QA & Software Tester Jobs Market April 2023
Software Testing has made a strong revival in the last 12 months across Ireland. Reflecting on previous years we have noted a significant number of organisations, in particular within software TechHouses reduce, outsource or even disband their software testing teams, folding this function into their software engineering teams as a cost-effective solution.
Speaking to CTOs and senior managers within Software Testing the decision boils down to having an effective product or solution that has been tested in the correct way for an end user, utilising the mindset of a Test Engineer and not a Software Engineer with are ultimately two very different approaches.
In the past 6 months, we have seen an increased demand for Software Test Leaders across Dublin and Ireland, Test Leads, Test Managers, Head of Tests and Directors of Testing within banking, financial services, insurance, payments and HealthTech/PharmaTech industries with plans of establishing new teams across Ireland.
The skillsets required remain similar to what we have seen over the past number of years, for manual testers candidates with strong E2E test skills on web and backend applications are most sought after utilising tools and technology such as Jira and SQL.
For Automation Engineers, the ability to script new automation through an object-orientated language such as Java or C#, paired with automation tools such as Selenium and additional skills such as CI/CD is fundamental. There are other tools and tech that are coming through for automation engineers such as JavaScript, Python, and Cypress.
With regards to contract hires within Software Testing, the demand has remained steady, with a slight upward increase since Q4 of 2022.
We have witnessed plenty of opportunities for software test contract candidates in particular in FinTech, InsuranceTech, and HelathTech companies in Dublin and across Ireland.
The most commonly required skillset is a mid to senior Fullstack Automation Engineer with Rest APIS, Rest Assured, Java, Selenium and CI/CD experience.
Knowledge of Microservices and CI/CD Pipelines (Azure Jenkins, Git,) has become more relevant in the market. Strong front and backend Test Engineers with hands-on experience in UI and API Automation are most desirable – Java, Selenium, and Rest Assured seem to dominate this space.
Organisations are primarily looking to speak with QA contractors that are working with modern technology and can work on their own initiative. At a senior and management level, their communication and stakeholder engagement is crucial.
wellness schemes.
For more information on the current QA & Software Testing jobs market and the latest salary bands, please download our IT Salary Survey below.