Software QA Engineer

SmartLight Analytics is looking for an automation-first QA Engineer to build and own test automation across our internal tools, carrier-facing APIs, and carrier and customer portals. This is a hands-on engineering role, not a manual-testing position with automation on the side: you'll design, build, and maintain an automated test framework (e.g., Playwright) as the primary way we catch regressions and gate releases, and you'll bring AI-enabled tooling into how tests get written and maintained.
This is a remote role.
What You'll Do
Design, build, and maintain automated regression suites (Playwright or an equivalent modern framework) covering internal tools, carrier-facing APIs, and carrier and customer portals
Integrate automated tests into CI/CD so they run on every relevant change without manual triggering
Evaluate and apply AI-enabled testing tools - AI-assisted test generation, self-healing selectors, AI-assisted defect triage - to speed up authoring and maintenance while keeping a clear standard for what still needs human review
Act as the release quality gate for the toolsets you own: sign off on releases based on automated test results, or make an explicit, documented risk call when something isn't ready
Find, isolate, and clearly document defects with reproducible steps, expected vs. actual behavior, and severity
Prioritize test coverage by risk - carrier- and customer-facing paths, compliance-relevant flows, and high-usage features get coverage first
Partner closely with Software Engineering and Product throughout the development cycle so testing isn't a bottleneck bolted on at the end
Build and document repeatable QA practice - test architecture, coverage standards, release-gate criteria - so quality doesn't depend on any one person's memory
Produce testing and change-management artifacts that hold up as evidence under compliance frameworks like SOC 2
What We're Looking For
Hands-on experience building and maintaining automated test suites with Playwright or a directly comparable modern automation framework (Cypress, Selenium/WebDriver, etc.)
Experience testing both UI and API layers, including reasoning about API contracts and data flows for integration testing
Experience integrating automated tests into a CI/CD pipeline
Practical experience using AI tooling to accelerate software testing work - test generation, test maintenance, or defect triage - with good judgment about where AI output needs verification
Strong defect isolation and reproduction skills; writes bug reports engineers can act on without back-and-forth
Sound risk judgment - can distinguish a cosmetic issue from one that threatens data integrity, compliance posture, or customer/carrier trust
Comfortable being a release gatekeeper: can say "this isn't ready" and back it up with evidence
Self-directed and comfortable building and improving automation process independently
Nice to Have
Experience testing systems in a regulated or compliance-sensitive environment (SOC 2, HIPAA-adjacent, or similar)
Experience testing external-facing API integrations with third-party partners
Familiarity with Python and/or Snowflake-adjacent data pipelines, enough to sanity-check data quality issues surfaced during testing
Experience standing up or significantly leveling up an automation framework
Reporting & Team
This role sits within Software Engineering, working closely with engineering, Product, and Data Platforms, with room to grow into a broader quality engineering function as SmartLight's toolset and carrier/customer-facing surfaces expand.

Work arrangement
Yes