Ronan Healy

Be A EuroSTAR Volunteer

March 29, 2022 by Ronan Healy

The EuroSTAR Volunteer programme is back. Along with out live event, we are delighted to welcome back our volunteers for the EuroSTAR 2022 Conference.

Taking place from 7-10 June in Copenhagen, the EuroSTAR Conference will take place in the Bella Centre. With over 70 sessions, exhibition space and social events taking place, there is lots to see and be part of at the event. So let’s take a look at the roles you can be part of at the event.

Huddle

The Huddle is the home of the “corridor talks” at EuroSTAR. Located in the heart of the Exhibition space, the Huddle is home to lots of events across the Conference.

At the Huddle you will find activities like Couch Sessions, 1st Timers welcome, Games and Giveaways, the famous Soapbox sessions and lots more. You should volunteer for this area if you like engaging with people, sharing knowledge and sharing experiences.

Test Lab

The Test Lab is the home of Testing at the Conference. Growing stronger after 14 years in existence, the Test Lab is led by our Lab facilitators each year who set the challenges for delegates.

If you like the challenge of figuring out puzzles and testing robots, and other testing challenges, then this is a place for you.

Test Clinic

The Doctors of the Test Clinic are at the Conference to solve the problems of all delegates at the Conference. They are experts in their area of testing helping testers with the issues that they have.

You should apply for the Test Clinic if you are very knowledgeable in testing, or a particular area of testing. If you love helping others out and solving problems for testers, then this role is for you.

Cadets

The EuroSTAR Cadets get involved in every aspect of the Conference. They are in the exhibition space, directing delegates to rooms, helping out in the tutorials or being part of the EuroSTAR team.

Anyone who would like to apply for the Cadets, should be interested in being part of the whole Conference experience and doesn’t mind adopting to different roles throughout the day.

As part of the Volunteer roles, you will have access to the event with the opportunity to attend sessions. Catering will be provided throughout the week. You will get to be part of a great team and experience the Conference from a new perspective.

You can apply to volunteer at EuroSTAR 2022 here.

Improve how you work and communicate with others in Software Testing

February 10, 2022 by Ronan Healy

Every software testers needs to have the skills to do their job. Whether that be experience in tools, working in DevOps, or other technical skills there are basic requirements to do your role.

Though they are often listed on job descriptions, the ability to work with others and communicate well are sometimes ignored for the technical ability to do a role. However the ability of working with others in software testing, being able to communicate and being aware of your own faults and biases are essential to being a great tester.

EuroSTAR Huddle can help with with our Deep Dive People Skills Series coming on 21-24 February. Over the course of 4 days the Huddle will host 6 speakers on four essential topics in working with others in testing. Let’s explore how they can help.

Psychology of Testing

We all have our own psychological biases and this can affect the way we work. In their talk on biases in testing, Michael Kutz & João Proença will explore what is bias, how you can recognise your own biases. They will, more importantly show how you can be aware of your own biases when making decisions. Avoid biases like confirmation bias through this expert talk.

Understanding You

To be a great tester and a great person, you have to be aware of your own strengths and faults. Not just that, you have to be aware of your background too. In her talk, Amanda Perkins shows how different backgrounds can shape your testing. Learn why your experiences outside testing matters and how they can contribute to what you do in software testing.

Communication in Software Testing

Communication is key in any role. How do you improve communication. This can be difficult especially when you have to criticise or assess others work. The emotional work this requires can be draining. So Jeffrey Fredrick and Douglas Squirrel will guide you on a path on learning how to be a good communicator and excel at communication in software testing. Discover the secret to being a good communicator which can benefit both you and your work colleagues.

Being Your Own Ambassador

Sometimes you have to shout about what you do and how good you are at it. This might not be something that you excel at. Creating your own personal brand might be something you would dismiss but you would be surprised to know that it something you do need to think about. In the world of social media, creating a brand image for yourself is very important. If you are applying for a job, looking to submit to a conference to or want to connect with others, your own brand matters. Raj Subrameyer will answer your questions on this in his AMA on Building Your Personal Brand. Ask Raj any question about branding and getting out in the world. Learn why you need to have a Personal Brand and why it it will benefit you.

These group of talks might not teach you how to use the latest automation tool but will teach you other tools and skills that you can use, not just in your work life but also in your home lives too. Make sure to attend the Deep Dive People Skills week to get the most of improving your soft skills and getting to better communication in Software Testing.

Feelings from the EuroSTAR Testing Excellence Award Winner

November 12, 2021 by Ronan Healy

Amazed.

Just a few days ago, I finally got the actual piece of glass art, the Award. It is an amazingly large glass vase, fittingly so, as the recognition of getting the EuroSTAR Testing Excellence Award is a large event in one’s life too. The vase will now take a special place on my desk, reminding me of the amazing honour I’ve been granted.

Humbled

It was so humbling to learn that so many of my peers thought my efforts for software testing profession and the field were worthy of recognition. Hearing the praise, now in social media, still makes me feel humble. Especially so, coming from Finland where we are culturally not that used to giving or receiving praise, or even a simple thank you. You know, we just must endure, through whatever hardship that may fall on our way.

Grateful

Having just pushed through several challenges in the publishing process of my book Dragons Out!, I feel really gratified to get this level of response. While there are lots of small successes in any book project there are also small challenges. And somehow those challenges sometimes overwhelm you. To overcome them, a proportionally larger success is needed. I’m so gratified this award is now here – it feels it made the book project worth it.

Unreal

When lots of things nowadays happen online, disconnected, out of sync, things start feeling unreal. Yes, there’s this great EuroSTAR award. But I wasn’t even there in the EuroSTAR due to schedule conflict! I was at an ISTQB General Assembly in Belgrade. How come I receive this recognition like that? One minute I don’t have it, and next moment I have it. Unreal. Yes, we recorded the thank you speech earlier and that felt similar to receiving the award live, but that’s not the same as standing in front of a thousand-person crowd at live EuroSTAR. Then again, the offline nature of the EuroSTAR made the thank you speech recording possible.

Tired

So many online conference speeches. Where’s the feedback loop? Where’s the applause? Where are the smiles? Where is that intriguing discussion with fellow learners? I feel a bit tired of the online routine but at the same time I’m really satisfied that these opportunities exist. I wouldn’t have the time and money to go to nearly as many places physically. Still, getting some more personal contact would feel good. We are getting there of course, as so many of us are now fully vaccinated and conferences start going back to physical locations.

Happy

Mostly though, I’m really happy at being recognized for my 25 years of work for the software testing field, and especially for my Dragons Out book project. I’m happy to have done it. I’m happy people are buying the books and like them. I’m happy to hear fantastic praise from readers, children and adult alike. I’m happy to start thinking about the next steps to educate children in software testing.

Determined

I’m more than determined to keep explaining about the fun of software testing to children. I’m determined to keep preaching about the need to add software testing education to all levels are our educational institutions, starting from elementary schools. I’m determined that my approach of coupling fantasy storytelling to software testing exercises works well and can change the world.

Convinced

I feel that software testing can indeed be a lifetime profession. I’m convinced that there are so many angles and opportunities in the testing field that even the most change-prone person can find the variety they look for. I’m convinced the world needs more and more testing even though testing is more and more integrated into rest of the software development work.

Thankful

Getting all this great feedback, through the award, through the book, through the social media makes me very thankful to have all these fantastic people around me. That passionate colleague who keeps finding new ways to educate management about importance of testing. That interested listener at one of my speeches who thanks for an eye-opening approach to software testing. That 10-year-old girl who at the book fair chooses my book over all the hundreds of books on display and continues to talk about the coding classes she now has at her school. That true friend who trusts that I will do fantastic things no matter what.

Open

I am open to any ideas to take the software testing matters further. There are many approaches. There are many people. There are many super ideas. All of these have a role to play in getting some more testing done, in getting yet more appreciation for our industry, in making the world a little bit better place. It’s great to hear of all the opinions and ideas. Maybe some of those will make it to my next book.

Positive

I feel we can make it happen. We can make better software, and better products, that can help create a more sustainable world for us to live in. We can prevent disasters, we can make those awesome experiences that create faithful customers, we can find solutions we all need, we can learn. Through better testing, through better quality. I am positive about it.

Kari Kakkonen was the 2021 winner of the EuroSTAR Testing Excellence Award. Kari has made his mark on software testing ever since stepping out of the university, leaving his mark in software testing world through testing, managing, productizing, training, coaching, preaching at a number of companies and associations. Kari presently trains testing at Knowit, manages funds at FiSTB, serves in Board of Directors of TMMi, helps out at ISTQB, and runs his book project Dragons Out at his company Dragons Out Oy. Kari is happy married with a son and a puppy, singing and snowboarding away when given a chance.

7 Automation Sessions to Improve your Test Automation Skills

October 21, 2021 by Ronan Healy

The EuroSTAR Huddle Deep Dive is just around the corner. Taking place from 1-4 November, this live event will take a deep dive into all aspects of test automation. If you are an automation engineer and want to improve your automation skills, the Deep Dive week is the event you should be attending. Let’s have a look at what is happening.

Big Data and Flaky Tests

Adam Sandman & Denis Markovtsev are at the cutting edge of test automation. They plan to showcase their novel use of Big data in test automation. This event will explain how big data was utilised by Adam and Denis to examine and reduce test flakiness. Part of a research project, this talk will showcase their approach of analysing 500 websites by downloading their DOM trees and performing data analysis to see how best practices developed in theory will work in practices with these sites.

What is Cypress?

What is Cypress? That is a question many of you might have some answer to. Cypress is becoming a popular tool in automation but what does it do? Marie Drake will discus Cypress as a tool is and look at the importance of visual testing and how to integrate visual testing plugins to Cypress.

Making use of Low Code Automation

Paul Grossman has many years of experience in automation. He is a fan of low code automation and so makes a great person to discuss the uses of low code automation. If you have thought about applying low code tools this talk will fill you in on its uses. Paul will explain how you can utilise low code automation and showcase its use with some demo’s too.

Learning From Mistakes in Automation

What are the common mistakes made in test automation? Corina Pip is here to describe and share her advice on the common mistakes in test automation from her experience in the field. This will be a great talk to learn the common pitfalls in automation that we end up in. The Dos and Don’ts of Automation will offer some real world experiences of when automation turns out to be not as useful as you might have hoped!

API Testing

API have become a bigger part of our everyday life. This means a bigger requirement for testing API’s. Julia Pottinger will discuss API automation and in particular Scenarios to consider when doing API Automation. Learn about the world of API’s where to get started, and how to start the process of testing API’s.

Ask Me Anything

Dorothy Graham has over 30 years in the software testing industry much of that focusing on automation. In this live event she will reflect of the week of live events, where automation is going but more importantly will answer your questions on test automation.

Testing the Tests

The week concludes with a well renowned test automation expert: Bas Dijkstra. Bas will ask and answer the question: Who Tests the Tests? In this lively session he will share how you can make quality control for your automated tests part of your testing and development process. He will also introduce the technique of mutation testing and how you might use it for checking the quality of your automated tests.

So seven talks that can only excite you about the new skills and takeaways that you could learn from these sessions. Remember to sign up here.

Reminiscing EuroSTAR 2021: My Top 10

October 20, 2021 by Ronan Healy

A EuroSTAR Committee member looks back at the 2021 software testing conference.

It has been two weeks since the action packed conference has ended but I am still full of thoughts from the amazingly memorable event it has been this year. I have been associated with EuroSTAR for many years now as a reporter and a volunteer but this year was all the more special, with an opportunity to be a part of the programme committee. It was a huge honour and I enjoyed every moment of playing the role, working alongside some of the biggest names in the testing world Fran O’Hara, Janet Gregory, Derk-Jan De Grood and Szilard Szell. This has been a exhilarating experience to say the least! Right from going through the significant number of submissions, to making decisions on sessions for the three days it was incredibly fulfilling and enlightening to witness the programme come together. The collaboration with fellow committee members was brilliant as we went through an incredibly difficult decision of choosing sessions from submissions of very high quality! The programme always feels incredibly impressive but this year, there was a personal connection. To witness the final form of it get unraveled to hundreds of participants is one of the most unforgettable experiences! This being a second online edition of the conference, there were a number of aspects to be considered but I must say none of that felt like an unsurmountable challenge, thanks to the unwavering support provided by the fantastic conference team. As the event got underway, there was so much energy and knowledge in the virtual environment that I felt transported into a world of unlimited inspiration! So much to learn and rejoice! As always, I want to list the top 10 things from this year’s conference for me. In no particularly order these aspects stood out for me this year:

Engage theme: I felt this year’s theme was a winner in attracting a huge variety of submissions. It was awe inspiring experience to see the various interpretations of it! I found it to have created a welcoming spirit amongst the conference participants as the theme could have multiple interpretations which helped spur creativity and imagination. Many congratulations to conference chair Fran to have come up with this motivational theme – it was a joy to work as a programme committee member on this theme
Tutorials – I always enjoy this format of the programme as you get to focus and absorb information on one specific topic. This year, once again I have to say the tutorial experience was an absolute delight, being a part of the award winning team of Anne Colder- Jantien van de Meer, who effortlessly delivered a highly coordinated, superbly crafted session. A stellar line up of speakers including maestros Michael Bolton, Rik Marselis delivered these phenomenal sessions, giving the participants an opportunity to deep dive into topics of interest – a great feature of the conference!
New terminologies – I learnt a few excellent terms from this year as part of many conversations ‘Critical incident’ is the top one from this year which was shared by Testing Guru Dawn Hayes. As Dawn puts it, critical incident is an experience after which you never return to operating like before. To me, all of this year’s experience has been one such critical experience! Another term is ‘happiness engineer’ – I derived it from an amazing key note delivered by Michiel Boreel who referred to testers as the guardians of digital happiness and in fact went on to suggest we should consider the above new title for testing professionals! These interesting terms have been duly added to my everyday vocabulary!
Implementable knowledge: All through the three days the sessions I attended delivered not just the theory behind an idea but gave an excellent focus on practical implementation of those approaches. Be it the concept of Building relationships by Lukasz Pietrucha, Automation pitfalls and possibilities by Sune Engsig, Quality and human factors by Andrew Brown, Dealing with conflict by Marielle Roozemond – I can list possibly every single session I attended which gave me new insight on how differently testers can approach real life challenges. As I am catching up on recordings from the event, my learning is continuing!
Riveting Keynotes: Each and every keynote session in this year’s conference was a gem, I went on being amazed at how fantastically these topics were presented by the skillful speakers. As one of the participants said “how many times can mind be blown in three days!”. I found all keynotes to be outstanding and to have delivered key messages that are highly relevant to our area of work. Rob Lambert, Aprajitha Mathur, Micheil Boreel, Maaret Pyhäjärvi and Janet Gregory – a huge round of applause to have made incredibly impactful deliveries.
Lightening talks: This has been my favourite format of talk, ever since I witnessed it back in 2018 with none other than Fran O’Hara on the stage! I was delighted to not only see this format again on EuroSTAR platform but also get the privilege of being a part of it! I was one of the eight speakers who delivered a brief 5 minute talk on a topic of their choice, which delivered great nuggets of thoughts for audience to consider. It was a high energy, fast and interesting session. I personally enjoyed preparing and delivering my short piece, felt honoured to have shared the virtual stage with amazing speakers like Dawn Hayes, Tariq King, Elise Carmichael, Rob Meaney, Sanne Visser, Chris Armstrong and Raj Subrameyer. Thrilled to have been a part of this fantastic ensemble!
Huddle sessions: This is an aspect of the conference I hold close, as my predominant involvement as a reporter / volunteer has been in this space. As always, this was action packed this year with a variety of conversations and activities. Inspirational AMA sessions with Michael Bolton, Rob Lambert, Jyothi Bhatt and Sune Engsig, career advise from Raj Subrameyer, Ensemble testing by Maaret Pyhajaravi, exploratory bug hunt with Marek Lof and so much more! The breaks from sessions had many engaging activities to relax and to network with fellow participants. The feedback sessions were great in hearing from the members of community. Always a hugely uplifting huddle of people!
Award winners: It was an absolute delight to learn of the most deserving winners of the award which was actually a top secret and not known till announced at the ceremony! Hearty congratulations Kari Kakkonen on the Software Testing Excellent award! I had the privilege of attending Kari’s session last year’s conference and I have since been in awe of his dedication, enthusiasm for testing, particularly about educating younger generation. The winner of best paper Adonis Celeste is again someone I have seen on EuroSTAR platform back in 2018. His white paper has deep insight and excellent pointers for tester role, a highly recommended read. We are fortunate as a community to have such brilliant thought leaders!
Conference team: I have known this team for a few years now and I guess I have run out of superlatives to express how much I admire them! It was yet another extraordinary experience to see the event being brought together skillfully and coordinated to perfection. What was an additional aspect was how experienced the team has in running the conference and how deftly they apply it in real time. The process was smooth flowing in spite of how complex the three day long event can be in terms of logistics and planning. Their tireless efforts, commitment and professionalism is simply top notch. Truly a wow team!
Testing community spirit: This entry has stayed in my top 10 list ever since I started attending EuroSTAR conference. This is an aspect I am so proud of and so very much enjoy during this event. The enthusiasm and community spirit just shines through on every occasion. This year too the participants proved that the format is secondary and the spirit of being in company of fellow testing professionals is much more! The conversations during the talks and the engagement with Q&A sessions from this year’s talks was outstanding! It was really nice to get to meet many participants from near and far, covering a big spectrum of career experience. The celebration of diversity in this community is exemplary and I feel really lucky to be a part of it!

As this year’s conference comes to an end, the new one is already looking hugely exciting! To be held in the beautiful city of Copenhagen, the conference is going to be first in-person event after 2 years of being virtual. It will be headed by none other than testing Guru Graham Freeburn, accompanied by the team of experts Sue Atkins, Morten Hougaard, Bart Knaack, and Tone Molyneux. I am sure this fabulous team will come up with a brilliant programme that we all look forward to!

In conclusion, I must mention, this year has been particularly emotional for me as EuroSTAR has been on my mind for the last 8 months. I am immensely happy for the conference Chair Fran, fellow committee members and the conference team on the success of this year’s event. My hearty congratulations to everyone involved – the speakers, the audience, the sponsors – what a festive experience that was from start to finish! I also feel a bit philosophical about the year that has been to us in the larger sense. We have all been through strange times and this event made reflect on how we have managed to stay connected as a community in spite of multiple challenges. Human resilience and adaptability will hopefully see us through as society as we transition back to the ‘original normal’. Here’s to the new sprouts of hope that have started to appear and here’s to good health, well being for everyone!

About the Author

Sowmya Ramesh EuroSTAR Committee — Sowmya Ramesh

Sowmya Ramesh is a testing professional with over 18 years of IT industry experience currently working as a consultant with 2i Testing. She has a deep interest in the area of non-functional testing, in particular, accessibility testing which she has promoted for a number of years in the testing community. Sowmya writes blogs on topics of professional interest and has been a speaker at events for MOT Edinburgh, DevTest Summit. Sowmya was awarded a reporter role on Eurostar Conferences in 2017 and 2018 and in 2021 was part of the EuroSTAR Conference Committee.

The Attributes of a C-R-A-C-K Tester?

October 12, 2021 by Ronan Healy

Understanding the skills of a great tetser

September 29, 2021

The attributes of a C-R-A-C-K tester came to be as a response to a frequent question:
“What do I look for in hiring a superstar tester on my team?”

Often the context of this question had to do with people asking about what automation tools/skills are essential in hiring new testers. I was continually stymied by the question, but it helped me ponder what things really differentiate the superstar testers I’ve encountered in my career. What do they possess or demonstrate that seems to be missing from the staff tester that has become a commodity in the industry (replaceable by automation, outsourcing, or other forms of test executioners)? Surprise! The answers categorically are not related to their knowledge of automation tools!

The many answers I came up with led me here … to C-R-A-C-K. CRACK represents a subset of all the answers I came up with, and I chose them because I think they are the most broadly applicable and helpful of the bunch. Further, they are all similar in this way … they are not things I can teach in the classroom. As a trainer, I was first depressed by that realization. But deep down, I know that career testers are born as testers. They are not made out of trainings, books, certifications, or things like that. So here’s C-R-A-C-K in a nutshell:

C – curiosity

R – resourcefulness

A – adaptability

C – creativity

K – knightly (bravery)

Why are these my favorites, and why do I value them?
Let me explain further:

Curiosity
Testing is a function of inquiry. Every test we design or execute is an inquiry about the software or system under test (related to functionality, usability, performance, etc.). A curious person will simply generate more questions to ask the software. Further, a curious person will pursue things outside of a specified test or requirement, often uncovering why something is not working correctly or discover new and unexpected things to be evaluated.

Those who do not possess a curious nature will probably not pursue these paths, thus limiting each testing encounter’s usefulness. That’s all.

Resourcefulness
So many things we encounter in software are new to us. New features, new functionality, new user interface conventions, new technologies or implementations, new security vulnerabilities, new organizational or project context or goals, new or shifting customer/user base, and so on.

With so much being new, how will we keep up? Develop an ongoing training program that attempts to keep everyone in sync about all that might be relevant to today’s work? As an instructional designer, curriculum developer, and career trainer, I know that won’t work. Training can help where and when it can help, but testers will be faced with “new” every day.

Resourcefulness helps a tester be in charge of their own learning – in a real-time way. Resourceful testers recognize new, different, or something that they are now curious about as learning opportunities. For example, if a new version of a website-under-test uses flyout menus for the first time, how should that be tested? It’s just a menu, right? Well, a curious and resourceful person might go research (a.k.a. Google), investigate, and learn more about it so they can incorporate that knowledge into their testing and evaluation.

A resourceful and curious tester doesn’t get stuck … they pursue! As a result, these self-starters will continually be growing their knowledge base and skill set, and in turn, will be contributing that to their work and teams. That sounds like a winning combination!

Adaptability
An adaptable person is continually able to evaluate current conditions and make adjustments. Adjustments that increase testing’s effectiveness and/or efficiency will often be highly valued.

Here are a few examples of how to identify a lack of adaptability:

“We’ve always done it that way.”
      “This is the way we do things here.”
“Test cases are required.”
      “We never write test cases.”
“We don’t do exploratory testing here.”
      “We can’t do that because it’s not part of our process.”

Inflexibility comes in the form of many superlatives. Always, never, must, can’t … and in even more subtle forms like should or shouldn’t.

The landscape of software and testing today requires us to pivot, sometimes immediately, along with changing requirements, development processes and tools, organizational initiatives, competitive concerns, and market demands. However, an adaptable person will not get stuck or knocked down by change or frustrated by constant change. Instead, a person possessing adaptability will not only anticipate change as a matter of course, but they will also develop a mode of working that will enable them to easily and quickly adapt.

In the ever-evolving and fast-changing world of software, adaptability is an essential quality for success and survival!

Creativity
Why did creativity make it into my top 5 list of attributes? That’s simple. Creativity leads to out-of-the-box or out-of-the-ordinary ways of thinking and doing things. This leads to increased coverage in testing and the ability to find questionable behavior and bugs that no one else will encounter following scripts or specs. Think about it. Do customers/users follow your test scripts? Do they have intimate knowledge of the specs or rules of technology implementations? I tend to think users do what they do.

Have you ever thought of entering data in a screen from bottom to top, or right to left, instead of the expected order of interaction? Have you ever tried to double-click or right-click a button? Creative people find ways to scratch the surface of possibilities that will illuminate previously hidden quality risks. I believe that’s a value-add to any team!

Knightly
I had some difficultly getting my cornerstone attribute of bravery into this acronym I wanted to build. Searching cascading lists of synonyms got me to the word knightly. Honestly, it’s a way better word! It encapsulates so many star tester attributes without making my acronym bigger! LOL

Knightly qualities can help a tester be a more valuable and impactful asset to their team and organization. Here are a few examples:

Bravery – Do it afraid! Have enough resilience to speak truth in intimidating situations. Truth comes in the form of bad news, devastating bugs, and the inability to meet deadlines. But the information must be shared, so be brave!

Ethical – Ethics in testing shows up in lots of ways. Confidentiality is an obvious one. But here’s a more subtle one – not spending testing cycles on what’s enticing to the self instead of what’s vital for the team and org.

Steadfast – We face so much adversity and stress in the job of testing. Through it all, it’s essential to maintain our inner strength and balance.

Loyal – Be a beacon of constant support. How can we help today?

Humility – Be careful of stating what someone should do or how something should be implemented. We, as testers, are not the decision-makers on projects. The business decides, and the customer or users will concur or not. Besides, a bossy or lofty attitude will curtail collaboration opportunities. Once those have dried up, our ability to influence things related to quality will diminish. A humble approach is often more effective.
___________

My goal in putting together and sharing C-R-A-C-K was never to suggest these are the only things that would matter to any hiring manager. Instead, it was to point out that many valuable things that talented individuals could offer to a team are not necessarily the things found in CVs or resume bullets. Instead, I want to provoke people to look beyond the buzzwords and contemplate what someone can add to the team now and in the future.

Probably the most common question I get after someone hears the CRACK talk is, “how do I interview for these attributes?”

I think the first step is determining which attributes, these or others, are most valuable to you and your team. Then, once you’ve settled on them, rank them. During the interview, listen for evidence or indicators of these things. When you want to explore an attribute or see if it’s there, then ask the candidate to share an experience.

Here are a few potential questions you can use to surface attributes:

With new technologies and tools emerging in software and testing all the time, how do you keep up?

Can you give me an example of a time when you had to deliver an important but difficult message to a person or team? How did you prepare? How did you end up delivering the message?

Have you ever been in a meeting with something critical to say on your mind, but you ended up keeping quiet? If so, why?

Have you ever invented something? Tell me about it …

Do you often come up with new (possibly better) ways of doing things, or are you satisfied to do things the way you learned them?

Do you follow instructions well?
– or –
Do you question instructions (or procedures) you are given?
Follow on: Can you give me an example?

Can you share an example of a bug report that you would write? This could be an actual bug you have recently scribed, one you haven’t submitted yet, or one you found on the way to the interview. 🙂

If you had to tell a developer they made the same mistake they’ve made several times before, how would you do it?

About the Author

Dawn Haynes is the Principal Trainer and Quality Coach at PerfTestPlus, a US-based consultancy. As a highly regarded trainer of software testers, Dawn blends her 35 years of IT experience with a real-world view to provide testers of all levels with tools and techniques to help them generate new approaches to common and complex software testing problems.

Dawn holds a BSBA in MIS with a minor in programming, and endeavors to keep pace with changes to the industry through memberships, participation in peer conferences, and continuing education/professional development. Member: IEEE, ACM, ASQ, AST. Former Secretary and Director of the Association for Software Testing Founding member-International Institute of Software Testing. ISTQB CTFL, CTFL-AT, CTAL Full, ASTQB CMT

This post was originally published on Curating Testing Talent.

EuroSTAR 2021 Day 3 – Sketchnotes

October 1, 2021 by Ronan Healy

Wow, the last day of the 2021 edition of the EuroSTAR Conference was over in a blink. There were also offered several side events that took place in between the conference talks like tool demos, AMAs and a feedback round at the end of the day.

A special program point was the EuroSTAR 2021 Software Testing Awards ceremony. Here the winners of the awards for Best Tutorial, Best Conference Paper and the 2021 EuroSTAR Testing Excellence Award have been announced.

And last, but not least, the programme committee and location for the 2022 edition of the EuroSTAR Conference have been presented. Copenhagen in summer – how cool is that?

But now, let me show you my sketchnotes of the day and do a quick summary of the talks.

Digital happiness in the age of customer obsession

Michiel Boreel
As the world is constantly changing and with it the people and their needs, opinions an mentality, Michiel wanted us to think more about Positive Computing. Focusing on happiness as a goal of technology.

We tend to think that from trust to distrust it’s a continuum, but actually they are two different emotions that happen at the same time. Overall, trust is declining. We don’t trust organisations anymore. Also, platform trust increases (ex. Airbnb, Uber) as these platforms provide the trust that is required for the economic transaction.

People born from 1998 to 2019 build the new synthetic generation. These people don’t see a difference between online and offline. They are:

Post-technological: it’s not an innovation anymore, but seen as given
Post-hierarchical: they trust influencers more than companies
Post-realistic: with AI working on images and videos, reality can be altered
Post-materialistic: they are confronted with crisis and want to solve the issues. Now not wealth but purpose is a valued goal

Companies have to ask themselves if they are woke – are they connected to the changes that happen in society? How can you transform and get a sense of purpose? Organisations need a new story clearly articulating their valuable role in digital society.

Escape “brain hijack” – dealing productively with conflict and disagreement

Marielle Roozemond
First, let’s define disagreement and conflict. Disagreements are about the content side of issues and people take a rational approach to them. Conflicts are about the content and the values side of issues and people take an emotional approach to them. Going up the escalation stairs, it’s not a very long way from win-win situations over win-lose situations to disfunction.

A highjacked brain focuses on the argument while fewer things get to the higher levels of your brain. You have a lower empathy and you might act not like you. If so, you need to try to de-escalate on purpose and to re-activate thinking with the higher levels of your brain.

Marielle proposed 4 tools to do so:

Activate curiosity
Activate exploration
Recognize and sidetrack signals from amygdala
Change your convictions about disagreement and conflict

Escape brain hijacking - dealing proactively with disagreement and conflict

Building relationships. A Tester’s Guide to the enterprise world

Lukasz Pietrucha
Building relationships is crucial, not only, but especially when working as a tester. Lukasz has a 5 pillar concept that he presented to us:

Start with the research: learn about business, know goals & objectives, study user reviews
Build the connection: identify champions, carefully select meetings, socializing
Adoption through small and simple steps: come up with a plan, POC/MVP, listen a lot, frequent reporting
Become an influencer: share what you know, ownership/proactiveness, shape the reality – build your reputation, be visible
Survive the storms: sometimes you need time, attach to business needs, learn from failures – build future fundamentals

Building relationships - a testers guide to the enterprise world

Using requirements as call to … conversations

Irja Straus
Testing begins before a single line of code is written. Testing assumptions can be helpful to determine opportunity costs and time to market. Keep in mind that correct and perfect requirements are a myth, they are prone to misunderstanding. BUT: They are a great conversation starter.

Irja likes to use “dogfooding” to get the to ground of the requirements – this basically means using your own product. The more disgusting it is, the more rewarding it gets, as you can discover more problems along the way.

Ask yourself if you have enough data that shows, that you need to build a certain feature. Will users understand what is happening and if not, how can we help them recover in case of failure? Try to simplify the workflow and think about if you could set the expectations.

A good approach is to collaborate earlier. Understand the business context, learn related skills and adapt practices that serve YOUR business. A good way of doing this is by doing product reviews. Ask the questions about design and requirements to avoid asking them after development when it’s too late/expensive to change anything.

Irja wants us to remember the following 3 things:

Consider requirements as call to conversations to understand the purpose
Consider learning different skills from your “monsters”
Consider YOURSELF and what works for YOU

Using requirements as call to conversations

The Automationist’s Gambit

Maaret Pyhäjärvi
Some time ago Maaret learned about the Queen’ Gambit – a chess move in which white appears to sacrifice the c-pawn but then black not being able to retain pawn without incurring disadvantage in the end. She then thought about the Automationist’s Gambit – opening by sacrificing material to win in the end. Automation might not test everything, but still be very valuable. Even if at first your automation tests aren’t perfect, start small, learn the basics and then get better every day.

Traditionally test design and test execution as well as manual and automated tests were seen as separate things. With (contemporary) exploratory testing this has changed. In test execution a good example is regression testing: automation serves as a little spider web and if something hits the web, you can manually check that part. For test design approval testing is a good example: the computer, the automation, creats the paths, and the human, manually, observes them and either approves or diapproves these paths. So you can’t automate well without exploring. You can’t explore well without automating.

Test automation in the frame of exploratory testing can serve for:

documenting
extending reach
alerting to attend
guiding to detail

Frustrated? It might be your fault!

Jeffrey Fredrick & Douglas Squirrel
Our mind generates an illusion of certainty. We’ve been conditioned to act as though the illusion is reality. Our lack of skill in navigating our mutual illusions creates suffering. We have the option to learn to do better. All of us know what is required to get to a good decision, and yet our actual behaviour is different, especially when stakes are high. We want our idea to win, we see difference as threat and we don’t listen to others and don’t share all we know.

Jeffrey and Douglas presented the 4R Model for Conversational Analysis:

Record: fold a paper in half – on the right side write down the visible part of the conversation, on the left side write down the unvisible part, meaning your thoughts and feelings
Reflect: Be curious and ask if your questions are genuine, be transparent and think about what things from the left side could be on the right and think about the triggers that set of a negative reaction for you
Revise: How could you’ve been curious and transparent – write down a revision
Roleplay: Roleplay your revision and see how it sounds and feels

Through practice we can learn how to act in ways that encourage mutual learning. The result is higher performance of groups, better working relationships and improved well-being. If you don’t take time to practice and remain frustrated, it might be your fault.

Continuous quality: The secret of the Pharaos

Adonis Celestine
When thinking about pyramids, it is astonishing that they are still standing, even after such a long time. This is because of their great quality. Adonis talked about the strategies of the pharaos and what we can learn from them for building continuous quality into our products.

The first strategy is the attention to details. The pharaos measured all stones, each and every one. Details define the quality, like Netflix customizing their pages for their users or Disney even engraving manholes in their parks with their logo. But details can also become the devil. Think about things like zero defect strategy, doing it right the first time, test coverage, questions about if the sprint can be completed or if the user stories have been automated.

The second strategy is thinking about the big pictures. The stones of a pyramid have to be placed in the right order. In quality assurance you have to use the following types of thinking:

Purpose thinking: what is the real objective, ask the 5 whys – people don’t buy WHAT you do, they buy WHY you do it
People thinking: it takes people to make the dream a reality, so think about what your users want
Product thinking: what is the innovation and technology that makes a change in the world, you have to find products for your customers, not customers for your product

And the last strategy is to balance micro and macro views, meaning connecting the big picture to the details throughout your whole pipeline.

Engagement is a state of mind

Janet Gregory
The final keynote of the EuroSTAR Conference 2021 was held by Janet Gregory. She thinks that as a tester our role is to be engaged, which requires a special mindset. There is passive and active engagement, watching vs. taking part. Use uncertainty as an opportunity to grow.

Technical engagement is about practical skills to do your job, infrastructure, pipelines, tools, automation and domain complexity. Ask how well your product is built, what system/devices it runs on, if behaviour can be simulated, how the product interacts with the world around it. Ask if you have the right data and if you practice observability.

In human-centric engagement there are hidden assumptions, cognitive biases, different perspectives and cultures and all this also affects our testing. We engage with people like our teams, other teams, stakeholders or customers at different levels like sharing, mentoring, teaching or in conflict. Therefore we need to pay attention and be mindful when we work with people. Honour yourself, the people involved and the context you are in.

To be socially connected, you need a culture of helpfulness, collaborators and to build trust. As a tester you have to remember that testing isn’t a solitary job, relationships with others don’t just happen, you need to interact with your customer and that knowledge is meant to be shared.

So the skills for engaging with people are:

communication
listening
emotional awareness
adaptability
empathy
facilitation
critical thinking
collaboration

I can’t believe the EuroSTAR Conference 2021 is already over. Hopefully I’ll get the chance to attend the next edition and once again share my sketchnotes with all of you.

About The Author

Katja Budnikov is a software tester and sketch noter from Northern Germany. Katja is passionate about software testing and sketch noting! She loves attending events like EuroSTAR and sharing her experience and learnings with others on her blog Katjasays.com. Katja first started sketchnoting in 2016. First analogue with pen and paper and now digitally with an iPad and Apple Pencil.

In her work life Katja started out in online marketing, then specialized in search engine optimisation and is now a quality assurance specialist in both manual and automated software testing. Away from work Katja loves photography, especially taking photos of nature, including many of her dog Auri, a young Australian Shepherd, who is super cute and fun to take photos of. She loves to spend time with her dog and partner, going out for walks, traveling and eating cake at a nearby coffee shop with a beautiful garden.

EuroSTAR 2021 Day 2 – Sketchnotes

September 30, 2021 by Ronan Healy

Woohoo, finally it’s that time of the year again – the EuroSTAR Conference is on. This year it took place as an online edition which gave people from all around the world the opportunity to take part in this amazing conference without needing to travel during the pandemic times.

Although it is an online edition, there was plenty of space to meet other attendees. You could do a speed meet sessions and talk to someone randomly for 3 minutes. You could join a lean coffee session and discuss interesting topics. You could get solutions to your problems from the Test Clinic. Or you could check out the demos of the sponsors and stroll through the Expo area.

The Programme Committee around the Programme Chair Fran O’Hara made an amazing job when choosing the speakers for this year’s edition and you could listen to talks from different areas of testing, speakers with different backgrounds and from different cultures. Let me summarize my first day at the EuroSTAR Conference 2021 by using my sketchnotes.

Moving to frequent releases. The 10 Communication Principles that support rapid change.

Rob Lambert
The first keynote of the day was held by Rob Lambert. Rob started by explaining the 5 step thinking model. First, you paint a picture of the bright future (like a vision). Then you lean into the problem and ask if the team is the right one to get it done. Afterwards it’s all about routines, habits, disciplines and processes, and finally there is a lot of learning.

He then talked about the 10 (+1) Communication Principles to support rapid change. These are:

Enthusiasm
Purpose, audience, context
Communication is something the listener does
Use stories
Don’t waste people’s time
Practice is preparation
People remember how you make them feel
Non-verbal is a superpower
People resonate with those who sound like them
You can hack your body
Listening is the greatest compliment

Moving to frequent releases - the 10 Communication Principles that support rapid change

Quality is not about testing … it’s about value!

Gitte Ottosen
Gitte thinks that is not that easy to define what quality is, as it doesn’t mean the same to everybody. It is the value to some person, at some time, who matters. So you have to find out who the people that matter are.

More important, you have to think about what value means to you and get a common understanding throughout the whole team. You can do so by using the VOICE Model: Value, Objectives, Indicators, Confidence, Experience. As value is time dependent, you have to think about what you want to get out of the things you do right now – this will change over time.

5 myths and anti-patterns to refactor out with continuous performance

Paul Bruce
Nowadays, organizations want to deliver things quickly. They run into a more continuous future where they do smaller releases more often and share knowledge along the way. This only works if continuous performance feedback is given.

Paul used 5 myths/anti-patterns to explain how to get to having a continuous performance mindset:

Prohibite Ubiquity
Expedited Gridlock
Mandated Ignorance
Escape Philosophy
Predictable Unreliability

Have a look at my sketchnote to learn more about the mantra and possible actions for each anti-pattern.

CSI testing – investigate like a pro

Adam Matlacz & Elzbieta Sikora
Adam and Elzbieta think that exploratory testing brings many opportunities for testers, especially when the sessions are held with people with different roles. While being a tester, you can behave like a detective when you are on a bug hunt. That’s how they came up with CSI Testing.

The CSI Principles are: Concentration, System thinking and Impartiality (+ break the rules). Focus on a goal, use a holistic approach and treat all fair without prejudices. A CSI Tester should build skills around different types of thinking, tools and gadgets and approaches and techniques.

The CSI Procedure would look like that:

Approach the scene: Find out what you deal with
Start investigation: Narrow down
Release crime scene: Team work
Conduct the trial: Confront suspects, call witnesses, judgement
Debriefing: Retrospect

Lightning Strikes

Lightning Strikes are short talks of 5 minutes in which 2 slides are allowed. This year there were 8 speakers who were giving a lightning talk.

Lightning Strikes 1

Tariq King, Sanne Visser, Rob Meaney & Elise Carmichael
Tariq thinks that the world is full of bad software and by filling AI & ML systems with bad data and biases, the problem is being made even worse. By testing your software and using a holisitic approach, you can unlock a revolution and make a difference.

The essence of Sanne’s talk is, that you should always remember that there are different ways to get to where you want to get and that you should take a look around and think outside the box to not get stuck on the way things should be.

Rob shared two philosophies with us: Seek problems, solve problems share lessons, which is basically about sharing what you’ve learned with everyone and working in a holistic matter to enhance quality. The other one is: Fewer, smaller things together – which means fewer as in the variety/volume of work, smaller as in slicing things down more and together as in cross-functional teams that start and finish together.

Elise thinks that next to maintaining, analyzing and creating tests there is a huge portion of test debt, a backlog of work not done. She thinks that flipping the test pyramid upside-down helps you to refocus on the customer’s experience and therefore also reducing some of this debt.

Lightning Strikes 2

Raj Subrameyer, Dawn Haynes, Chris Armstrong & Sowmya Ramesh
Raj compared pre- and during covid work to each other and found that from having onsite interviews, working from home as a luxury, limited virtual meetings and mandatory travel it all transfered to no onsite interviews, work from home as a necessity, virtual meetings as a normality and travel not existing any more. This leads to a huge change in the future of work in which a social media footprint, personal branding, remote working, going the extra mile and re-tooling your skillset become crucial.

Dawn’s approach to finding and hiring awesome testers is usins these attributes of a CRACK tester:

Curious
Resourceful
Adaptable
Creative
Knightly

In short, Chris’ talk is about not overlooking any rules when doing test automation. A small mistake as letting someone and not the whole team decide on which tool to use might turn into a huge problem.

Experimentation is pivotal to success. Sowmya encourages us to be open to changes, so that we don’t lose any opportunities. But while experimenting, you should not forget to do extensive research, monitor and measure, improvise as required, document the lessons learned and implement with confidence.

The seeds of toxicity we’ve been trained to overlook at work

Raj Subrameyer
Raj has been dealing a lot with stereotyping and racism himself – mostly microagressions (actions/words that can be offending). He discovered that those often appear at work places and should definitely be fought. He has 5 proposals on how to curb microagressions:

Diversity & inclusion training
Having open conversations
Own your mistakes
Anonymous help hotline
No tolerance policy

The seeds of toxicity we ve been trained to overlook at work

Continuous performance testing in DevOps

Lee Barnes
Traditional performance testing, which often comes too late and takes too long, is dead. Continuous performance, which means evaluation at each stage and more frequent feedback, is uprising. But you have to think about performance factors early on in your development process. Incorporate the requirements as contraints or/and as acceptance criteria for existing user stories.

Lee advises us to start small and expand to move from a centralized to an integrated performance team. Gather feedback and continuously improve.

Testing and monitoring in production is important, but don’t forget to consider to:

eliminate requests to 3rd parties
ensure system “knows” that it’s being tested
identify an ideal test window
coordinate with infrastructure providers
solicit broad IT input

Continuous performance testing in DevOps

The journey of testing software for DNA analysis

Aprajita Mathur
The last keynote of the day was held by Aprajita Mathur. She was talking about testing software for DNY analysis. The standard workflow for analysis of genome sequence data is:

Alignment
Reference Genome
A) Somatic or B) Germline variant calling
Variant filtering & annotation
Data visualization & reporting

Machine learning applications help testing and can be supervised, unsupervised or predictive. While testing – also called Bioinformatics Analysis Pipelines – keep in mind:

Statistical models are used
The models are trained on data sets
The model is as good as the data or worse
You aren’t testing the exact output, but expected behaviour
You have to test in different situations
There are lot of changes, which lead to complexity, but also exploration and fun

Between testing software for DNA analysis and “normal” software testing there are a lot of common grounds. But to DNA analysis, there are also some challenges as Gold Standards, domain knowledge, population genomics and that nature always has its way.

As you can see, on the first day of EuroSTAR 2021 there were a lot of different topics already. From communication principles over performance testing and racism at work to testing software for DNA analysis – that’s what I call a huge variety. And there are so many talks that I haven’t attended and might re-watch after the conference.