WhistleblowersI’ve written before on how software testers think differently and play a different role to others in a technical team. In the past, a typical non testing view of the role was gatekeeper. This really didn’t turn out so well. The history of quality and software testers, is

Leadership is being your best self. Easy to say, harder to implement. For starters, what the hell does ” be your best self” mean? And why is that leadership? For me, being my best self, doesn’t mean achieving goals. It doesn’t mean going to the gym, eating the right

Growing up, I remember listening to Bob Dylan on the radio with perplexment. He would sing: “the answer my friend is blowing in the wind”To a twelve year old, this made little sense. How could wind, something invisible, fluid and uncontrollable provide any solution, any answer? And because the

Its not about winners and losersIt’s not about right versus leftIts not about good or bad, right or wrongIts not about pass or fail, testing versus checking, manual versus automationIts’s about the helpers. Always look for the helpers. It’s scary at the moment. Hell, everything seems to

I struggle to complete blog posts. Lena Wiberg suggested we do pair-blogging on a same topic. It’s a great idea. Here’s my version. Lena’s angle is more personal and I love it. You can read it here. Thanks Lena for the suggestion. This topic has been on

The concept of test management sits awkwardly in agile, mostly because it’s a construct derived from the time when testing was a post-development phase, performed by independent testing teams. These teams were often of significant size, to reduce the time required to perform test execution. A test manager was

Sometimes the thought of making ‘big’ decisions gives us that ‘rabbit in the headlights’ look. ‘Big’ decisions often have outcome can have a significant impact to either ourselves or our company. Lack of information can make these decisions harder to make. Constant decision making over sustained periods of time, and

In his article “What leaders do”, J.P Kotter makes the following distinction between management and leadership: Managers promote stability, leaders press for changeFor example: Management involves planning and budgeting. Leadership involves setting direction.Management involves organizing and staffing. Leadership involves aligning people.Management provides control and solves problems. Leadership

Today I went to Agile Australia as an attendee. That’s a first for me, usually, I’m speaking. It was wonderful to go with a different purpose, which is to learn from others. Typically, if I’m speaking I’m so focused on ‘my talk’ and getting ready for

One of the morals of the Back to The Future series is being able to walk away from a fight. It took three movies for Marty McFly to learn this self-control. Walking away from a twitter stormOne thing that the scriptwriters failed to predict was the birth of speaking your

I was recently in New York and had a chance to walk along the High Line. The High Line is a disused overhead train line converted into a walkway and park. It’s a really lovely walk. I was interested to learn that the train line had been built in

Does the thought of ‘dropping the ball’ fill you with dread ?  Perhaps you feel you will let people down, or more importantly yourself? Here’s a thought experiment: What if you actually let the ball drop? Do you know what might happen?  Will the sky fall?  Are people let down?

I read a blog post about why waterfall is NEVER the right approach and I feel compelled to respond to what’s touted as the waterfall mindset. Here’s a copy of the paragraph, but you can read the whole post on the above link to get a better sense

What drives people to take up my offer of free Skype coaching? Most testers when asked give on of the following reasons: 1) they want to pass an exam 2) They are having difficulty at work and need to get over some particular obstacle 3) They want to test themselves

One of the hardest parts of working as a software tester is keeping on top of new technologies, techniques in testing and development and software testing tools.  I can sometimes feel quite intimidated at the amount of information that I need to absorb in order to keep on top of

Have automation tools become the new templates in software testing? The cornerstone on which all our testing hangs on? Its starting to look that way. Think about it. The traditional method of testing was to use a software testing process identifiable by test templates. These templates were (and in many

It doesn’t happen all the time, but some days its just hard to be motivated and inspired. Today is one of those days. Perhaps its because it's a grey day, or that yesterday in Ireland was a public holiday and its hard to get motivated after a break, but