How a Great QA Team can make a Disproportionate Contribution to Project Success

How a Great QA Team can make a Disproportionate Contribution to Project Success
Paper Presented by Mark Ryland

Transcript

1. ‘How a Great QA Team can make a Disproportionate Contribution to Project Success’ Paper Presented by Mark Ryland
2. Presentation Contents 1. Introduction 2. Project Lifecycle & Team Constituents 3. Team Dynamics 4. Typical QA 5. Great QA
3. Mark Ryland’s Credentials • Close on 20 years large project delivery experience in Wholesale Financial Services • Banks, exchanges and brokers • Variety of systems types • Projects from $10M to $150M • All of these projects required QA testing • Involved in building 2 offshore testing centres • Schooled in QA testing best practise
4. Off-shore On-shore  ‘Location QA’ - ‘end to end’ testing with location specific downstream systems  user acceptance testing ( executed by user representatives)  Test execution ( system, regression, new functionality)  Maintenance of regression test cases  Test automation development C o n s i s t e n t T C o n s i s t e n t T o o l A u t o m a t e d T e W e l l M a n W e l l M a n E x e c u t i o n Example Scope From Building QA Centre
5. Project Team v Lifecycle Conception Initiation Development Test Implement Project Sponsor Project Manager Business Analyst Architect/Designer Development Team QA Team Production Team
6. Team Dynamics
7. What Determines The Team’s Rate of Progress? Pacemaker(s)
8. ‘Typical/Normal’ QA Experience 1. Doesn’t fully understand project objectives 2. Lacks detailed domain knowledge 3. Consumes lots of management & BA time 4. Is a bottleneck - test execution cycles take too long 5. Not flexible in dealing with unplanned change 6. Test coverage and quality is not good enough 7. QA team measure their success on how many test cases were executed (as opposed to the value of them)
9. Attributes of a Great QA Team 1. The basics 2. Domain experts 3. Works out for itself what needs to be done 4. High calibre, motivated staff, stable team 5. Intelligent use of tools to speed up test execution/improve 6. Only raise genuine defects 7. A peer to other parts of the project team
10. Attributes of a Great QA Team Cont…. 8. Energy and diligence 9. Flexible orientation of test effort 10. Responsive to changes in project priorities 11. Disciplined organisation of the test environment 12. Creative 13. Independent & Objective Adds Up to Making a ‘Real’ Contribution to Quality & Hence Project Success
11. 7. Test Case Quality 6. Test Process Effectiveness 1. High Quality Staff 3. Level of Energy Enthusiasm & Proactivity 4. Planning & Delivering Ability 2. Domain Knowledge 9. Bespoke Automation Tools Available 8. Detailed Management of Test Environment 5. Creativity & Flexibility in Problem Solving Measuring QA Team Effectiveness
12. Independence & Objectivity Business Analyst Designer Devel –oper End Users Business Manager 1. Understanding of Requirement 2. Delivery of Solution 3A. Independent Measurement by QA Team 3B. Independent Measurement by High Quality QA Team
13. Team Dynamics When the QA Team is Excellent 1. Developers try harder to get it right in the first place 2. Developers get rapid/timely feedback on what’s wrong 3. Developers are work harder to solve defects to keep the project on track 4. Project sponsors get clear visibility on quality level and progress 5. Project designers and analysts are have clear problem statements to work from 6. Have (justified) confidence in the system – that will feed through to the users 7. Fewer problems are going to found in live & hence the project will cost less
14. Conclusion Great QA Team
15. Questions & Answers Thank You