Quality Assurance Engineer

About

Description

The Quality Assurance Engineer is responsible for ensuring the stability, functionality, and effectiveness of the Hermes suite of products, an advanced institutional equity trading system for South African stockbrokers. While the core function of this role is Quality Assurance, it operates with the breadth and depth of a Systems Analyst. This role is much broader than pure testing; it requires an analytical thinker who can look beyond individual bugs to understand system-wide behavior, complex interactions, and the broader financial infrastructure. This is a high-impact role operating in a live trading environment. The Quality Assurance Engineer will act as the primary point of contact for investigating complex production issues, often under significant time constraints. The ability to maintain composure and think clearly under pressure during critical incidents is essential to success in this position. Operational Context & Technical Complexity This position requires a candidate capable of navigating a sophisticated, high-performance trading environment. The Hermes suite is built on a Delphi-based client/server architecture, utilizing proprietary TCP/IP protocols for communication between multiple distributed server components and the frontend.

Responsibilities

• Pre-Market Operational Support: During onboarding, conduct daily pre-market system health checks (07:00 AM) to master system topology
• Post-onboarding, provide standby escalation support to the Support Team to resolve critical issues before the market opens
• First-Principles Thinking: The ability to deconstruct complex problems into their fundamental parts
• The company seeks individuals who seek to understand the "why" behind a failure rather than simply applying patches
• Resilience & Clarity Under Pressure: Demonstrates the ability to stay calm and think clearly during high-stakes production incidents
• The candidate must be able to effectively prioritize tasks and communicate accurately when time is critical and pressure is high
• Internal Toolsmithing: Identify inefficiencies in the testing process and build bespoke scripts or small utility applications (e
• g
• , in Python or PowerShell) to automate log parsing, data generation, or message injection
• Broad Systems Analysis: Apply a "Systems Analyst" mindset to assess system behavior, identify trends, and recommend improvements to enhance performance and maintainability
• Deep Domain Expertise: Develop expert knowledge in financial markets, including institutional trading and equity trading concepts

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field (required)
• 5+ years of experience in financial markets, trading systems, or enterprise financial technology
• Expert-level knowledge of financial workflows and trading systems, with a deep, practical ability to read, interpret, and trace FIX message flows for diagnostics
• Distributed Systems Aptitude: Experience troubleshooting complex client/server architectures where communication relies on custom/proprietary TCP/IP protocols
• Legacy System Aptitude: Demonstrated ability to navigate and understand complex, monolithic legacy architectures (eg, Delphi, C++, or older Java)

Application instructions:

• Please Note: As part of the interview process, shortlisted candidates will be required to complete a comprehensive practical assessment.