth Opportunities: Commitment to professional development, regular performance reviews, and opportunities to grow within the company.
• Dynamic Work Environment: State-of-the-art workspace, regular team-building activities, and an atmosphere that promotes creativity and innovation.

About You (Candidate):

Dots Africa is entering a new phase of engineering maturity and is looking for a senior professional who can take full ownership of our Quality Engineering practice. You are someone who doesn’t wait for direction, you bring it! You understand how world-class QA operates, and you know how to build it. You’ve worked across multiple testing frameworks, tools, and architectures, and you know how to establish a quality strategy that scales.

You are highly skilled in automation, but you also know when manual testing is the right call. You understand the future of QA, including the practical use of AI for speed, stability, accuracy, and productivity. You thrive in an environment where you can uplift the team, mentor others, and set the standards for how things should be done.

Our current team will learn from you, not the other way around! You are driven, intelligent, and deeply knowledgeable about modern quality engineering.

Skills that Will Give You A Boost:

• Experience designing robust automation frameworks from scratch
• Exposure to multiple programming languages and test libraries
• Deep familiarity with cloud environments, especially Azure
• Expertise in AI-assisted testing and toolchains
• Experience introducing testing standards, governance, and QA processes
• Understanding of DevSecOps and shift-left quality practices
• Performance and load testing exposure
• Security testing knowledge (OWASP, SAST, DAST)
• Strong communication and mentoring ability

Key Responsibilities:

• Own the entire QA practice and lead the long-term quality strategy across the organisation.
• Define, design, and implement scalable automation frameworks for API, Web, Mobile, and Database layers.
• Evaluate and introduce best-in-class tools, processes, and methodologies that raise the quality bar.
• Lead the transition from manual-heavy testing to a mature automation-driven approach.
• Build a strong quality culture by mentoring, coaching, and upskilling the existing QA team.
• Establish QA governance standards, documentation, and automation guidelines.
• Drive continuous improvement and optimise test coverage, reliability, and execution times.
• Integrate automated tests into CI/CD pipelines and ensure high-quality releases.
• Identify quality risks early and drive shift-left testing practices with developers and analysts.
• Introduce and utilise AI tools to accelerate test writing, coverage analysis, and defect detection.
• Oversee end-to-end regression, performance, and integration testing efforts.
• Partner with developers, analysts, operations, and product teams to plan and coordinate test activities.
• Conduct root-cause analysis for defects and recommend clear remediation paths.
• Establish metrics and reporting dashboards to track quality trends and release readiness.
• Remain current with industry trends, emerging frameworks, and the future of automation.
• Ensure our QA tools, processes, and approach scale as the systems and business grow.

Requirements:

• 8+ years of QA experience with a strong split between Automation and Manual testing.
• Proven expertise in designing and maintaining automation frameworks (Selenium, Playwright, Cypress, Appium, or similar).
• Strong programming proficiency in Java plus experience with Angular-based applications.
• Solid experience testing APIs and microservices using Postman, REST-assured, or similar tools.
• Strong SQL querying and experience with relational databases.
• Deep understanding of QA methodologies, SDLC, Agile, and modern quality engineering principles.
• Experience integrating automated tests into CI/CD pipelines (Jenkins, Azure DevOps).
• Proficiency with Git and modern branching strategies.
• Familiarity with Docker and containerised test execution.
• Experience in mobile testing (iOS and Android).
• Strong analytical skills and the ability to spot gaps in processes, architecture, and test coverage.
• Ability to manage multiple streams of testing in a fast-paced environment.
• Track record of mentoring and upskilling junior and mid-level QA engineers.
• Experience with performance testing tools is an advantage.
• Experience with security testing practices is beneficial.
• Strong communication skills with the ability to influence engineering decisions.
• Bachelor’s degree in IT or equivalent experience preferred.
• ISTQB or similar certifications are a plus.

Join us

Be the force that defines the future of Quality Engineering at Dots Africa. If you want the opportunity to shape a QA culture, build world-class automation, and raise the bar across engineering, this is where you belong.