Senior Test Lead, Diablo IV | Austin, TX

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Team Introduction

The concept of “Blizzard polish,” that is, the infinite care and loving detail put into every aspect of our games, is something we take seriously and pride ourselves on delivering to our players. It’s a responsibility shared across the company – and its undisputed heart and soul is Blizzard QA.

Blizzard QA is a close-knit team; we care about iteration, problem-solving, and succeeding as a group. We genuinely love what we do for a living and expect the same from everyone who joins us. If your career is ready for its next great challenge, get in touch and let’s get to work!

About the job

The Sr. Test Lead at Blizzard oversees QA operations and testing for assigned team and product, ensuring software quality and process improvement. It is a pivotal figure in ensuring the success and quality of our products, leading a team responsible for testing initiatives aligned with senior leadership strategies. They collaborate closely with leadership and key partners, offering valuable insights and services to enhance product quality. With a focus on quality and continuous improvement, they oversee all aspects of test execution and reporting, ensuring deliverables meet high standards. Their role involves creating and monitoring metrics and analyzing product quality and risks. Additionally, they play a key role in developing their team and leadership talent, championing best practices, and driving the long-term vision for quality assurance.

This role is anticipated to be a hybrid work position, with some work on-site and some work-from-home. The potential home studio for this role is Austin, TX.

Responsibilities

• Lead a test team for a product, ensuring alignment with senior leadership initiatives and strategy across globally distributed teams.
• Collaborate with development leads and provide high-value, quality-related services to the product area.
• Oversee team test execution and reporting, ensuring the quality of all deliverables, workflows, and relationships.
• Create, monitor, and control metrics impacting product and team quality, analyzing product quality and usability, associated system limitations, and reporting on risk.  Collaborate with senior leadership on shifting work or resources to promote test quality, software development best practices, and enhanced customer experience.
• Host test closure activities, such as testware evaluation, knowledge transfer, and retrospectives.
• Develop training materials for the project team and lead workshops for test leadership, requirements gathering, and risk identification.
• Champion and influence software development best practices and the customer experience.
• Lead and support projects and initiatives with regional teams, cross-functional partners, and QA teams. Provide resources and assistance and oversee adherence to the master test plan for the product. Contribute to the long-term QA vision and facilitate communication with stakeholders.

• Provide leadership, support and guidance to assigned team, ensuring their performance is managed effectively and fostering a productive, positive, collaborative work culture. 
• Champion efforts that build synergy, trust, collaboration, and inclusivity within the organization. Own and manage relationships with key partners, resources, colleagues, and leaders ensuring transparency around critical decisions and trade-offs. 

Requirements

• Minimum 6 years of experience in Quality Assurance.  
• Minimum of 3 years directing the work of individual contributors and multiple levels of leadership and teams.
• Experience with game engines, content and asset editors, and shared technology.

• Thorough understanding of Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC), specifically QA processes in agile and waterfall development environments.
• Practical knowledge of relational databases such as Oracle, MySQL, & SQLServer.
• Thorough understanding of Jira process for their team, able to navigate their project and enter defects with no oversight.
• Proven ability to analyze, interpret, and act on data sets and complex workflows.

Pluses

• Bachelor’s Degree in a related field preferred. 
• White box testing experience.
• Certifications: PMP, Scrum Master and/or Product Owner, ISTQB 
• Coding Knowledge: XML / HTML, JavaScript, Python, Java, C / C++ / C#, SQL.
• High level of gaming knowledge and/or skill.
• Passion for Blizzard’s line of products and services.

Your Platform

Best known for iconic video game universes including Warcraft®, Overwatch®, Diablo®, and StarCraft®, Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. (www.blizzard.com), a division of Activision Blizzard, which was acquired by Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT), is a premier developer and publisher of entertainment experiences. Blizzard Entertainment has created some of the industry’s most critically acclaimed and genre-defining games over the last 30 years, with a track record that includes multiple Game of the Year awards. Blizzard Entertainment engages tens of millions of players around the world with titles available on PC via Battle.net®, Xbox, PlayStation, Nintendo Switch, iOS, and Android.

Our World

Activision Blizzard, Inc., is one of the world's largest and most successful interactive entertainment companies and is at the intersection of media, technology and entertainment. We are home to some of the most beloved entertainment franchises including Call of Duty®, World of Warcraft®, Overwatch®, Diablo®, Candy Crush™ and Bubble Witch™. Our combined entertainment network delights hundreds of millions of monthly active users in 196 countries, making us the largest gaming network on the planet!

Our ability to build immersive and innovative worlds is only enhanced by diverse teams working in an inclusive environment.  We aspire to have a culture where everyone can thrive in order to connect and engage the world through epic entertainment. We provide a suite of benefits that promote physical, emotional and financial well-being for ‘Every World’ - we’ve got our employees covered!

The videogame industry and therefore our business is fast-paced and will continue to evolve. As such, the duties and responsibilities of this role may be changed as directed by the Company at any time to promote and support our business and relationships with industry partners.

We love hearing from anyone who is enthusiastic about changing the games industry. Not sure you meet all qualifications? Let us decide! Research shows that women and members of other under-represented groups tend to not apply to jobs when they think they may not meet every qualification, when, in fact, they often do! We are committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment and strongly encourage you to apply.

We are committed to working with and providing reasonable assistance to individuals with physical and mental disabilities. If you are a disabled individual requiring an accommodation to apply for an open position, please email your request to accommodationrequests@activisionblizzard.com. General employment questions cannot be accepted or processed here. Thank you for your interest. 

We are an equal opportunity employer and value diversity at our company. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status, among other characteristics. 

Rewards

We provide a suite of benefits that promote physical, emotional and financial well-being for ‘Every World’ - we’ve got our employees covered!  Subject to eligibility requirements, the Company offers comprehensive benefits including:

• Medical, dental, vision, health savings account or health reimbursement account, healthcare spending accounts, dependent care spending accounts, life and AD&D insurance, disability insurance;
• 401(k) with Company match, tuition reimbursement, charitable donation matching;
• Paid holidays and vacation, paid sick time, floating holidays, compassion and bereavement leaves, parental leave;
• Mental health & wellbeing programs, fitness programs, free and discounted games, and a variety of other voluntary benefit programs like supplemental life & disability, legal service, ID protection, rental insurance, and others;
• If the Company requires that you move geographic locations for the job, then you may also be eligible for relocation assistance.

Eligibility to participate in these benefits may vary for part time and temporary full-time employees and interns with the Company.  You can learn more by visiting https://www.benefitsforeveryworld.com/.