1 / 14

Getting out of the Testing Game

Getting out of the Testing Game. By Bill Matthews Test Architect • Manager • Technical Tester @ Bill_Matthews Bill.Matthews@TargetTesting.co.uk. What is the Testing Game?. Testing is seen as an end in itself rather than a means to an end

prem
Download Presentation

Getting out of the Testing Game

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript


  1. Getting out of the Testing Game By Bill Matthews Test Architect • Manager • Technical Tester @Bill_Matthews Bill.Matthews@TargetTesting.co.uk

  2. What is the Testing Game? • Testing is seen as an end in itself rather than a means to an end • Testing has become Nominalised (verb treated as a noun) • Testing is seen as a barrier that must be passed • Testing driven by process not outcomes • Testing is disconnected from its context • Those outside testing dictate test activities

  3. The challenge • “Testing is taking too long” • “Testing doesn’t find all the bugs” • “It all goes fine until we hit testing…then it just falls apart” • “The PMs struggle to get good testing done” • “We use industry best practices but I’m sure they’ve changed since we last had a consultant in” • “Can you help us improve our testing process practices?”

  4. The Challenge • Company was in a competitive market and so always had various offers in place. • Most offers took about 4 weeks to implement from idea to launch. • Frequently had to roll back changes because of errors. • Releases were slow, very early morning affairs • Rollbacks resulted in system outages => possible loss of revenues • Difficulties in getting a clear picture of what was happening during testing • Phased testing…for small changes

  5. How the management viewed testing

  6. How would you improve the situation? • Traditional approaches to test process improvement take an analytical approach. • Assumes current practices approximate some “best practice” • Measures against an idealised “best practice” • Suggests a prescription to bring current practices closer to the “best practice” • What if your processes are fundamentally broken and don’t fit your current needs? Design Thinking (Exploring What If)

  7. 2 minute introduction to the Business Canvas Model

  8. The Value of Testing • The Customers and Value Proposition segment is where the value of our testing activities can be realised. Who are your customers and what problem do we solve for them? • Do we solve the “testing problem” for them? • If you are in the Testing Game…yes. • And our customers also think that’s the problem we solve for them • If not the “testing problem” – what problem do we solve?

  9. How do our customers want to be engaged? • The Customer Relationship and Channels segments is where we understand how our customers want to interact with us. • So how do we deliver the information our customers value? • Those in the Testing Game think it’s all about Test Plans and Metrics • But have never really explored how their customers (really) want to work with them? • If you were a customer how would you want to be engaged? • Think about the user experience/journey when they engage with you – does it feel right and appropriate?

  10. How do deliver something our customers value • Key Activities, Key Partner & Key Resource Segments • This is where the activities associated with Testing sit. • What are the key activities that we need to do (and do well) to deliver value? • Those in the Testing Game have a testing centric view so know all about these segments. • But customers just get what they are given – take it or leave it. • Wouldn’t it be better to have a customer centric view and adapt the How in line with the Need?

  11. What we came up with

  12. The catalyst for change • What would be different if this is how we approached testing? • A flood of energised ideas • Not all of them practical but at least we were Exploring What If • What’s stopping us? • Only the Permission to change

  13. Organic change • Some changes that happened: • The test team started to communicate…and it was infectious! • Collaboration - No longer a long chain of sequential processes • Abandoned the “one size fits all” processes and naturally adopted a more context driven approach • “Does that mean we don’t need to write test scripts?” • Test Plans were replaced with Kanbans • the PMs were wary of this at first but agreed to let us try and manage our own work. • Soon Kanbans were popping up all over the office (outside of the test team) • Focus was on the flow of information • PMs finally stopped telling the testers how to test…and we stopped having test phases based around testing levels. • The team seemed more energised • Overall time for small changes reduced to about 2 week • still not great but an improvement

  14. So the Business Canvas Model is Magic then? • So all the change happened because of a single sheet of paper? • No really, the magic is with the people • It helped the team see a wider context and focus on what adds value • In most cases they already had ideas on how to improve their practices. • Gave them a framework to discuss what they do without really talking about testing • They were given permission to make changes • A little sad that they needed to be given permission

More Related