STARWEST 2019 - Project Manager
Customize your STARWEST 2019 experience with sessions covering project management.
Monday, September 30
Agile Test Team Leadership: From Concept to Product
Today, many agile organizations are making a terrible error. They are assuming there is no place for test management and leadership in agile, self-directed team contexts. Mary Thorn and Bob Galen beg to differ with this view and believe a strong need exists for testing leadership in agile organizations—just different from the way we’ve typically approached it. Join Mary and Bob as they explore what excellent test team leadership looks like in agile contexts. Explore the aspects of self-directed teams and the implications to your previous leadership styles. Look under the covers of Scrum...
Tuesday, October 1
Agile Testing: Team Tactics that Deliver the Goods
Sold Out!Let’s face it—agile testing is different. Challenges exist in successfully integrating within the teams themselves. Scrummerfall continues to run rampant. The dichotomy of testing vs. quality—and balancing both the team’s and your focus—still exists. Delivering value is both an imperative and a challenge. In this dynamic workshop, join agile coaches Mary Thorn and Bob Galen to explore the tools, techniques, and mindset you must bring to the table to successfully test in agile contexts. Mary and Bob examine risk-based testing, iterative test planning, exploratory testing, agile automation...
Success with Test Automation Projects: A People-driven Approach
NewAs we face increased demands for speed, change and technical excellence—the pressure, and the need for automating aspects of testing increases. But, successful test automation is not just about selecting and implementing tools and a technical infrastructure. People ensure the success or failure of the automation project; they must drive the project. Join Isabel Evans as she shows you how to make your test automation projects people-driven, by focusing on two vital but often neglected elements of any automation project: attitudes towards automation and experiences of automation. What...
Quality and Testing Measures and Metrics
To be most effective, leaders—including development and testing managers, ScrumMasters, product owners, and IT managers—need metrics to help direct their efforts and make informed recommendations about the software’s release readiness and associated risks. Because one important evaluation activity is to “measure” the quality of the software, the progress and results of both development and testing must be measured. Collecting, analyzing, and using metrics are complicated because developers and testers often are concerned that the metrics will be used against them. Join Mike Sowers as he...
Automation Framework Essentials
NewAutomation is critical in today’s software delivery lifecycle, and yet many organizations struggle to keep their automation running. How can we mitigate difficulties and get consistent automation runs and results we can trust? The secret is implementing a solid automation framework, but that isn’t as easy as it seems. Chris Loder has built several automation frameworks over his career and has learned what works—and, more importantly, what doesn’t. This tutorial will cover what an automation framework is, the benefits of having one, and the keys to a successful framework, including...
Wednesday, October 2
Keynote - Making the Career Transition from Software Testing to Data Science
A decade ago Microsoft had over twelve thousand full-time testers, and when you added up all the contract and outsourced testers too, there were more software test engineers than developers. The test automation solutions alone had more than a hundred million lines of code. However, that process was built for a company that would release a new version of a monopoly-scale product once every three years and ship it on a CD. That world had already begun to change, and Microsoft was missing the boat. When Microsoft tester Ken Johnston first encountered agile development and DevOps, he realized...
Thursday, October 3
Fun as a Productivity Tool
We should all just be professionals and do our jobs, right? There's no need for fun at work as long as everyone comes in and does their hours, right? As long as we have our processes to cover the work needed, we're good, right? Wrong! Kristoffer Nordström will show you why we need to have fun at work, why simply following the processes isn't always right, and, yes, why we sometimes need to bend the rules just a little to get things done. New research and insights into humanistic approaches have illuminated concepts such as grit and drive, which attempt to explain what motivates people. We'...
Making the Marriage of Product and Engineering Thrive
PreviewBy now you have probably heard that there should be a healthy tension between the product and engineering teams. The key word there is "healthy"—when this relationship is unhealthy, silos tend to form, ideas may be thrown over the wall, and a lack of ownership can develop. But what exactly goes into making this relationship work? Vidya Dinamani and Heather Samarin will explore this question and provide the product perspective in not just identifying and overcoming the root causes of most dysfunctions, but getting on the path to thriving. They will share examples from their...
Testers: The Unsung Data Heroes
PreviewConnor Dodge believes that data is the most valuable commodity in the world, and that testers generate some of the most valuable data in product development organizations. Test data can inform release schedules, aid in decision-making, and shape the direction of the product. However, such benefits can only be realized if test data is effectively tracked and presented, and if testers learn how to present that data in compelling and persuasive ways. Join Connor as he talks about how testers can create and use real-time dashboards to analyze the status of agile projects and...
Connected Cybersecurity: Stories from the IoT Hall of Shame
PreviewThe amount of IoT software in everyday things is growing at an alarming rate. Some cars now have over 100 million lines of code. Software exists in everything from our home security systems and thermostats, our televisions and phones, our children’s toys, and our cars to the systems we rely on every day but don’t think about, like our water supply, electricity, and power plants. Unfortunately, the amount of security testing being done on these devices is not growing at the same rate, as evidenced in the so-called IoT Hall of Shame, which keeps a running account of IoT...
Continuous Testing: A Fishbowl Discussion
Many people confuse continuous testing with test automation, but continuous testing is much more. It requires that all tests to certify a feature are automated and part of the continuous integration pipeline, and the results of those tests determine automatically when the next step should be run. We will discuss how companies have enabled this process, common pitfalls and how to avoid them, and how to move from automation to continuous testing. In a fishbowl discussion, the audience members sit in a circle of chairs in the middle of the room. Several brave souls will fill all but one of...
Storytelling in the Age of AI
Around the world, citizens are actively engaging in civic tech, social robots are tweeting, and veteran storytellers are capturing and curating stories in new and dynamic ways using virtual and augmented reality. This explosion of tools, sources, voices, and data is indicative of a new, more collaborative era for storytelling. But is the public getting quality stories? Join award-winning storyteller and entrepreneur Davar Ardalan for a dynamic look at the intersection of emerging technology, transparency, and inclusivity in media. The founder and storyteller-in-chief of IVOW, a cultural...
Reception and Summit Kickoff: As a Leader, What Is Keeping You Up at Night?
Kickoff the Testing & Quality Leadership Summit with a reception and some networking.