Changing Testing Culture in a Ginormous Organization

This is a talk about my journey being part of trying to change the testing culture in a Fortune 10 company with over 200,000 employees on every continent but Antarctica. Lots of losses, some good wins.

Presented at Selenium Conference 2018 Bangalore, TestBash Brighton 2019, and Heisenbug St. Petersburg 2019. This deck is from the Heisenbug presentation.

Transcript

1. DRIVING
   CULTURAL
   CHANGE
   

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2. Jim Holmes
   Jim@GuidepostSystems.com
   @aJimHolmes
   FrazzledDad.com
   

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3. Slides:
   http://speakerdeck.com/jimholmes
   

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5. http://leanpub.com/
   theleadershipjourney
   

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6. LET’S TALK
   CULTURE
   

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7. WHAT’S
   YOUR DAY
   LOOK LIKE?
   

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8. Some Text
   

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13. TAKEAWAYS
    

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14. What should your
    Future State
    look like?
    

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15. Focus on value
    

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16. Focus on
    the business
    

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17. Identify and overcome
    roadblocks
    

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18. Find advocates
    

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19. Manage expectations
    

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20. WHAT DOES
    THE CULTURE
    NEED TO BE?
    

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21. Testing is
    changing
    

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22. Testers must
    …
    

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23. Be champions of
    the business
    (not just users)
    

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24. Communicate
    during all phases
    (not just the end)
    

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25. Become far more technical
    (even learn to code)
    

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26. “Technical”
    is much more than
    coding
    

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27. Spread testing competency
    across entire team
    (Work ourselves out of this
    specific job)
    

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28. Push for
    Continual Improvement
    

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29. Live and breathe
    Lean Thinking
    and
    Theory of Constraints
    

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30. Sidebar:
    Theory of Constraints
    

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31. Think Bottlenecks
    

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32. Find a bottleneck
    Fix it
    

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33. Move to the next
    bottleneck
    Fix that one
    

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34. Repeat
    Continuously
    

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35. HOW DO WE
    MAKE A
    DIFFERENCE?
    

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36. Too often testers feel
    POWERLESS
    

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37. No influence
    

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38. No allies or advocates
    

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39. No idea where to start
    

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40. A STORY
    

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41. Fortune 10 Company
    

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42. 110 year old auto
    manufacturer
    

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43. 200,000 employees
    

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44. Every continent
    

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45. Except Antartica
    

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47. MY PART OF
    THE CHANGE:
    EXACTLY
    00.00025684%
    

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48. “Just help us write
    WebDriver”
    

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49. Bureaucracy
    Problems
    

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50. People
    Problems
    

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51. Castles
    

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54. Culture
    Problems
    

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56. System Version 1:
    Three years
    200+ team members
    

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57. One Release
    

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58. Over 250 bugs
    

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59. IN PROD
    

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60. Testers didn’t know
    a
    single user
    

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61. Testers usually on a
    different continent
    

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62. Testers had
    awful
    skills
    

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63. SOUND
    FAMILIAR?
    

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64. THESE PROBLEMS
    ARE THE SAME IN
    LARGE AND SMALL
    ORGANIZATIONS
    

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65. WHERE
    SHOULD
    WE BE?
    

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66. Constant communication
    EARLY
    

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67. Know
    The
    Business
    

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68. Level Up
    Testing
    Skills
    

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69. Constant
    Improvement
    

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70. MAKING
    CHANGE
    SUCCESSFUL
    

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72. https://www.math.nyu.edu/~crorres/Archimedes/Lever/LeverIntro.html
    

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73. CHOOSE
    YOUR
    BATTLES
    

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74. You can’t fix everything
    

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75. Theory of
    Constraints
    

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76. What’s the most valuable
    thing I can do?
    

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77. What’s the most impactful?
    

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78. Maybe it’s
    …
    

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79. Testers as part of delivery
    team
    

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80. Time on schedule for skills
    improvement
    

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81. DevOps capabilities
    in
    delivery teams
    

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82. RECOGNIZE
    ROADBLOCKS
    

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83. Systemic Inertia
    

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84. Organizational policies
    

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85. Castles
    (the bad ones)
    

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86. People
    and
    Fear/Uncertainty/Doubt
    

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87. Poor skills
    

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88. OVERCOME:
    FIND
    ADVOCATES
    

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89. Learn the business
    So you can advocate for
    yourself!
    

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90. High-level support
    is
    CRITICAL
    

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91. Look for existing initiatives
    

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92. Change Agents
    

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93. SET
    REASONABLE
    EXPECTATIONS
    

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94. Pace of Change
    

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95. Scope of Change
    

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96. Learn from your losses
    

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97. Celebrate your wins
    

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98. V1:
    Release to prod once in three years
    > 250 bugs in PROD
    

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99. V2:
    

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101. CURRENT
     STATE
     

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102. Single team
     

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103. 3 Amigos
     

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104. Dev/Tester pairing
     

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105. Testers
     =>
     more technical
     

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106. “More technical”
     !=
     just coding
     

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107. Immediate fix of bugs
     Few(er) bug tickets filed
     

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108. Zero
     bugs
     in
     PROD
     

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109. Value to Customers
     

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110. Happy Testers
     

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111. HELPFUL
     THINGS
     

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112. Learn the business
     

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113. Learn more about people
     

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114. READ
     MORE
     BOOKS
     

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115. Emotional
     Intelligence 2.0
     

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116. Driving
     Technical
     Change
     

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117. Peopleware
     

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118. The
     Trusted
     Advisor
     

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119. Lean Software series by Tom & Mary
     Poppendieck
     

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120. Don’t Ask
     You don’t need permission
     to be awesome
     

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121. INFO
     

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122. Slides:
     http://speakerdeck.com/jimholmes
     

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123. Jim Holmes
     Jim@GuidepostSystems.com
     @aJimHolmes
     FrazzledDad.com
     

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124. THANK
     YOU!
     

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