Can we get better? 1% at a time!

We are lucky that there are no standards in testing. There is so much diversity and variety in contexts that there are unlimited learning opportunities.

Different Experience Levels
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# No professional experience or only theoretical experience of software testing

# New job with prior experience of hands-on software testing

# Coming back to software testing after a break

# Starting software testing after working in a different profession

# Veteran of software testing

Different Domains
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Insurance | Education | Gaming | Finance | Ecommerce | Retail |
 
Emerging Tech and much more

Different Quality Criteria
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Functionality | Usability | Security | Automation | Performance |
 
Scalability | Accessibility | Compatibility and more

Different Models of working
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Agile / Scrum / Lean / Kanban / Waterfall / Customized Agile /

Strictly by process

Different Platforms/Layers
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Desktop/Web/Mobile/API only | Multiple platforms/layers(UI, DB, API)        

Even with so much diversity, most of us want to improve. The goals are big, sometimes vague and most of the time only on paper. My point is - as we all want to improve, can we improve 1% at a time, consistently across all areas so that when it adds up, leads to a bigger and significant gain.

Let me walk you through an example:

No one likes when the customers report bugs after production release.

So what would be some kneejerk reactions?

• Bring more automation
• Increase the number of testers
• Increase the testing cycles
• Give testing to a different team
• Write more test cases

Instead, we could focus on the critical factors that contribute to this problem and target to solve them. What if we don't have any problems as of now but want to improve, can we focus on all the areas and improve by 1% in each of them?

• List out all the tasks done as part of testing a release
• Focus on improving each task by at least 1%
• Keep on doing it till there is a plateau or the team feels no more improvement is possible

Questioning and Documentation

For any release, there might be discussions with different stakeholders. What if we improved our questions? What if we made more useful notes in each meeting? If we never had the minutes of the meeting sent, can we start sending the minutes? If we are already sending the minutes, can we save time by removing the redundancy or improve the format of the minutes? If we are already following a specific format, can we target to finish on time and stick to the agenda? If we are not wasting any time in meetings, can we target to shift the meeting to emails/chat and save the meeting time?

Understanding the Design

Can we record the meeting so that we save time explaining the same design to multiple people? What if we shared the recording well before the meeting or shared it in a common pre-defined location so that everyone knows where to find it? How about contrasting and comparing multiple designs at this stage than just going through one design? What if we include all the stakeholders and share the impact of each design on them?

Dev Tests

What if we discussed the code at this stage itself? What if testers and developers discussed ideas on how to test a particular design? What if the testers shared the probable bugs even before the code is developed? What if testability is incorporated from the first line of code?

Test Ideas

Think about the scenario when the priority of ideas and scope is clearly discussed with the stakeholders. The focus is on finding the more critical bugs? What if the bug reports are 1% better - maybe the right attachments, logs? If they are already present, the follow-up test results are also included?

Tools

The right tools are used from the start. The tools that can save us time. The tools that help us discover the right kind of information. The tools that prevent us from making blunders.

There are many more such areas where we spend a lot of time while testing. What if we improve in each of those by just 1% to start with?

Happy to discuss more. I am still thinking more about this idea.

Maybe, I will improve this thought by 1% in the coming days.

What do you think about this idea - 1% improvement at a time?