Why you test

- [Narrator] When trying to identify a clear strategy to test, you need to think about the why. Why are you testing in the first place? Sure, you have a lot of obvious quality-related reasons, nobody sets out to release a buggy product. However, it goes deeper than just identifying issues. There are many direct and derivative variables to your work that will drive the direction of your project. In the early stages of the product planning, your company will define its features and functionality. Your strategy will be focused on assessing the design and the look of that product as much as the quality of its features. It's not just about the aesthetics, but how the product works within the framework of the specifications. Your strategy will be to determine if it meets the design criteria your team set out to build. First, you'll need to measure the product's performance within the system it's designed to operate. So your strategy will need to test the product's ability to work within the operating systems, websites, networks, and other pieces you don't have control over, but interface with when using the product. Next, your strategy will need to measure the innovation of the design. Companies design new products to make money. People don't typically like a worse solution than they currently have, so you'll need to think about how you'll benchmark its performance, and compare it to similar products in the space. Additionally, customer input about the design of a product is central to the success of any test. How will your strategy incorporate customer feedback? You'll need to consider when and how you plan to get your product into the hands of testers who will give you real world feedback. Last, no testing program will be complete without a comprehensive quality assessment. While the tools you use are important, quality assessments aren't about your test tools, cases, and automation. Your strategy is about aligning what's necessary to accomplish the testing. At any given time you may have some, none, all the tools you need, or you might need to build some new ones. The point is, we don't test to fit the product into a program we've designed. We build around the product making our program align with the product's goals. Your strategy needs to be aligned with the team who is building the product and their objectives. Communicating with your team, learning their needs, and being actively involved in their project is essential. Testing isn't about preventing mistakes, finding flaws, or even hunting for bugs. We test to ensure the customer has a great experience with the product. So as you formulate a strategy, consider the output of your work. Don't fixate on schedules or driving to help hasten the release of a product. Focus on whether or not the product you are testing is going to deliver what the customer needs and wants. In the end, it's why we test.