Software Test Automation Manager

Software Test Automation Manager

The Software Test Automation Manager is a key leader within the Software Quality Engineering organization responsible for defining, building, and scaling a unified, global test automation capability. This role serves as the hands-on technical leader and owner of the automation system, ensuring a single, consistent automation strategy, toolset, and framework across all sites. This role combines people leadership and deep technical ownership, managing a team of SDETs while actively contributing as an engineer responsible for automation frameworks, architecture, and implementation. The Software Test Automation Manager ensures automation aligns directly to SQE-defined test strategy, maintaining clear ownership boundaries where SQE defines what to test and SDETs implement automation. A critical focus of this role is treating automation as a disciplined engineering system, with defined standards, operating mechanisms, and lifecycle management. This includes embedding AI-assisted development as a core capability, significantly increasing automation capacity while raising the technical bar for the organization.

Essential Duties:

• Lead and manage a team of Software Automation Engineers (SDETs), providing coaching, performance management, and professional development to build a high-performing organization.
• Serve as the hands-on technical leader and owner of the automation system, defining and driving global automation strategy, frameworks, tools, and architecture.
• Establish and enforce a single, unified automation approach and toolset across all sites, eliminating fragmented or local implementations.
• Define and implement automation operating mechanisms, including how automation work is planned, developed, reviewed, and integrated into the software lifecycle.
• Design, develop, and maintain scalable automation frameworks, test harnesses, and supporting infrastructure.
• Lead the development and maintenance of automated test scripts that implement SQE-defined test cases, ensuring full traceability and alignment to test strategy.
• Ensure automation work is driven by SQE-defined priorities and test coverage, reinforcing the SQE test ownership model.
• Embed AI-assisted development as a core practice, using AI tools to accelerate automation scripting and improve efficiency.
• Review, validate, and refine AI-generated automation code to ensure correctness, maintainability, and compliance.
• Partner with Software Development, SQE, and DevOps to integrate automation into CI/CD pipelines and enable continuous testing.
• Establish and enforce coding standards, framework quality, and automation best practices to ensure scalable and reliable test systems.
• Analyze automated test results, drive root cause analysis, and ensure high-quality defect detection and reporting.

Other Duties and Responsibilities:

• Support the Senior SQE Manager in defining and evolving global automation and quality engineering strategy.
• Ensure validation and compliance of automation frameworks and tools in regulated environments.
• Drive continuous improvement of automation practices, tools, and capabilities across teams.
• Contribute to organizational upskilling, particularly in automation engineering and AI-assisted development.

Minimum Qualification Requirements:

Education: Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or equivalent of education and experience sufficient to successfully perform the essential functions of the job may be considered.

Experience: Minimum 10 years experience: Experience required in the Software Test Automation field with proven understanding of all phases of the development lifecycle including scoping, design, construction, integration and testing. Experience building and scaling automation frameworks in complex systems. Experience in regulated environments (e.g., medical devices, aerospace) preferred.

Skills: Strong expertise in designing and building scalable automation frameworks and test infrastructure. Deep understanding of automation architecture, tools, and engineering best practices. Proven ability to define and drive automation strategy across distributed teams. Strong hands-on coding skills in languages such as Python, C#, or C++. Experience integrating automated testing into CI/CD pipelines and DevOps workflows. Ability to implement and enforce standardization of tools, frameworks, and practices. Experience using AI-assisted development tools to accelerate automation and improve productivity. Strong ability to review, validate, and refine AI-generated code for quality and correctness. Understanding of SQE ownership model and alignment of automation to test strategy. Strong analytical and problem-solving skills, including troubleshooting complex automation issues. Effective leadership, communication, and cross-functional collaboration skills. Commitment to continuous learning, innovation, and advancing engineering practices.

Physical Requirements: Hybrid position reporting to the Lakewood, CO headquarters a minimum of 3 days a week. Typical Office Environment requirements include reading, speaking, hearing, close vision, walking, bending, sitting, and occasional lifting up to 20 pounds. The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an associate to successfully perform the essential duties of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential duties.