So what is the process? Well, Google defines it as a series of actions or steps taken to achieve a particular end. Nerds think that “a process is an instance of a computer program that is being executed".
All these can be true depending on the context in which the word was used, but here at Granular IT, The QA Process is a way of preventing mistakes or defects in programs and avoiding delivery hiccups before deploying solutions or services to customers. Should have mentioned it’s The QA process in the title, but if you made it this far then you know what I'm talking about ;-). Anyway back to The Process; what is it? Why is it important? How do we do it and why do you even need it?
I can answer all these questions with dictionary definitions and make this blog as short and boring as possible, or we can look at it from the perspective of a project that was undertaken by the team a few months back. So successful that the client disbanded their internal QA team and hired us as their official QA people, OK, this happened in my dreams.
Planning
Planning is key to pulling off something like this and delivering within the time and budgetary constraints. For this, you need a test plan with test cases, an execution plan, and the team members each with their own delegated task. The execution plan should be broken down into chunks, say Editorial for grammar and Functionality, these two can then be subdivided further according to the available localization options. We had English and Swahili for this project.
Collaboration
Tool. Yes collaboration tool, and this is not just internal, you need to work hand in hand with the contracting company, this enables you to create workarounds to the foreseeable hindrances that may occur during the test period. Slack was used here.
Execution
This is really the most important part, you see it's fine if you have proper planning in place but it won't matter if the plan is not executed diligently. Here tasks are delegated to each team member, a mini internal resource sheet is also maintained with tasks updated by the team member upon completion.
Reporting
How do you inform the client about the work that you have been doing? Well at some point you’d have to give an account of what was happening during the testing period, and why this failed. Why did something pass? And why was that blocked? All these scenarios have to be covered in your reports. The report has to be carefully designed to provide relevant information at just the right level of detail so that the client can make the right decisions about their project.
Of course, there is a lot more that is involved in the process but if you adhere to these 4 pillars you should be fine.
Happy testing.
