Learning on the Beach: Agile Testing Days Open Air 2022

I have been a fan of Agile Testing Days since my first visit in 2011. Although I am not even a tester, and not much of a software developer two, I have always loved the professional and friendly atmosphere provided by the great trendig-Team and the community of attendees. So when José Diaz announced this event at the recent Agile Testing Days 2021, I immediately registered without a second thought. And I could even bring three of my teammates with very different backgrounds with me. And so I want to share some of my impressions, particularly of the sessions I focused on. I’ll pick five of them that somewhat had a special significance to me.

The AgileTD Open Air took place at the beautiful Blackfoot Beach, a leisure and event location in Cologne. As with any AgileTD, the conference provided talks, workshops, extra activities, and lots of opportunities to connect, share stories or just relax. If you never have experienced a keynote during heavy rain in a tent or went swimming during a conference break, you might want to give it a try next year.?

What I like about the AgileTD, in general, is the mixture of technical, organizational, and humane topics. Naturally, they are all interconnected. And, despite the name, the Agile Testing Days are not only about testing. I would daresay the recurring, most important theme is to create a challenging, inspiring, and safe learning environment. Learning about user needs, system behavior, interactions with people - and learning itself. I recall a brief conversation with Vera Baum, CEO of quality minds, who is currently working on the introduction of Communities of Practices – CoP – as a learning concept to a larger organization. Essentially by establishing a CoP for CoPs. As a trainer-trainer myself, I am fascinated by such meta-concepts. And so my impressions are gathered around the topic of learning.

Dear Mrs. Aquafresh: Bottling this girl’s confidence – by Clare Norman

Clare Norman is a sunny character. You can see the joy and energy she brings into her work. But she could not take this energy source for granted. Her personal story contained many challenges that almost brought her down and left her with anxiety and concerns. And then she started her work as a software tester. Clare showed how she overcame her fear by reconnecting to her joyful younger self. And left some helpful insights and advice on how to achieve this new level of confidence.

When she started as the solitary software tester at her new company, she compared her feelings of anxiety and insecurity with herself back at the age of Seven, all confidence and glitter. She has confronted her challenges by reconnecting to her younger self. She presented five points that could help us all gain more confidence:

• Stretching yourself is rewarding: Get out of your comfort zone, and try something new and unexpected.?
• Don’t change who you are: Do not try to be someone else, to fulfill the image others might have of you.
• Remember your goal: Work on your personal vision, and your objectives, and don’t give up prematurely.
• Who is in your support network? You are not alone, there are many people you can reach out to who will support you.
• Be your (younger) self: Embrace joy, and glitter if you want to, keep the curiosity and boldness of a seven-year-old child.

I had to ask myself where I had probably lost contact with my inner child. I remember a time when I swam out to the sea, although not being a very good swimmer. I used to be just totally confident in my capabilities. So I definitely want to get out of my comfort zone from time to time.

Introduction to Cypress.io by Marie Clarke

On my recent path to embrace the Developer role, I have come across a couple of technologies, frameworks, languages, and tools. But I had not heard about Cypress, a modern acceptance test framework for browser-based applications.

So I decided to join the workshop by Marie Clarke. And it was fun - at least if you had the prerequisites ready. The WiFi at the conference wasn’t so great, but Malte and I brought our own hotspots. I could participate and try to go through the workshop exercises. Malte already had a running Cypress installation and showed it to other participants. I learned how to install and configure cypress, ran my first test, broke the workshop code, and improved some simple tests. Mainly, I got inspired to dig into this deeper with our developer, Mama Boye.

Cypress does have its limitations, but it is a great addition to any automated test suite. I am looking forward to trying it in our own internal products.

Pairing - Level Up! By Lisi Hocke and Simon Berner

I have to admit that I actually did not attend this session. I was there at the beginning, but when the pairs started to build, I was kind of extra. As Malte and Mama were already there, I went somewhere else. But I really have benefitted from the session I did not attend. Mama learned about the pairing basics beyond our regular turn-taking mode. Malte got some new inspiration on how to improve his own pair coding sessions.?

The pairing had always sounded odd to me. I used to love coding on my own. But then I remembered how I learned to code: By looking my neighbor over the shoulder, who was working on his own ?smart home“ appliances back in the early 80s. Well, it surely was a pretty one-directional pairing style, but I learned a lot. So pairing helped me to learn my first programming language.

The session looked very hands-on and useful. Mama told me how encouraging it was to pair up with another AgileTD newbie. In that way, pairing is not only effective and productive, a learning method with immediate feedback, but it has also a social and teambuilding function. It is also great to see Lisi on her way to Pairing Mastery.

Creating a Culture of Learning by Huib Schoots and Vincent Wijnen

Huib and Vincent discussed the necessary system components of a learning organization and enriched the talk with their own positive and negative experience. As they dug into the topic, it became clear that you should not take your organization’s capability to learn for granted. Based on the five disciplines listed by Peter Senge, Huib and Vincent demonstrated the necessary preconditions and enabling factors.

It was good to see their passion and expertise create the connection between foundational theory and practical application. Eventually, the culture of an organization is determined by its collectively solidified behavior. An organization can foster the conditions for learning or block them. And I have to admit that even our own small team has suffered from some anti-patterns that would block our learning. We’re not perfect – another reason to embrace a learning culture.

If you want to, you can play their learning anti-pattern bingo, too. How many boxes can you or your organization tick?

What are the most powerful questions you can ask? By Alex Schladebeck

Alex Schladebeck is an amazing person. You would call her a high-achiever. But Alex is not the stereotypical CEO, she’s a CEO with a tester mind. And one of the most important skills for testers – I would say for anyone who does not want to stick with their current level – is asking good, effective, sometimes provocative - powerful questions. In her talk, Alex described how she learned to identify and ask the important questions in her life – and how she leveraged her courage and clarity for her work as a tester and leader.

Alex started the talk with her own personal story. She quickly connected her growth experience with the importance of the right question. The guiding questions around her very core of existence led to other questions for herself, and finally others. She demonstrated this development by sharing some experiences from her work life, both positive and challenging.

In hindsight, I must say that I have always thought of myself as a great question-asker. But I noticed the difference in both content and intent between Alex’s question setting and my own. My questions are always meant kind of instructive and guiding; I am a trainer after all. After the talk, I have to admit that these kinds of questions can also be confusing and frustrating for my team members. As one of the attendees of the talk mentioned, developers sometimes just ask for decisions or instructions, not even more puzzles.

A very refreshing and eye-opening talk for me, and probably a candidate for the AgileTD Hall of Fame.