ZS Associates

Required Degree: B.A./B.S. or M.S.
Geographic Location(s): Evanston, Illinois & Pune, India

Software Test Developers / QA Analysts help ensure the quality of ZS-built software tools that help our clients and consulting teams make billion dollar decisions. Our software includes single-user desktop tools, large-scale highly-interactive websites, and large multi-server parallel optimization frameworks. The variety and complexity of our software makes testing a tricky and interesting challenge.

As a Test Developer or QA Analyst at ZS, you’ll take products from their earliest conceptual phases all the way through development and testing and ultimately to release and deployment. You’ll collaborate with our software developers, our consultants, and our clients to complete your understanding of not only the technical nuances of the software but the underlying business needs as well. You’ll then create and implement the testing plan that will play a major role in producing the best software possible. Your testing plan will be tailored to the product that you’re working on and may consist of things like architecture recommendations, unit tests, automated UI tests, and manual tests. You will add value to projects in your particular area of expertise and draw upon other skill sets in the group to help round out your plan.

In short, you’ll be challenged with interesting problems and will play a large role in the successful development of our software. This is not a testing job where you sit all day putting checkmarks next to items on a list of tests.

What opportunities exist at ZS?

Software is a huge part of ZS’s business and, as such, career opportunities abound. The typical progression of a test developer may start with ownership of the test plan for a small project, grow into larger projects, then coordinating the efforts of others on multiple projects, and eventually leading the way for our group by defining how to continue to help ensure we deliver the best software we can.

What are we looking for?

Software Test Developers have a Bachelor or Master with a major in computer science, a physical science, engineering, mathematics, economics or another discipline with a strong quantitative focus, as well as a strong academic record. Beyond strong analytical skills, we seek individuals with the following:

• Advanced critical thinking skills. You will need to be constantly analyzing the software and business problem you’re working on to understand what defines high quality for that application and to identify potential weaknesses.
• Excellent communication and interpersonal skills. You will only sufficiently understand the problem you’re working on if you can effectively communicate with everyone involved. Furthermore, since a big part of your job is trying to find problems with other people’s work you must have advanced interpersonal skills so that you can convey issues tactfully and constructively.
• A broad technical background. While we’re open to a variety of backgrounds and experience levels, some decent exposure to the technical world is important. If you know how to program, you’ll be able to apply those skills to writing unit tests. If you’ve written test cases for software before, those skills will obviously be used here as well. As you work with us your skill-set will be expanded to include many aspects of quality assurance but some technical experience is required to get started.