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Risk Assessments for Teams and Individuals

Risk Assessments for Teams and Individuals

Jenny Bramble

March 27, 2019
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  1. @JENNYDOESTHINGS HI I’M JENNY! ▸ Test Lead at Willowtree ▸

    Yes, we’re hiring! ▸ Human interfacing is my favorite thing ▸ Testing is also my favorite thing ▸ Two cats—Dante and Dax ▸ Ask me for a sticker later! ▸ Yes, they’re also my favorite things ▸ My pronouns are she/her
  2. @JENNYDOESTHINGS WHAT’S THIS ABOUT RISK ASSESSMENT? ▸ What is risk?

    ▸ Two types of risk assessment sessions ▸ Five steps to a well run session ▸ Pick your features ▸ Choose a rating system ▸ Level-set your system ▸ Assign values ▸ Re-evaluate ▸ Applying this to informal sessions
  3. TYPES OF RISK ASSESSMENT SESSIONS FORMAL, INFORMAL, BLACK TIE, POST

    APOCALYPTIC BUSINESS CASUAL @jennydoesthings
  4. @JENNYDOESTHINGS TYPES OF RISK ASSESSMENT SESSIONS ▸ A chance to

    walk through the risks of an application, feature, use case, or other subset of your life ▸ Describe the risks that face your project ▸ Decide on their impact and probability ▸ Create cohesion between groups or between yourself and reality ▸ Formal or informal?
  5. @JENNYDOESTHINGS TYPES OF RISK ASSESSMENT SESSIONS - FORMAL ▸ A

    whole-team event ▸ Level set risk with the team and determine what is acceptable ▸ Creates cohesion within your team ▸ Lets everyone feel heard ▸ Run at regular intervals. Generally less often than grooming, but find a cadence.
  6. @JENNYDOESTHINGS TYPES OF RISK ASSESSMENT SESSIONS - INFORMAL ▸ A

    single person event ▸ Back-of-the-napkin ▸ Use these kinds of sessions to level set yourself ▸ Judge your growth as a tester ▸ More on this later! ▸ Foreshadowing
  7. @JENNYDOESTHINGS FIVE STEPS TO A WELL RUN SESSION ▸ Pick

    your features ▸ Choose a rating system ▸ Level-set your system ▸ Assign values ▸ Re-evaluate
  8. @JENNYDOESTHINGS FIVE STEPS TO A WELL RUN SESSION - DEFINE

    RISK ▸ Quickly talk about impact and probability of failure ▸ Include any additional considerations you need to have a full picture ▸ Set a goal for the meeting ▸ Time box this to 5-10 minutes
  9. @JENNYDOESTHINGS FIVE STEPS TO A WELL RUN SESSION - PICK

    YOUR FEATURES ▸ Expect to get through about 6 features in an hour ▸ This depends on how chatty your team is ▸ It’s okay not to get through everything! ▸ Look for logical groupings ▸ Consider personas ▸ Handle this before the session! ▸ Make a collaborative document
  10. @JENNYDOESTHINGS FIVE STEPS TO A WELL RUN SESSION - CHOOSE

    A RATING SYSTEM ▸ How do you want to represent your concerns? ▸ 1-10 ▸ T-shirt sizing (extra large, large, medium, small, extra small) ▸ High/Medium/Low ▸ Emojis ▸ Images
  11. @JENNYDOESTHINGS FIVE STEPS TO A WELL RUN SESSION - CHOOSE

    A RATING SYSTEM ▸ How do you want to represent your concerns? ▸ 1-10 ▸ T-shirt sizing (extra large, large, medium, small, extra small) ▸ High/Medium/Low ▸ Emojis ▸ Images ▸ Time box this to about 5 minutes
  12. @JENNYDOESTHINGS FIVE STEPS TO A WELL RUN SESSION - LEVEL-SET

    YOUR SYSTEM ▸ A system that’s not calibrated is just chaos ▸ A system that is calibrated is organized chaos ▸ Start by asking what the lowest part of your rating looks like ▸ Move on to the highest part ▸ Use these two as bookends for your system ▸ Expect contention! ▸ Time box this to about 10 minutes ▸ You must time box this or it will take the entire session ▸ You can re-use the system and calibration for other sessions with the same group
  13. @JENNYDOESTHINGS FIVE STEPS TO A WELL RUN SESSION - ASSIGN

    VALUES ▸ Vote with fingers, cards, an app, anything ▸ The important thing is to make sure everyone’s voice is heard ▸ The first vote takes the temperature of the room and leads into discussion ▸ Discussion fills in the gaps ▸ A second vote is usually more confident, if it’s needed ▸ If the second vote is still conflicted, table the issue and revisit when you have more information ▸ Time box each issue to 5-7 minutes.
  14. @JENNYDOESTHINGS FIVE STEPS TO A WELL RUN SESSION - RE-EVALUATE

    ▸ Check if ▸ …your rating system is working for your team ▸ …your ‘book ends’ are still correct. Has something else come up that’s more impactful? ▸ …everyone’s voice is heard ▸ Your rating system should be a living thing that evolves as your team changes
  15. @JENNYDOESTHINGS OUTPUT ▸ Once you feel good about the numbers,

    combine them ▸ This can be done outside the meeting ▸ This gives you a good picture of where you should focus your efforts ▸ You will have a picture of risk in context with all the features you’ve been talking about
  16. APPLYING THIS TO INFORMAL SESSIONS (HE’S MAKING THAT FACE BECAUSE

    WHAT IS LOVE IS STILL STUCK IN HIS HEAD) @jennydoesthings
  17. @JENNYDOESTHINGS APPLYING THIS TO INFORMAL SESSIONS ▸ Make it less

    rigid ▸ Look at the work you’ve got ▸ Jot down your gut feeling on risk/impact/probability ▸ Use this to rank items and focus your attention ▸ Is it what you expected? ▸ Do you need more clarification? ▸ Do you feel good about your plan?
  18. @JENNYDOESTHINGS APPLYING THIS TO INFORMAL SESSIONS ▸ After the product

    rolls out, revisit your risk matrix ▸ Were your instincts right? ▸ Did you miss something? ▸ Did you need to re-evaluate anything? ▸ Did you contribute to the success of the project? ▸ Congrats! You’re calibrating your gut instinct
  19. @JENNYDOESTHINGS WHAT WAS THIS ABOUT RISK ASSESSMENT? ▸ What is

    risk? ▸ Two types of risk assessment sessions ▸ Five steps to a well run session ▸ Pick your features ▸ Choose a rating system ▸ Level-set your system ▸ Assign values ▸ Re-evaluate ▸ Applying this to informal sessions