One of my favorite things about being a tester is the way testers find inspiration and techniques from outside of the testing world and integrate them into their work. In my graduate work I’ve been discovering the many ways that traditional research techniques overlap with testing behaviors, my favorite of which is autoethnographic research. What in the world is autoethnographic research you ask? Let’s start by looking at ethnography, the research methodology this technique grew out of. Ethnogra...

May is Mental Health Awareness Month, and right now, I think we’re all struggling. And while mental health is a deeply personal thing no one should feel obligated to share about, I think there’s no better time than now to start meaningful conversations about it.How are these unprecedented times affecting our coworkers’ work and home lives? How much more effective would our teams be if we created an environment that was psychologically safe enough to be vulnerable and honest? How many of our peer...

During the first week of women’s history month, I had the pleasure of teaching ISTQB’s Advanced Test Manager syllabus to a room of seven women. This was not the first time I’ve taught this class, and it most certainly will not be the last, but this session will likely be my favorite and the most special.Research tells us that men outnumber women in STEM careers five to one, and this disparity only grows as we move up the ladder of leadership and longevity. Women leave tech careers at a significa...

This series of posts will explore my perspective on risk as a metric and a measure. I’m starting this series with the Math of Risk, I promised a breakdown to Melissa Fisher and Angela Riggs, and wanted to make sure I got it down before it potentially falls down the ADHD black hole where many other half completed blog posts have found themselves.There’s a common misconception when it comes to risk that it cannot be used, measured, or understood, and that if it can be measured, the measurement lac...

Managing a high-performing QA team is a challenge. This is often made even more challenging by competing priorities on a manager’s time and effort. One of the biggest concerns most managers have is how to future-proof their team. Ensuring your team is ready to tackle the needs of the organization today and in the future requires a combination of intentional focus on retention and forward-thinking.Preventing attrition is a critical component of future-proofing your QA team. Attrition is expensive...