Here’s a post on some thoughts on testing I thought I’d share. Very much based upon my own experiences. Some of it might work for your context.
How things have changed.
When I started in testing we had testing as a sperate team. Work was fed into the team and work/ rework was passed back and forth with little interaction between the developer and the tester. It was sometimes difficult to ask questions or get help and made the tester the responsible for the feature being ok or not ok.
Then on moving into a situation where teams of developers and testers were formed, meant at least from my experience the opportunity to understand changes better. Which means the team can have a better conversation about risk. It’s also better for building relationships between team members as both the good and bad are shared. For the context I’m in this works, other contexts may require a seperate Quality Team and development team.
Testing needs interactions.
I found that a lots of the best value from the testing involves pairing with dev’s, debriefing the team with one’s findings and talking with the wider business (Pre-sales, support & professional services). From these interactions we get insight from other areas about what matters to them. They can also provide test scenarios and other such information that can help feed into testing.
There is always something new to learn.
When I started testing back in 2001 I never thought that I’d move into a leadership position. On reflection it’s been down to growing and increasing my skills. Then working hard to put them into action. This takes time and from experience not all lessons I have learned have been easy. This is where persevering comes into play. Just as an example I knew that my public speaking needed to improve. So I joined my local Toastmasters club. As a result of working on it, my public speaking has improved. It’s not been an easy journey but there’s been improvement. The same goes for learning technical things. I’ve devoted time to doing courses etc in order to understand features better. The next big step for me is to conquer coding!
The Quality community is full of new ideas and things to try. I have found that by attending webinars, conferences and meet ups my view of the world of quality has broadened. I’ve taken things back to the team to try and well as upping my testing game. There is also the learning process from making mistakes. I’ve made loads over the years and I’ve learned that there is always something to take away for next time.
TestNinja 