SN Digital (SND) is a technology division of Springer Nature. We are responsible for maintaining and delivering millions of articles used by researchers, scientists and students around the globe.
There are c.330 of us in London, Berlin, Pune, New York, Madrid, Dordrecht, Heidelberg. We work in collaborative, multi-disciplinary delivery teams, developing digital products and services that answer user problems and support business goals.
The work is interesting and meaningful.
Our culture is collaborative and friendly.
We encourage and support growth, both personal and professional.
This is a terrific opportunity for friendly, inquisitive people who want to get involved in our work, who love to learn, who will embrace and develop our culture, and help make SN Digital a place where people and ideas can thrive. Having a good command of English is important; collaboration is important in our day-to-day work, so being able to communicate your ideas and understand others’ is key.
We are intentionally looking to create teams that are diverse and inclusive. Diversity is the mix of culture, background, experience and personality that we all bring; inclusion is getting the mix to work better together. We want every member of our teams to contribute to our common goals while respecting each other's skills, knowledge and needs.
YOUR ROLE
We are looking for people who are passionate about reducing risk wherever it lies in an organisation building software products.
QA != End of the line testing
QA != Gatekeeper of releases
QA != Automate all the things
The role of a QA is to question all aspects of the software development lifecycle and beyond. Risk lies not only in work moving across a team’s delivery board, it requires someone with awareness of this and the expertise and experience to surface risks before they become issues. Organisational structures do not constrain you, you are confident in following your instinct to ensure that risk has nowhere to hide.
From querying user flows across the Springer Nature software estate to the monitoring systems in production to threat modelling across infrastructure and product portfolios, there are many areas to investigate and advise upon. Providing insight to senior leadership on vulnerabilities not yet on anyone's radar, coaching teams on their approach to cross-functional requirements, the role is diverse and requires a proactive person to succeed in it.
Driving the organisation towards working in smaller batches, releasing more frequently, shortening feedback loops and learning from log analytics and customer feedback is in your DNA. Your interaction and collaboration with different roles and teams are more valued than finding bugs or writing test scripts and documenting test cases and charters.
You will also be a part of a global QA community working across London, Pune, Berlin & Lisbon. We invest in our employees, and we also expect you to take responsibility for your own personal growth and continuous improvement. We are looking for people who constantly look for things to learn and believe in sharing and helping others grow.
YOUR RESPONSIBILITIES
You are expected to be the influencer and coach for your team, to bring risk reduction (and, through logical outcomes, an improvement in quality) to the forefront of every activity. You will also be looked upon to explore/support new ideas/tools/techniques within the QA space to help us grow as a community.
• Be the tactical risk reducer: You will advise fellow team members of the full range of functional and cross-functional risks apparent in quality product build and delivery. You will help the team to implement best practises to minimise these risks.
• Embed the three core QA activities: Explain, demonstrate and help to embed within the team the three core QA activities of Exploratory testing, Shift-left and Collaborative QA (AKA shared responsibilities)
• Analyse and question decisions and approaches: Strong at understanding how things work under the hood i.e. the technical architecture, you will help to improve products through contributions to architectural discussions and technical implementations. Your input will be strengthened by your awareness of the supporting mechanisms that enable domains in SND.
• Embed effective testing: Testing is an essential part of building any product. We don’t believe in one group being charged with doing this; we advocate that many perspectives and opinions provide a more effective critique of what has been created. You will be expected to support and further embed this ethos, encouraging responsibility and effectiveness of testing from, and by, everyone. Clarity of testing types, boundaries, construction and maintenance will be something you lead the charge in defining, documenting and ensuring is adhered to across the domain.
• Improve our efficiency regarding Continuous Integration: Working with your team, you will advocate for stability, repeatability, reliability and efficiency of fully automated delivery pipelines. With an awareness of costs related to hosting and management of environments and infrastructure, you will provide input to help guide your team on how best to maintain their delivery mechanisms.
• Advocate process improvements: Experience with various methods possible to use in an iterative SLDC, so that you can suggest ways that may work within the team context and help improve the processes. Innovate to improve current working practices/products/technologies in favour of better quality.
• Bring a particular specialism to your team and the Discipline: Along with being the generalist QA who understands sufficiently all other roles in the team and technologies used, you will have a particular passion or specialism to bring to the QA Discipline. Be it a deep interest in Accessibility, Software Security, Product Management, Monitoring, User Experience etc., your team will benefit from your skill in this topic as well as the QA Community.
• Be aware of the constraints and product quality requirements in your domain:
Understand the standards within the industry and regulations around the globe that may impact the product(s) your team builds, ensuring that everyone is aware of and proactively works to meet these requirements
• Help the QA community grow: Be an active member of the QA team, helping organize events/sharing sessions and participate in community meetings.
Within 3 months you will:
• Understand the practises and processes necessary for your team to function, and will be encouraging those concerned to document and make it available within SND.
• Understand the software development lifecycle (SDLC) of your team and be aware of similarities between SDLCs used by other teams in your domain. You will start to forman opinion on what and where would make valuable changes for your team to assist with risk reduction.
• Have met and built rapport with other QA staff in your domain, and be providing
suggestions and receiving insight from them in their role.
• Have met and built rapport with those in the domain from other disciplines
• Have become familiar with most people in the QA Community, and be contributing to discussions both on slack/Teams, email and Quality Street calls.
Within 6 months you will:
• Ensure that the team you are in continues to document their necessary practises and processes, that they understand the value in doing so, and notification of this has been provided to the domain.
• Use the compiled documentation to target areas of improvement you see the team needing to embark on as part of team risk reduction.
• Understand the wider domain and have formed opinions on how it handles cross-
functional attributes.
• Have a clear idea on how you can help your domain improve its approach to QA.
• Discuss with domain leaders on how to support further risk reduction.
• Be driving discussions to encourage more communication between everyone in the QA Community, from particular approaches to situations in teams to explaining detailed config in pipelines to learnings from other areas of SND.
Within a year you will:
• Be aware of the groups within SND that service the domain you are in, and have started to build rapport with these groups.
• Be a trusted advisor in your team regarding the QA Discipline, providing advice on best practises and tailored approaches based on the team’s needs.
• Be discussing with leaders in your domain about long-term areas of improvement to further reduce risk, and be assisting these leaders in bringing about positive change.
• Be collaborating with other QAs in SND in maintaining a healthy and communicative QA Community.
ABOUT YOU – SKILLS, EXPERIENCE AND QUALIFICATIONS
Essential:
• Experience working in a team that uses iterative software development practices
• Experience leading the QA strategy in a team of more than 5 people (defining,
documenting, explaining and continuously reviewing the QA strategy with every other Discipline).
• Knowledge of cloud-based architecture, microservices and the testing infrastructure required to validate products built using them.
• Knowledge of cross-functional requirements e.g. security, accessibility, performance, data protection, compliance etc and how to ensure they have a consistently low risk profile in the team.
• Ability to advise and influence a group of people on risk reduction approaches
• Excellent active listening skills and confidence to question anyone.
Desirable:
• Ability to read and understand code to a level that enables meaningful conversations with developers.
• In-depth understanding of exploratory testing, with an ability to coach teams in best practice approaches to performing it.
• Ability to efficiently use AI tooling to augment QA work throughout the team’s software development lifecycle.
At Springer Nature we value the diversity of our teams. We recognize the many benefits of a diverse workforce with equitable opportunities for everyone. We strive for an inclusive workplace that empowers all our colleagues to thrive. Our search for the best talent fully encompasses and embraces these values and principles.
#LI-AR1
Skills Required
- Experience working in a team that uses iterative software development practices
- Experience leading the QA strategy in a team of more than 5 people
- Knowledge of cloud-based architecture, microservices and the testing infrastructure required to validate products built using them
- Knowledge of cross-functional requirements (security, accessibility, performance, data protection, compliance) and how to ensure low risk
- Ability to advise and influence a group of people on risk reduction approaches
- Excellent active listening skills and confidence to question anyone
- Ability to read and understand code to a level that enables meaningful conversations with developers
- In-depth understanding of exploratory testing, with ability to coach teams
- Ability to efficiently use AI tooling to augment QA work throughout the SDLC
- Good command of English and strong collaboration/communication skills
What We Do
Research and learning are the cornerstones of progress, which is why we open doors to discovery for our communities, enabling millions of researchers, clinicians, educators and other professionals to access, trust and make sense of the latest insights. Springer Nature is an ambitious and dynamic organisation. For over 180 years our imprints, books, journals, platforms, and technology solutions have been a trusted source of knowledge to our communities. Today, more than ever, we see it as our responsibility to ensure that fundamental knowledge can be found, verified, understood, and used, ensuring that the world continues to make progress, improving and enriching lives and helping to protect our planet for future generations. Global key facts: Established for over 180 years Nearly 10,000 colleagues 200 offices in 45 countries on all continents World’s largest academic book publisher Publisher of Nature, the world’s most influential journal First company to publish more than 1 million Open Access articles Key brands and imprints: Springer Nature is home to some of the best-known names in research, health, educational and professional publishing. Every day, around the globe, our brands reach millions of people. Nature Springer BMC Palgrave Macmillan Apress Macmillan Education Scientific American Springer Healthcare Springer Medizin Research Square J.B. Metzler BSL Adis
