10 Skills of Elite Testers: Day #1

There are many disciplines and methodologies to master in order to become an elite tester, and that mastery can take many years. But the key to developing these masteries lies in your fundamentals.

Just as with any endeavor, developing the fundamentals necessary to excel in your field is crucial. You may be able to get by for a year or two without grounding yourself in the true foundation of your craft.

But you will quickly hit a wall that you will not be able to overcome without spending effort on the key ingredients that make a great tester. And you will certainly never become a great Software Quality Assurance leader. So I encourage you to spend the time it will take to master these fundamentals that will empower you to rise to the top of your profession.

The 10 Skills of Elite Testers

1. Communication
2. Bulletproof Bug Writing
3. Managing Expectations
4. Attention to Detail
5. Asking the Right Questions
6. Be Solution-Oriented and Proactive
7. Master Your Bugbase
8. Deliver Stellar Reports
9. Deliver on Your Word
10. Never Stop Learning

A brief note about practicing what you learn:
It is said that “practice makes perfect.” I disagree. This is a nice sentiment, but this is not accurate in my experience. I learned many years ago that how you practice is key to perfection.

Practicing results in training you to perform as you have practiced. If you practice ineffective behavior, you will perform ineffectively. The more you practice ineffective behavior, the more a habit being ineffective will become.

The key to mastery lies in perfect practice. Perfect practice makes perfect. Although you may not perform perfectly every time in every situation, if you strive for excellence, to do better each time, your performance will improve without fail.

So please, learn each of these skills and strive to practice as perfectly as possible. You will be amazed at the progress you will make in just a short time.

Please remember that simply knowing this information is not enough. Studying this course is no guarantee of employment or testing excellence. You must do the work yourself, I can only inform, advise, and guide you as best I can.

If you invest in yourself to learn and apply these lessons then what I can promise you is that you will be ready to adapt to the challenges that lay ahead. You will be prepared to succeed.

All you have to do is keep doing the right things – you’ll know what they are. And always continue to invest in yourself because you are worth it!

Skill #1:
Communication

Think like a wise man but communicate in the language of the people.
~William Butler Yeats

There are two types of communication at which QA must excel; written and verbal. Communication with others on a daily basis is the most effective way for QA to build trust.

Trust in QA so that other departments know what QA is doing and are confident that QA is doing the right things and doing them in the right way. Trust with other departments that everyone involved in the project is on the same page and working in the same direction toward the same goals. Below I will outline the key pieces of communication most available to QA.

Written Communication:

This is such a preventable mistake that I just cannot emphasize it enough. Few things lower the trust that others have in QA more than a shoddy email or report. If Quality Assurance can’t be bothered enough to spend the effort to make sure that their bugs, emails, and reports are properly written, then what trust should anyone have that QA is doing anything else correctly?

Some would (and have) argued, “But a quick ‘heads-up’ email to an engineer or project manager is just a courtesy I am extending them. Why does it matter if I punctuate it correctly or if I spell all of the words correctly?”

It matters because EVERY piece of communication that comes from QA represents the entire QA department. It is QA’s job to take responsibility for all of the little details as well as any major flaws in functionality. If you can’t communicate in a professional manner, no one is going to take what you have to say seriously.

If, on the other hand, your written communication is flawless, they will trust the testing you perform all that much more. This may not seem fair, but it is the perception you will have to live and deal with.

Any communication you make, whether written or verbal, may be communicated up the chain. Because of this, you had better ensure that what you say and write is accurate.

Spell checking your emails and reports takes only a few seconds and can make the difference between the information that you provide being trusted or not (and thus whether you are trusted or not). The few moments you take to ensure that your communication is clear, accurate, and properly spelled will pay off ten-fold as you progress in your career as a QA professional! Trust me, you won’t be sorry if you spend the time to do it right the first time, because you never know when a Vice President or CEO will be forwarded a key excerpt from your report.

If you have taken the time to proof it, you will be looked upon as a solid performer. If you can’t put a coherent sentence together and haven’t taken the time to ensure you have spelled everything correctly, then you will be seen as a possible liability that is in a high-risk position in the project – this will not bode well for your future. High risks don’t last…they get replaced.

Bug Writing
Writing bugs is the most common, everyday communication that a QA tester has with the rest of the project team. It is therefore my most fervent hope that you make sure that your bugs are clear, have all of the necessary information (and no extraneous, useless data), and are easy to understand.

If the person assigned your bug has to decipher what you have written, you have just made their job harder and created more work for them. Make their job easier and build the knowledge that they can trust you by writing clear, concise bug reports. And for the love of Joe – SPELL CHECK them before you submit to the bugbase – you may not have the option of editing your original submission later!

Status Reports
Daily, weekly, or per project, these reports are critical to the continued success of your team and your company. Your reports that detail the status of your testing will be used by the company to gauge whether or not their product will ship on time. They will be used to determine whether or not it will have all planned features included and functional. Be sure you are clear in advance about what information the recipient needs from you and then provide them that information in a clear and easy-to-understand manner.

When you send a Status Report keep these 3 simple keys in mind:

1. List the most critical issues first at the top of the report
2. Articulate clearly the current status of your testing
3. Include the date you estimate your testing will be complete

• The amount of testing completed to date (often expressed by as a percentage)
• The number of bugs found (grouped by Priority level)
• The number of bugs closed (also grouped by Priority)
• The status of the testing (whether on schedule, ahead of schedule or behind)
• And help to set expectations regarding the timeline for completion of testing

As a tester, you will most likely not be asked to compile one of these reports. However, all of the reports that you do write and deliver will help to enhance the Test Metrics report that your Quality Assurance Lead or Manager creates and uses to support the project team.

Please remember that all QA reports whether they are bug reports, status reports, or metric reports must explain the impact of the information they are delivering. It is very easy to simply send someone a list of numbers and hope that they can make sense of them – but if they are not in context, the reader may not find the numbers very impressive or even understand why you sent them.

To ensure that your reports are received with thanks and greeted by a trusting audience, state your issues clearly and succinctly and explain the impact of the information you are imparting. People will come to trust your reports and trust you. This will enhance others view of you and your QA team.

If you really want to ensure that your written communication is not only professional, but also persuasive…I’ve got some help for you.

I spent many years honing my report writing skills. I suggest that you shorten that learning curve. My expertise is Quality Assurance.

I communicate effectively when writing my own reports, but the only way I have ever been able to truly teach report writing is by critiquing reports one at a time, one-on-one with my team.

Since I don’t have the time to do this with everyone…and since it would take you several months and/or years to do this with me, I offer you an alternative. I give you a writing expert!

Learn to write effective reports, emails, or anything else! Learn in a matter of days, not months or years! Treat yourself to the life you deserve – learn to write effectively!

Dr. Ugur Akinci is a professional with over 20 years experience writing copy. Don’t just take my word for it, go and see for yourself! What is your career worth to you? Use me as an expert on QA, but use Dr. Akinci as your expert on writing!

Verbal Communication:

If you are not able to communicate clearly when speaking to others, it will take longer for them to trust you and longer for you to be perceived as a reliable professional. Clear communication is the critical. Let’s look at some simple, yet often overlooked, skills to develop so that you may enhance the efficacy of your verbal communication.

Be nice!
It is amazing how many people cannot seem to be bothered with asking questions politely or by phrasing their statements in any way other than “I am right and thus you must be wrong”. Be nice and see just how many people will go out of their way to give you all of the information you need whether you ask for it or not. Be nice, and note how many people will give you the benefit of the doubt if you ever make a mistake.

Listen
None of what else I have written will be useful to you if you do not learn to listen. There are volumes of books that cover the subject of, listening, learning to listen, being a good listener, etc. and so I will keep this portion brief and to the point.

If you are going to become a skilled communicator you must not only be able to send information, but you must be able to receive it. That means that when the other person is talking, you listen.

• Don’t form an answer while they are talking. Listen.
• Don’t focus on how soon you can leave. Listen.
• Don’t interrupt them and finish the speaker’s thought. Listen.

Listen to understand what the speaker is saying. Listen to learn what the speaker means. Become an effective communicator by honing your listening skills. If the person speaking to you doesn’t think you are listening – they won’t trust you.

Think Before You Speak
Before you begin asking people questions that may be irrelevant, inaccurate, or only partially formed, make sure you know what it is that you want to know and phrase your question accordingly. Know what information you are seeking before taking up someone’s time. Know the message that you want to deliver before you get someone’s attention.

Get To The Point
Tell them what you need to tell them. Ask them for the specific information that you need to know. Don’t waste their time with a long, drawn-out story about the last week of your testing and why it is important to the world. They have a job to do too, so let them do it. Get to the point and move on.

Give Respect
Do you only speak kindly to people that can fire you? Are you impatient with others because you’re sure they’re not as smart as you, as detailed as you, as good looking as you?

If so, you’re going to have problems. Give respect. Work with everyone on your team as though they deserve it – because they do. If you work with your team, they will work with you. If they don’t, they won’t stay around very long because you will have helped create an environment where those that are not team players will stick out as liabilities.

If You Don’t Know, Ask!
It’s really as simple as that: If you don’t know, ask. The quickest way to find out if the bug you just found is already in the bugbase? Ask! If it’s in there, chances are that someone on your team has already seen it, so ask. They will tell you if it’s there.

The quickest way to get clarification about a test that you are running and don’t understand 100%? Ask! The person that wrote the test should be able to clarify what they meant – and this gives you both an opportunity to improve the test so that the next person understands it when they encounter the test.

If a developer has made a fix for a bug but their explanation of the fix is unclear to you – Ask them about it. If you don’t know or understand how to test a fix – Ask. I have found that most developers are more than happy to talk about the code that they have written.

When you ask them about it they have a chance to talk about themselves and the cool kung-fu that they practice. In addition to that, they are usually thrilled to have you, the tester, gain a deeper understanding of the program so that you can test it more effectively and maybe the next time you ask them a question they will get to talk about the ultra-super-secret kung-fu they have been working on… so Ask. And ask politely.

Vision without action is merely a dream. Action without vision just passes the time. Vision with action can change the world.
~Joel Barker