What does a Quality Assurance Specialist do?
A quality assurance specialist is an individual who is responsible for monitoring, inspecting, and proposing measures to correct and improve a company's product. Quality assurance specialists need to outline quality assurance policies and procedures, making sure that quality standards are assured. It is important that a quality assurance specialist should have strong attention to detail and is excellent in data collection. This work may require a minimum of bachelor's degree and certification to get certified.
Quality assurance specialist responsibilities
Here are examples of responsibilities from real quality assurance specialist resumes:
- Manage all NDT relate gauges to ensure calibrations requirements are meet.
- Provide employee training and manage all NDT certification records per ASNT SNT-TC-1A.
- Lead the HACCP team to ensure full compliance with regulatory and industrial food safety standards.
- Manage product and environmental sampling for chemical and microbial analysis to meet HACCP requirements.
- Lead cross functional project team to build user-friendly windows base customer support applications which interface with the OmniPlan/OmniPlus mainframe application.
- Execute quality processes in tissue banking and medical device, FDA requirements 21 CFR 1271 and 21 CFR 820.
- Perform extensive planning, testing of controls, and substantive audit procedures in accordance with GAAS during financial statement audits.
- Develop company quality policy and objectives for quality system require by ISO QMS guidelines.
- Monitor manufacturing and QC operations trying to find opportunities for improvement corrective and preventive actions.
- Monitor new regulatory legislation or guidelines, which have direct impact on GCP regulatory compliance function.
- Perform fraud risk assessments and assess internal controls in accordance with Sarbanes-Oxley, including reviewing management's documentations and making recommendations.
- Cross browser testing using selenium web driver.
- Execute functional testing and facilitate UAT with internal clients.
- Use and familiarity with .Net and Java addin for creating scripts.
- Draft, review and negotiation of punchlists and contracts with Sr.
Quality assurance specialist skills and personality traits
We calculated that 6% of Quality Assurance Specialists are proficient in GMP, Patients, and FDA. They’re also known for soft skills such as Analytical skills, Communication skills, and Detail oriented.
We break down the percentage of Quality Assurance Specialists that have these skills listed on their resume here:
- GMP, 6%
Perform Audits during the manufacturing process for adherence to current GMP, Specifications and ensure compliance with established regulatory requirements.
- Patients, 5%
Collected patients demographic and verified their medical insurance benefits, obtained prior-authorization as needed for DME supplies.
- FDA, 5%
Maximized profitability and eliminated liability by establishing procedures and standards that were compliant with internal, third party and FDA standards.
- CAPA, 4%
Provide timely data trending and metrics analysis for presentation at Monthly Metrics Review meeting for quality assessment and CAPA recommendations.
- Corrective Action, 4%
Review and approve contractor Corrective Action Plans resulting from audit findings and perform follow-up assessments for verification and validation ensuring implementation.
- CFR, 4%
Participated in 21 CFR electronic signature compliance and software validation completion for ARC computer system national consistency program.
"gmp," "patients," and "fda" are among the most common skills that quality assurance specialists use at work. You can find even more quality assurance specialist responsibilities below, including:
Communication skills. Another essential skill to perform quality assurance specialist duties is communication skills. Quality assurance specialists responsibilities require that "accountants and auditors must be able to listen to and discuss facts and concerns from clients, managers, and other stakeholders." Quality assurance specialists also use communication skills in their role according to a real resume snippet: "self-motivated leader committed to company's goals with excellent organizational, written and oral communication skills. "
Detail oriented. Another skill that relates to the job responsibilities of quality assurance specialists is detail oriented. This skill is critical to many everyday quality assurance specialist duties, as "accountants and auditors must pay attention to detail when compiling and examining documents." This example from a resume shows how this skill is used: "organized and prepared annual review of cmc section for detailed annual reports submitted to the fda. "
Math skills. A big part of what quality assurance specialists do relies on "math skills." You can see how essential it is to quality assurance specialist responsibilities because "accountants and auditors must be able to analyze, compare, and interpret facts and figures." Here's an example of how this skill is used from a resume that represents typical quality assurance specialist tasks: "created trend reports, training materials, and call reporting statistics. "
Organizational skills. Another common skill required for quality assurance specialist responsibilities is "organizational skills." This skill comes up in the duties of quality assurance specialists all the time, as "strong organizational skills are important for accountants and auditors, who often work with a range of financial documents for a variety of clients." An excerpt from a real quality assurance specialist resume shows how this skill is central to what a quality assurance specialist does: "demonstrated excellent organizational and problem resolution skills. "
The three companies that hire the most quality assurance specialists are:
Choose from 10+ customizable quality assurance specialist resume templates
Build a professional quality assurance specialist resume in minutes. Our AI resume writing assistant will guide you through every step of the process, and you can choose from 10+ resume templates to create your quality assurance specialist resume.
Compare different quality assurance specialists
Quality assurance specialist vs. Test specialist
A test specialist is responsible for evaluating and running diagnostic tests for system networks and applications to ensure stability and efficiency according to the quality standards. Test specialists analyze the system's features and write findings reports for improvement and technical resolutions. They also help system engineers in developing infrastructures and designing servers to support business operations and maximize productivity. A test specialist must have excellent communication and organizational skills, especially in identifying malfunctions and inconsistencies before the actual launch of deliverables.
There are some key differences in the responsibilities of each position. For example, quality assurance specialist responsibilities require skills like "gmp," "patients," "fda," and "capa." Meanwhile a typical test specialist has skills in areas such as "java," "test procedures," "test equipment," and "troubleshoot." This difference in skills reveals the differences in what each career does.
On average, test specialists reach similar levels of education than quality assurance specialists. Test specialists are 0.1% more likely to earn a Master's Degree and 0.1% more likely to graduate with a Doctoral Degree.Quality assurance specialist vs. Senior quality assurance engineer
A senior quality assurance engineer oversees the testing procedures conducted in software development, ensuring technical accuracy and efficiency. They are primarily responsible for working alongside software designers and quality engineers, reviewing quality control reports, inspecting specifications, and devising particular test procedures. Moreover, it is also essential to troubleshoot issues and identify any inconsistencies or bugs. As someone with more experience in the team, they must supervise and serve as a mentor to the younger quality assurance engineers in the joint effort to develop efficient software.
In addition to the difference in salary, there are some other key differences worth noting. For example, quality assurance specialist responsibilities are more likely to require skills like "gmp," "fda," "capa," and "corrective action." Meanwhile, a senior quality assurance engineer has duties that require skills in areas such as "qa," "java," "python," and "test automation." These differences highlight just how different the day-to-day in each role looks.
Senior quality assurance engineers may earn a higher salary than quality assurance specialists, but senior quality assurance engineers earn the most pay in the telecommunication industry with an average salary of $112,284. On the other hand, quality assurance specialists receive higher pay in the pharmaceutical industry, where they earn an average salary of $76,157.In general, senior quality assurance engineers achieve higher levels of education than quality assurance specialists. They're 8.9% more likely to obtain a Master's Degree while being 0.1% less likely to earn a Doctoral Degree.Quality assurance specialist vs. Quality analyst
Pumpers are individuals who take responsibility for setting the pumping system controls for product maximization. Their job requires them to set density, concentration, rate, and pressure. They do the operation and maintenance of the auxiliary equipment pumping oil. It is their duty to set the wells so they will function based on the production schedules and switch the oil flow between tanks. They even install the pumping systems.
Some important key differences between the two careers include a few of the skills necessary to fulfill the responsibilities of each. Some examples from quality assurance specialist resumes include skills like "gmp," "capa," "cfr," and "continuous improvement," whereas a quality analyst is more likely to list skills in "customer service," "qa," "post implementation," and "manual test cases. "
Quality analysts earn the highest salary when working in the finance industry, where they receive an average salary of $77,710. Comparatively, quality assurance specialists have the highest earning potential in the pharmaceutical industry, with an average salary of $76,157.quality analysts typically earn similar educational levels compared to quality assurance specialists. Specifically, they're 3.0% more likely to graduate with a Master's Degree, and 0.0% more likely to earn a Doctoral Degree.Quality assurance specialist vs. Quality assurance team leader
A quality assurance (QA) team leader is an individual who is responsible for managing a team of engineers from the quality assurance department of an organization to participate in the overall QA planning and activities. QA team leaders are required to play the key role as a member of the project management team to ensure that the product exceeded user expectations. They must develop and implement QA processes and supervise daily QA activities to maximize quality and productivity. QA team leaders must also prepare and report audited results to the organization's site senior management.
Even though a few skill sets overlap between quality assurance specialists and quality assurance team leaders, there are some differences that are important to note. For one, a quality assurance specialist might have more use for skills like "gmp," "patients," "capa," and "corrective action." Meanwhile, some responsibilities of quality assurance team leaders require skills like "qa," "manual test cases," "status reports," and "scrum. "
Quality assurance team leaders enjoy the best pay in the automotive industry, with an average salary of $105,602. For comparison, quality assurance specialists earn the highest salary in the pharmaceutical industry.The average resume of quality assurance team leaders showed that they earn similar levels of education compared to quality assurance specialists. So much so that theyacirc;euro;trade;re 4.6% more likely to earn a Master's Degree and less likely to earn a Doctoral Degree by 0.1%.Types of quality assurance specialist
Updated January 8, 2025
