Careers at Watu Credit Limited

Job Summary

• The QA Automation Engineer will be responsible for ensuring the quality and reliability of the organization's information systems through automated testing processes. The role involves designing and implementing robust automated test frameworks, conducting comprehensive functional and regression testing, and collaborating with cross-functional teams to enhance system performance and usability. This position focuses on maintaining high standards of software quality, optimizing testing workflows, and proactively identifying potential issues to minimize risk.

Key Responsibility

• Designing, developing, and maintaining automated test scripts using Playwright.
• Conducting functional and regression testing of application modules.
• Validating and ensuring the quality of user interface elements, identifying inconsistencies in design and usability.
• Analyzing and testing SQL-based backend operations, ensuring data integrity and accuracy.
• Setting up and managing testing environments using Docker Compose.
• Collaborating with development teams to review code, refine test scenarios, and suggest optimizations.
• Testing APIs (REST/GraphQL) for reliability and performance.
• Creating and maintaining test documentation, including test cases and defect reports.
• Conducting exploratory testing to uncover unanticipated issues.

Base requirements:

• 2+ years of experience with TypeScript/JavaScript.
• Excellent knowledge of SQL.
• Experience with Playwright.
• Strong understanding of OOP principles.
• Experience with Git version control.
• English – intermediate.

Other technology stack knowledge:

• Familiarity with Docker Compose for setting up and troubleshooting environments.
• Basic understanding of CI/CD pipelines (e.g., Jenkins).
• REST/GraphQL API testing basics.
• SQL and ORM tools, such as Prisma

Optional knowledge that will give an advantage to the candidate:

• UI/UX basics for identifying design and usability issues.
• Ability to read the front-end part in TypeScript.
• Knowledge of Java for backend code analysis.
• Familiarity with Selenium or similar tools for understanding testing principles.
• Experience in creating test documentation.
• Advanced skills in log analysis and debugging.
• Understanding of application security, including token validation.
• Experience in testing financial applications.

Other skills:

• Strong attention to detail (e.g., identifying UI/UX inconsistencies).
• Initiative in identifying untested scenarios or edge cases.
• Effective communication skills and teamwork capabilities.
• Willingness to learn and adapt to new tools and technologies.
• Code review and refactoring skills with a focus on optimization.

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The Role

• This is a founding leadership hire for the Digital Experience Engineering function. You will be the first Head of Engineering, Digital Experience at Watu, responsible for building and leading the engineering organisation that owns everything the customer touches: payments, the Android app, conversational experience and growth.
• You will report directly to the CTO and be a peer to the Head of Engineering, Platform and the three Heads of Product. You will define how engineering works on the customer-facing layer, setting technical standards, building the squad model, hiring Tech Leads, and creating the conditions for fast, high-quality delivery.
• This is a hands-on leadership role. You are expected to be close to the code, the architecture, and the engineers, not behind a layer of process. The culture we are building is one where Tech Leads are genuine 

Your Squads

• You will lead four squads and a QA chapter. Each squad has a Product Owner (aligned to a Head of Product) and a Tech Lead who reports to you. The QA Chapter Lead is embedded in one of your squads but reports directly to you, driving QA strategy and standards across all five squads.
• Squad 1 - Payments Engineering
• Payment rails and integrations (MPESA, Airtel, and others), reconciliation, post-go-live ops, and the Payment API. The most business-critical squad in the function.
• Squad 2 - Messaging Experience Engineering
• SMS, WhatsApp, and FCM dispatch layer; conversational orchestration; in-house flow logic for loan notifications, payment via chat, and customer communications.
• Squad 3 - Android Experience Engineering
• The Watu Android app, BE API serving mobile, release process and QA strategy ownership. Device experience features.
• Squad 4 - Growth & Loyalty Engineering
• Loyalty and rewards engine, points, tiers and redemption logic, growth feature backend (referrals, campaigns), integration with Android app and payments.
• Peers- Head of Infrastructure, DevOps & SRE · Head of Engineering, Platform · Head of IT · Heads of Product

What You Will Own

Engineering leadership

• Set the technical direction for the customer experience engineering layer, architecture patterns, API design standards, code quality gates, and testing strategy.
• Build and manage a team of Tech Leads, hire them, develop them, hold them to a high bar. They are your primary lever for quality and velocity.
• Lead the QA Chapter model: work closely with the QA Chapter Lead to ensure consistent testing standards, automation coverage, and definition of done across all five squads.
• Own the release management process for CXE: coordinate cross-squad releases with your counterpart Head of Engineering, Platform, and own the CXE side of the Release Calendar.

Delivery and quality

• Drive delivery across five squads operating on Scrum or Kanban (your decision per squad), fast, predictable, and high quality.
• Work with existing dev outsourcing partners (when applicable) to define the long term strategy, nothing ships without Tech Lead sign-off. You are accountable for making this governance real.
• Enforce the engineering standards: GitHub for all code, GitHub Actions for CI/CD, mandatory PR reviews, coverage gates, OpenAPI documentation, ADRs, runbooks.
• Own the Definition of Done for your function. QA is embedded in every squad. not a bottleneck at the end of a sprint.

People and culture

• Build the CXE engineering culture: high ownership, direct communication, AI-native ways of working. Every engineer in your function uses AI/LLM tooling as a standard part of their workflow.
• Hire into your function, Tech Leads first, then engineers. You will define the hiring bar and conduct final interviews for senior hires.
• Work closely with three Heads of Product (Digital Experience, Onboarding & Operations), you own How and When; they own What. This partnership must be strong.

Who You Are

Essential

• 7+ years of software engineering experience, with at least 3 years leading engineering teams of 15+ people across multiple squads or product areas.
• Track record of shipping customer-facing products at scale, payments, mobile apps, messaging, or growth engineering in fintech, e-commerce, or a similarly high-velocity environment.
• Strong technical depth in backend engineering (APIs, event-driven architecture, distributed systems) and enough mobile/frontend fluency to govern Android squads and set standards.
• Experience with partner or vendor governance, you have been in situations where external teams execute work that your team owns, and you have made that work.
• Proven ability to build and develop engineering managers and Tech Leads, not just manage them, but grow them into genuine technical authorities.
• Comfortable operating in markets with limited infrastructure, you understand the constraints of building for mobile-first, low-bandwidth, emerging market customers.
• Fluent in modern engineering practices: trunk-based development, CI/CD, infrastructure-as-code thinking, security-first API design, test automation.

Strongly preferred

• Experience in fintech, particularly payments, lending, or digital financial services in Africa or LATAM.
• Hands-on experience with Android app development or governance of a mobile partner.
• Familiarity with conversational product engineering, WhatsApp Business API, SMS orchestration, or chatbot-adjacent product delivery.
• Experience operating in a squad-based engineering model (Spotify model or similar).
• Nairobi-based or willing to relocate, this role needs to be present in the market.

The kind of person we are looking for

• You push back when the product roadmap is unrealistic. You protect engineering quality without being obstructionist.
• You are direct. You give feedback clearly and early, to your engineers, to your peers, and upward.
• You think in systems. When something breaks, you fix the process, not just the incident.
• You are genuinely excited about AI-assisted engineering and you model that for your team.
• You have strong opinions about how good engineering teams work, and you are willing to defend them.

What We Offer

• A genuinely senior role, direct CTO report, peer to Heads of Product, founding member of a restructured engineering leadership team.
• A clean mandate. The engineering structure is being rebuilt from the ground up. You are the first hire into this function, you will shape it.
• Real scope: four squads, the core customer-facing product surface, and the authority to set the technical direction for all of it.
• A mission that matters. Our customers are real people financing motorcycles and phones that change their economic lives. Engineering quality directly affects millions of people.
• Competitive salary, benefits, and long-term incentive participation commensurate with a senior leadership role.

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Job Summary

• The Senior QA Automation Engineer will be responsible for ensuring the quality and reliability of the organization's information systems through automated testing processes. The role involves designing and implementing robust automated test frameworks, conducting comprehensive functional and regression testing, and collaborating with cross-functional teams to enhance system performance and usability. This position focuses on maintaining high standards of software quality, optimizing testing workflows, and proactively identifying potential issues to minimize risk.

Key Responsibilities:

• Designing, developing, and maintaining scalable automated test frameworks using Playwright and related tools.
• Leading test automation strategy and ensuring alignment with overall QA and development goals.
• Conducting comprehensive functional, regression, and integration testing across application modules.
• Ensuring UI consistency and usability by validating visual design, accessibility, and user experience standards.
• Analyzing backend processes, validating SQL data integrity, and troubleshooting data-related issues.
• Managing and optimizing testing environments using Docker Compose and CI/CD pipelines.
• Reviewing code and test implementations to ensure best practices and maintainability.
• Testing REST and GraphQL APIs for performance, reliability, and compliance with specifications.
• Documenting and maintaining detailed test plans, test cases, and reports on test results and coverage.
• Mentoring junior QA engineers, providing guidance in test automation, analysis, and debugging.
• Identifying process improvements, proposing test strategy enhancements, and driving automation efficiency.
• Collaborating with cross-functional teams to ensure timely delivery of high-quality software.

What we are looking for:

Base requirements:

• 5+ years of experience in automated testing with TypeScript/JavaScript.
• Expert-level proficiency in SQL, ability to design and optimize complex queries and data validation scripts.
• Extensive experience with Playwright, including building scalable and maintainable test frameworks from scratch.
• Strong understanding and application of OOP principles in test automation architecture.
• Proficient with Git and branching strategies for collaborative test development.
• English – upper-intermediate or higher (ability to participate in technical discussions and documentation).

Technology stack and tooling:

• Deep familiarity with Docker Compose, including the ability to design, configure, and troubleshoot multi-service testing environments.
• Good understanding of CI/CD pipelines (e.g., Jenkins, GitHub Actions, or GitLab CI) — capable of integrating automated tests into deployment pipelines.
• Advanced API testing (REST/GraphQL) — designing API tests, validating authentication flows, and building reusable API test utilities.
• Strong experience with SQL and ORM tools (e.g., Prisma) — validating data integrity across multiple services and environments.

Optional but highly valued expertise:

• UI/UX evaluation skills — ability to identify usability, accessibility, and design inconsistencies.
• Confident reading and understanding of frontend TypeScript code, with the ability to identify potential weak points for automation.
• Working knowledge of Java — enough to analyze backend logic, logs, and integration points.
• Experience with Selenium or similar tools, understanding different automation strategies and frameworks.
• Advanced log analysis and debugging — capability to isolate and diagnose complex issues in distributed systems.
• Understanding of security aspects (token validation, authentication flows, access control).
• Experience testing financial or high-risk transactional applications.

Other skills:

• Proactive in identifying coverage gaps, suggesting improvements to automation scope and process.
• Strong communication skills, capable of mentoring junior QA engineers and collaborating effectively with developers and product owners.
• Ability to design and enforce QA best practices — code reviews, standards, and continuous improvement initiatives.
• Eagerness to learn new tools, frameworks, and testing paradigms — staying ahead of modern QA trends.
• Experience conducting root cause analysis and contributing to postmortem reviews.
• Leadership mindset — capable of owning the entire testing process from strategy to execution and reporting.