Personal Improvement

Keynotes

K4 Asking the Right Questions? What Journalism Can Teach Testers

Thomas McCoy, Australian Department of Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs

Thu, 05/02/2013 - 8:30am

As the testing discipline continues to evolve—and the demands on testers increase—we need to look for new paradigms to guide our work. Thomas McCoy believes the profession of journalism has much to offer in helping us ask the right kinds of questions, be heard, and deliver bad news effectively. In many ways, our profession has ideals similar to those of journalism: our first obligation should be to the truth, we must maintain independence (even when embedded in agile teams), and our mission includes the protection of society.

Tutorials

ME Leading Change—Even If You’re Not in Charge

Jennifer Bonine, tap|QA, Inc.

Mon, 04/29/2013 - 8:30am

Has this happened to you? You try to implement a change in your organization and it doesn’t get the support that you thought it would. And, to make matters worse, you can't figure out why. Or, you have a great idea but can’t get the resources required for successful implementation. Jennifer Bonine shares a toolkit of techniques to help you determine which ideas will—and will not—work within your organization.

MK Team Leadership: Telling Your Testing Stories

Bob Galen, RGalen Consulting

Mon, 04/29/2013 - 1:00pm

It used to be that your work and results spoke for themselves. No longer is that the case. Today you need to be a better collaborator, communicator, and facilitator so that you focus your teams on delivering value. Join Bob Galen to explore the power of the story, one of the most effective communication paradigms. You can tell stories that create powerful collaboration. You can tell stories that communicate product requirements and customer needs. You can tell stories that inspire teams to deliver results.

TC Critical Thinking for Software Testers

James Bach, Satisfice, Inc.

Tue, 04/30/2013 - 8:30am

Critical thinking is the kind of thinking that specifically looks for problems and mistakes. Regular people don't do a lot of it. However, if you want to be a great tester, you need to be a great critical thinker, too. Critically thinking testers save projects from dangerous assumptions and ultimately from disasters. The good news is that critical thinking is not just innate intelligence or a talent—it's a learnable and improvable skill you can master.

Concurrent Sessions

W1 Emotional Intelligence in Software Testing

Thomas McCoy, Australian Department of Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs

Wed, 05/01/2013 - 11:30am

As test managers and test professionals we can have an enormous emotional impact on others. We're constantly dealing with fragile egos, highly charged situations, and pressured people playing a high-stakes game under conditions of massive uncertainty. We're often the bearers of bad news and are sometimes perceived as critics, activating people's primal fear of being judged. Emotional intelligence (EI), the concept popularized by Harvard psychologist and science writer Daniel Goleman, has much to offer test managers and testers.

W10 Exploratory Testing on Agile Projects: Combining SBTM and TBTM

Christin Wiedemann, Professional Quality Assurance, Ltd.

Wed, 05/01/2013 - 1:45pm

Exploratory testing provides both flexibility and speed—characteristics that are vitally important with the quick pace of short agile iterations. With session-based test management (SBTM), exploratory testing is structured and documented in pre-defined sessions. A newer approach, thread-based test management (TBTM), organizes test efforts by threads of activities rather than sessions. So, how do you retain the traceability of SBTM without losing the creativity offered by TBTM? The answer is xBTM—a combination of SBTM and TBTM.

W12 Presenting Test Results with Clarity and Confidence

Griffin Jones, Congruent Compliance

Wed, 05/01/2013 - 1:45pm

Test leaders are often asked to present the results of their testing to management—and even to auditors. Can you clearly and confidently explain and summarize your test plans and results? Can you prove that your testing is compliant with internal procedures and regulations? Griffin Jones presents a model for how to prepare and present your test work and demonstrate compliance. He explores how you can appear—and be—congruent, honest, and competent during formal and informal presentations.

T19 Maybe We Don’t Have to Test It

Eric Jacobson, Turner Broadcasting

Thu, 05/02/2013 - 3:00pm

Testers are taught they are responsible for all testing. Some even say “It’s not tested until I run the product myself.” Eric Jacobson believes this old school way of thinking can hurt a tester’s reputation and—even worse—may threaten the team’s success.