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EuroSTAR Conference

Europe's Largest Quality Engineering Conference

Lecture

Past Performance is No Guarantee of Future Results

Paul Gerrard, Gerrard Consulting Limited

Legend's Lecture
13:45 - 14.45 BST Friday 6th June 2025

Seen that text before? Usually it’s associated with financial advice or the caveats published on online trading apps. Can we say the same of the testing profession? Given our personal experience and performance, can we not say our future performance is guaranteed? It would be nice to think we could. As an industry, what has been our performance in the face of changing technologies, methodologies, complexity, agility and scale? Has it been exemplary, continuously improving. As good as it gets?

In this talk, Paul reflects on the changes testers have faced in the last thirty years and how testing has evolved. The future is uncertain (as it always is) but the challenges testers face are new to us all, but also foundational. Will AI replace us? Are our ambitions to improve quality now fake news? Has the politic of testing (never far from the surface) finally caught up with us?

This talk sets out the new challenges we face and the potential changes of aspiration, approach and attitude. What are our chances of success in the future?

What you will learn

  1. The past isn’t what it used to be.
  2. We think we’re good at what we do.
  3. Future thinking will be different.

Session Details

  • All
  • 1hr
  • Future of Testing
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Check out this video from Paul Gerrard to hear more about his talk, ‘Past Performance is No Guarantee of Future Results’.

We look forward to welcoming you to EuroSTAR 2025.

Session Speaker

Paul Gerrard

Gerrard Consulting Limited, UK

Paul Gerrard is a consultant, teacher, author, and speaker specializing in software testing and quality assurance, with a focus on test assurance. He has delivered keynote talks and tutorials at major conferences globally, including in Europe, the USA, Australia, and South Africa. Paul is a Principal at Gerrard Consulting Limited and co-director of Technology Unleashed. He has served as Programme Chair for the EuroSTAR conference and other industry events. Paul has received several prestigious awards, including the EuroSTAR Testing Excellence Award (2010), the TESTA Lifetime Achievement Award (2013), and the ISTQB Testing Excellence Award (2018). He is leading an initiative to create the Test Engineering Society, a professional body for test engineers.

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