- Designs, builds, and maintains scalable, reusable automated test frameworks across UI, API, integration, and (where applicable) performance testing for their product area.
- Treats test automation as production-quality code: writes maintainable, well-architected, peer-reviewed test code and advocates for the same from others.
- Partners with engineering and DevOps to integrate automated tests into CI/CD pipelines, enabling fast, reliable, repeatable releases.
- Drives shift-left testing practices within their team — influencing design and development to build in testability and quality from the start.
- Reduces manual testing burden by expanding automation coverage and improving test execution efficiency.
- Defines and monitors quality metrics (coverage, defect trends, flaky test rates, release readiness) for their area and reports on them to engineering leads.
- Leads root cause analysis for escaped defects within their scope and implements automated safeguards to prevent recurrence.
- Establishes test data management and environment readiness practices for their team or platform.




- Mentors and provides technical guidance to junior and mid-level SDETs, including code reviews and pairing.
- Collaborates with Architecture, Security, and SRE to ensure test coverage extends to non-functional requirements (performance, security, resiliency).
- Influences engineering design decisions on their team to improve testability and long-term maintainability.
- Contributes to org-wide quality engineering standards and communities of practice, without owning enterprise strategy.

Qualifications

- 8+ years of experience in software development or test automation engineering
- Deep proficiency in at least one programming language (Java, Python, JavaScript/TypeScript, etc.) and test automation frameworks (Selenium, Playwright, Cypress, REST Assured, etc.)
- Strong CI/CD experience (Jenkins, GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, etc.)

Nice to Have:

Evaluates current tools, frameworks, and testing approaches and recommends adoption where it improves quality or velocity.

📌 SDET Engineer - Chennai
🏢 Photon
📍 Chennai