This was a discussion topic we added to LinkedIn.
"Do they need to be certified? Is experience better? Do they need a degree? Is multiple industry experience important?"
The replies to follow.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Subscribe To QAIST Blogger
Posts
Comments
Followers
1. high emotional quotient (implies ability to tolerate frustration)
ReplyDelete2. think outside the box
3. process oriented
4. technically sharp (not necessarily a programmer but understands and loves technology)
There are more but these are the top ones in my mind.
Suhas Patil.
Agree with the above. In addition, a good tester must be a good team player as our work is based on a team work - gather info from many resources, in order to get full picture and full cycle of the processes to be tested.
ReplyDeleteEfrat Weinberg.
I agree with both Suhas and Efrat. Additional to that good Analytical skills and innovative thinking is also required. I would also vote for excellent writing and verbal skills to express oneself in documented bugs etc.
ReplyDeleteQuestion 2. As far as Certifications are concerned, I will certainly encourage it. I did my ISEB couple of years back and it was really helpful. I am sure everybody will agree with me, in real life it is really difficult for any project to stick to a particular "PROCESS". But after appearing for certifications a person will certainly get to know what should theoritically happen, and try to follow it. I strongly believe that a tester should follow the defined guidelines for every work he/she does.
Question 3: Experience always helps in anything. People who have good exposure to variety of technologies and organizations always adds up to the quality of testing and bugs. But I will also like to have fresh minds, as they can think on their own as they dont have any boundary of thoughts in their minds.
Bhavik Patel.
This is quite a nice topic.
ReplyDeleteI agree with all of them but have some differ regarding the 3 topic.
It may be help a tester in his career to have multiple industries exposure (it will wider his possibilities) but to become an expert in any specific field, it is better to give more concentration on a specific field than moving around to get more knowledge about multiple industries. And this habit of QAE does give a bad impact to the IT industry too.
Jobayer Abu Zahed Mohammad.
I would suggest the following for being a good tester
ReplyDelete1) Should be very innovative.
2) Never gives up on his commitment to work.
3) Last but not the least MUST be a very good team player.
Krishna A.
A very interesting subject. But I have a few questions first:
ReplyDelete1. What is meant by a tester, is that someone who analysis and designs test, or one who executes tests, or one who designs automated tests, or a team lead, test manager or test programme manager?
2. What level are we refering to, do we mean to entry level for the role, or to be competant?
3. Is this related to your paper for QA, i.e. what makes a proffesional tester?
This is no simple subject, many have tried to define the answer in a few lines but seem to ignore the fact that there are different roles in testing. Some may be seen as more 'proffesional' than others, and require a higher level of competancy (skills and knowledge) to be able to undertake them.
Geoff Thompson.
Surely, regardless at what level we have in our profession (test designers, executioners, automation specialists, team leads, managers etc..) the qualities are the same i.e. alot of people have said "team players" etc.. We start to pigeon hole qualities just because of test ranking will surely create divides. I agree with your last statement that certain roles require a different type of competency/skill set but there must be a broad-base of qualities that cover all roles mentionned above.
ReplyDeleteI am not planning on using specific comments posted here in the WP, just wanted a general feeling for what people think.
I like all the answers that have been provided in each individual's thread, as they all apply. Some testers have more technical ability and can combine both testing and programming / development in any environment. On the other hand there are individuals who are purely testers with good knowledge and experience of testing methodologies and tools (auto & manual).
ReplyDeleteNow to concentrate of Mark's specific question .
1. A good tester must be diplomatic, a good team player, willing to learn, share information and contribute to business processes and must be able to communicate at al levels.
2. I feel certification and experience are necessary as they play important roles in the processes involved in software testing. Although some may argue that experience supersedes certification. Personally, I will take any opportunity to gain further certification.
3. Degree, National Diploma, NVQ, GCSE, does it matter?
4. Multiple industry exposure is good, but as soon as you find an industry you are comfortable with, then settle down. The advantage of having multiple industry exposure is it could serve as a backup in lean times and especially if you are not employed permanently.
Rashid O Ogunbambi.
Why would having a certificate make a tester a better one than one who hasn't ?
ReplyDeleteExperience is good IF the person has learnt from their experiences - they could have 10 years experience of doing the same thing ( and doing it badly )
( so I suppose thats one quality - able to learn from experience and apply these learnings )
the great thing about testing is that it covers such a wide base and so the best and usual answer to most questions about testing is 'it depends'
would you expect and want a security tester to have the same qualities as a usability one ? an embedded avionics tester to have the same as the tester for a web start-up ? Do all testers make good test managers ( how many would want to be ? )
Were you expecting anything other than the standard "is curious, good communication skills and used to take their toys apart when they were a small child" ?
Phil Kirkham
I would like to focus on three Areas. First of I would like to comment on what Geoff was saying what you mean by Testers because that can mean different thinks at diffrent companies. In a large company like mine a Tester would only get involved in Execution while in a small company especially when you are the only tester then you would do everything from planning to release including Test Management so it really depends in what context tester is used in. Second point i would like to address is certification and experience probably the most interesting aspects of this discussion as we have different views on this. In my view Certifications are nice to have but they should never be made compulsory. The main reason is that if you work for a large company or can do them privately you will try to get as many certifications as you can which is fine but if you work for a small company or you just cannot effort to go on certification training so a lot of test professionals are going to be at a disadvantage due to the nature of the companies they work for. So you could have people who have all the certifications in the testing but lack the experience against experience testers therefore you are not getting the best staff if you make certifications compulsory. One final point on certifications I took the ISEB Certificate in 2001 and i belive the foundation version of the ISEB Certificate has got easier and easier mainly in the early days you may have been one of the first persons to be sent on the course now but that is not the case now there is past papers etc on the internet. The final point I would like to discuss multiple industries i think working in different industries has may advantages like working with different processes, tools etc and especially in todays markets you have got to be flexible in the type of testing work you get i have always worked in multiple industries it does not matter what industry i work in the most important thing for me is the tools they use, processes and what there product and systems are used for. I would never tie myself to a single industry sector. For example if you tied yourself to the finance industry in this economic climate and never worked in any other industry then you may have problems finding another position outside the finance sector. I hope that helps chris.
ReplyDeleteChris Williams
1. Tester should have excellent communication and presentation skills.
ReplyDelete2. Atleast basic certifications in testing should have done.
3. And most important tester must be very detail oriented, to explain defects/ discussion with the concern teams.
Jayesh Bari.
Hi Phil, I don't think having a certificate will / would make a tester better than one who hasn't, as I know many excellent Testers, Test Managers / Leads who have been testing software for Yonkers and have not bothered with the certification. Personally, I see certification as a good to have and not a must have and will not impose that individuals must have them.
ReplyDeleteRashid O Ogunbambi.
I don't think certificate would add much value to a tester. Testing is all about patience, good knowledge of Domain & System and methodology. Experience is always better as it increases the probability of finding defects/ bugs in one go. Atlast the most amazing quality that needs to possess in testing is "PATIENCE".
ReplyDeleteAbhishek Agarwal.
I think experience is second to none when you are continuously evolving yourself and gaining knowledge with it (don't think certification is mandatory for that).
ReplyDeleteI can safely say with my personal experience, testers can take on any business process moving forward in their careers, because they think out of the box and don't always confine themselves to a specific module or unit, they always put the "big picture" under consideration.
Farhan Ahmed.
1) The biggest quality is a tester needs is curoisity. The ability to look beyond the requirements into the undefined unwritten needs of the user and application. The what if I do this?
ReplyDelete2) Having a degree doesn't insure compentency.
3) Experince is seeing mutliple failure types makes the testing more complete.
4) Writing skills are also needed to make the problem understandable.
Roger Richardson.
Excellent characteristics listed by Suhas and everyone. I would add
ReplyDelete- Persistance. Tester should persist in an environment of instability, and be able to reproduce issues when required.
- Detail-oriented. Tester should attempt to capture as many details as possible for the software bugs, and write detailed test cases.
- Analysis. Tester must be able to analyze the results, and analyze requirements to write detailed and accurate test cases.
- Leadership. Tester must be the leader of an organization to influence Quality in all aspects of product development.
- Customer Focused. Tester must represent the customer, and push for issue resolution based on the customers requirements.
- Troubleshooting. If required, tester must have strong troubleshooting skills inorder to help the designers find the root cause of the failure.
- Team-Oriented. Tester should help the development organization and project management in closing the major issues at hand.
- Flexible. Tester must be able to work late in the evening, and in the weekend to finish test activities.
- Committed. Tester must be committed to quality and finishing all test activites on schedule.
- Honest. Tester must be honest in executing test cases and raising bug reports.
- Learner. Tester must be able to ramp up quickly on the product and it's technology to write detailed test cases.
- Positive. Tester must remain positive in an envrionment of poor quality software.
Dilip Patel.
Beside all the already listed qualties of a hard-working, positive and team-playing tester, I would be also looking for these:
ReplyDeletea) Be able to understand what the software is supposed to do and what the customer is going to do with it
b) Accurately working, do not miss situations worth testing or overlook a fault
c) The inner urge to proove that there is a bug (a real one, a bad one)
The reason is that without these skills you only have a devoted person, who doesn't see beyond the test case he/she is checking.
While interviewing potential testers, I learnt that without these 3 basic skills they are not testers, but would-be testers. The last point is the most important one, I think.
Hofmann-Strähle Alexandra.
I recently completed a project that had a varied-skilled onshore team, and with a major release on its way everyone had their own terminology and understanding of the testing processes (different phases rather which were to be carried out with each having its individual objective, entry and exit criteria). It really took time and discussions to have everybody get into the same boat.
ReplyDeleteSo I think certifications like ISEB (foundation) does help in getting some of these practical situations out of the way especially in an Agile environment where mostly everyone (including developers) is testing during the end phases to get the release out
Another area that comes to mind is a complex software that has a good number of variables while testing, at times it’s tricky to establish defective behavior given the number of combinations you have at hand making it difficult to quantify the defect. To be successful as a tester in such situation you really need to keep hitting hard until you succeed. So I think patience and persistence are good qualities to also look for in a tester
Deepak Sharma.
Beside all the already listed qualties of being a diligent professional as a software tester, i would like to just append by saying that......
ReplyDeleteLike how a light has orientations in all directions in the same way a software tester has to think in all possible directions while testing a particular flow in an application.Testing approach should be highly conceptual.
Shijath Ali.