The Catalyst

Several years ago I found myself pressured by some colleagues to join the executive team of my local software quality association. I had often considered joining as it seemed an excellent venue for networking and getting more involved in the software testing/QA community, but I always had a reason for not joining. I thought, “What do I really have to offer?”, “I am too busy this year”, and simply, “I’m scared!”.

Over the course of a few weeks, suggestions quickly became, “We don’t need to fill the newsletter editor position, because Selena is going to do it.”  My colleagues were not surprised when I finally said I would take the position; they knew me well. The motivation of my colleagues, and learning that other people felt the same way I did, helped me overcome the reservations I had in joining the executive team.

The following year I accepted a nomination to become the president. My reasoning? I was terrified to speak in public. I figured that if I was ever going to present at conferences and provide training courses, I needed to face that fear. I conquered the worst of that fear during the first season by speaking at membership meetings making announcements and introducing monthly speakers. After two years in that role I felt much more confident and stepped down to pursue other opportunities in the testing community.

Association for Software Testing

Following a nomination for an AST Board Member position a couple months ago, I found out at CAST that I was elected to the Board by the membership. I am excited to become more involved in the AST community by helping to grow, support, and provide new opportunities for the organization. While I have a Board Member role, I plan to decide on a particular area of focus after spending a couple months figuring out how I can best add value. I truly believe in the spirit and goals of AST in promoting and supporting the evolution of software testing as an intelligent, creative, and context-driven craft.

This summer I also started co-instructing the BBST Foundations course offered by AST after taking it in the spring (read about my experience). I finished my first co-instruction in July alongside Rebecca Fiedler and Michael Larsen, and am currently co-instructing the August session alongside John McConda, Brett Leonard, Michael Larsen, and Jen McCann. I have learned even more in this role, both from my fellow instructors and the students.

Other Organizations

I support a number of other software testing organizations in a variety of ways, while my time and contributions are volunteer-based. I contribute for a number of reasons, the primary being a desire to contribute to this community on a larger scale to help herald in a new era for software testers around the world (one where intelligence, critical-though, and creativity are expected and recognized).

• Software Test Professionals: They have recently undergone a rebranding to create a community for software test professionals who want to learn, engage, and network. I am speaking and leading a workshop at the upcoming STP Conference in October, have been an interviewee for Matt Heusser’s weekly This Week in Software Testing broadcast, have an article releasing on the STP website this week, and am giving a webinar for STP in September on test management. Again, this is a volunteer-based community, and the majority of my involvement has been non-paid work. I have recently joined a couple of STP Crews, though have yet to see what they are about in practice. A great way to contribute and gain recognition through a variety of avenues.

• Software Testing Club: This is an open-community of software testers. My recent activity has been limited to contributions to their newspaper, The Testing Planet. I have read a lot of really good content, contributed by test practitioners, trainers, and consultants who are truly passionate about software testing. While contributions are not paid for, there is a broad audience of testers who read this publication, and the website content, due to the breadth of the community. Another great way to contribute to the field.

• Waterloo Workshops on Software Testing: A local workshop I started with a colleague this year. It is a peer workshop with an emphasis on mutual learning, sharing hands-on experiences, solving practical problems, and promoting contributions to the field. We aim to build skills in software testing and allow people who are passionate about software testing to network with their peers, and help to move thinking about testing forward. Contact me if you are interested in participating in an upcoming workshop.

• Kitchener-Waterloo Software Quality Association: I continue to offer my support to my local software quality/testing organization, the KWSQA. I promote the organization, present at membership meetings and the yearly conference, and (try) to attend monthly membership meetings. I declined a larger role in the organization this season, due to my other obligations aside from starting up my own business.

What Are You Doing?

How are you supporting the software testing community?

Volunteering takes time and requires following through on committments. BUT it is also extremely rewarding in a number of ways:

• A sense of pride and satisfaction in helping the testing community grow and evolve.
• Networking with like-minded individuals you can call on if you need advice or help.
• Meet and network with people you respect and admire.
• Learn even more about your craft as a result of all of these, which increases your skills, professionalism, and drives your career forward.
• Build recognition for yourself in the industry and propel your career forwards.

There are many opportunities to assist with, and contribute to any of these organizations and many others. Let go of your excuses and fear and take your first step in helping the software testing industry gain the respect it deserves. Whether you can pitch in a few hours, or several days, over the course of a year, any organization will be glad to have you on board as volunteers are in short supply.

Contact me for questions about, or even a desire to volunteer for, any of the organizations I mentioned. You can even contact me if you can’t find a local organization you would like to contribute to – I may be able to locate something suitable, or connect you with someone else who can.

I challenge you to step up your game!

A bold statement? … Perhaps.

If you have ever attended CAST though, I am sure you would agree with me. If you haven’t, check out my earlier post on Why I Attend CAST to learn why.

Exploratory Test Automation

This year I started with a full day workshop by Harry Robinson on Exploratory Test Automation. He challenged the prevalent notion that test automation means running the exact same set of scripts every time. The same idea is still rather prevalent when it comes to manual testing, but exploratory testing is starting to make inroads in the testing industry to change that. You may be surprised to learn that similar principles can be applied to test automation too.

The basics: Challenge automation assumptions, vary inputs, vary paths through a program, automated tests <> human-driven tests.

Watch for an upcoming blog post expanding on this.

I have been fortunate in guiding teams in applying basic exploratory-like automation techniques, but appreciated the stories and experiences that Harry shared. They were interesting challenges to hear about.

Though I was not able to attend, Cem Kaner and Doug Hoffman also did a track session on the same topic, which I heard was also quite good.

Conversation Starters

After a rushed dinner, I spent Monday evening chatting with a number of other people about Mentorship and Consulting.  I had volunteered to be on a ‘panel’ for each of these and ended up being double-booked. Pleasantly, both turned into informal chat sessions, which allowed all participants and panel members to hang out and learn from each other.

The Mentorship talk focused on the qualities and behaviours of good mentors and/or coaches, and things to consider if you wanted to become a mentor.  The Consulting talk focused on the building blocks in deciding to become a consultant, what to do before you make the leap, and how to get through those first couple of years. Good discussions all around.

Art of Visualization

Wednesday afternoon I presented, ‘The Art of Visualization’, discussing how visual modeling techniques help improve effectiveness in testing, and allow testers to add more value to stakeholders. I shared examples of how visual models like flowcharts, mindmaps, informal whiteboard diagrams, and use case diagrams are valuable tools for customer requirements, software designs, test strategies, and problem resolution. Learn more via my presentation slides, and supporting paper.

I particularly enjoyed the discussion that occurred during the latter portion of my session. Participants questioned some ideas, shared their own experiences, and even drafted a list of tools that can be used to enable the use of visual models. Thanks to all who attended!

Watch for an upcoming blog post on this.

Communication Chameleons

Wednesday afternoon I also presented, “Communication Chameleons”, discussing the importance of testers being able to speak effectively to different types of stakeholders. I shared a story about a coworker who did this rather well and held the respect (and ear) of everyone he worked with, from customer support, to programmers, through to the executive team. The presentation finished up summarizing important parts of communication as testers, such as active listening, engagement, adaptive behaviours, and information radiation. Learn more via my presentation slides, and supporting paper.

The discussion that followed was engaging as attendees shared their own communication experiences, recommendations, and insights. I thank everyone who attended for their contributions.

Unplanned Activities

It used to be that when I went to a conference I planned out all the sessions I was going to attend and the evening activities I would partake in. A couple of years ago I broke that habit, and learned to ‘take it as it comes’. My conference experiences are now never what I expected, yet seem to provide me with exactly what I needed.

Case in point: While I had thought to attend sessions on Tuesday, I ended up spending most of the day talking with different testers. The discussions were quite wonderful (both the people, and the topics) and covered a variety of testing, software, and other various topics.

On the various thread: One person I spoke to was like fate intervening – they had a teenage son with Asperger’s Syndrome (high functioning autism), while I suspect that my son may as well. We spent time comparing stories, and they offered helpful advice. In another fate-like intervention, I had a conversation with someone about experiences with chronic pain (from which I suffer) and pain management strategies. I now have new approaches to look into that I had not investigated before. I did not expect those experiences at CAST!

Note: Evening activities are a must!

At CAST this year, the Rebel Alliance hosted a sponsored event (with several independents kicking in sponsorship funds) with drinks and snacks. There was a strong turn out with many conference attendees partaking in the goods and enjoying conversations.

Otherwise, while going out with folks for dinner and drinks is exhausting every night, I strongly recommend it. It is well worth the effort, as you will have conversations you would never have at the conference otherwise.

Games nights are also strongly encouraged!  Wednesday evening saw a sizable number of people playing interesting strategy games. While I’m a board-game fanatic, I didn’t get to participate as I needed to get out to eat dinner. I did buy one of the games on my way home though, and look forward to playing it soon.

Through the rest of the conference I was pleased to spend time talking with so many friendly, intelligent, thoughtful, and insightful testers. I hung with old friends, met people I had only met online through BBST or Twitter, as well as people who knew me and my blog (how cool!), and many others I met for the first time. I can’t possibly list everyone, so you will have to trust me in that the calibre of people who attend CAST is top-notch.

Thanks to everyone I met and spoke with, I appreciate you for the pleasure of your company, time and insights.

Next Year

CAST 2011 will be held in Seattle, Washington.

This is sure to be another amazing conference!  The Conference Chair, Jonathan Bach, and the Program Chair, James Bach, already have some great ideas that I am excited to see occur. Be sure to book the date as soon as it is announced.

If you would like to be involved as a volunteer, be sure to contact AST, Jon, or James, or myself (I’ll hook you up) asap.  We can always use more help!

I hope to see you at CAST next year … and bring some friends along too!

When asked by Jonathan Bach if I was doing a lightning talk, I wimped out. I had never seen one done, had no idea what to talk about, and certainly had no clue how to do it in less than five minutes. I eventually said I would do one if time allowed for it. It turned out that time did not allow (everyone was hungry), so StarEast was not meant to be the stage for my first lightning talk.

It ended up being at Agile Coach Camp Canada 2010. Instead of 5 minutes, I had a mere 3 minutes (the topic for which will be covered in a different post). I learned some interesting things through that experience, some of which surprised me.

Learnings from Lightning Talks:

• Your topic could be anything from something that irks you, a proclamation that falls in line with (or against) the event theme, promoting something you are working on, seeking other people to collaborate with, or a story that relates to the event somehow.
• Talk about something you are passionate about. If you are not passionate about your topic, the audience will sense it, and not pay you much attention. While your talk is only 3-5 minutes, the audience not paying attention may not seem like a big deal, but consider whether anyone will remember your talk, and if you want them to.
• Keep it simple. Don’t try to cover the meaning of life, research results equivalent to that for the search for cancer, or a one hour presentation crammed into 5 minutes. Pick 2 or 3 key points that you feel are the most important for people to take away from your talk, and stick to supporting those.
• Make your point. Don’t wait until the last minute to make your point clear. Despite the limited amount of time you have, if your message isn’t interesting or clear, people will tune you out. If you want folks to listen, make your point early on.
• Limit slides to few, and very simple. With a 3-5 minute window that starts immediately after the previous speaker finished, you don’t have time to figure out computer problems, or provide enough context to ensure audience members understood every teeny detail. Better yet, just skip them.
• Your talk might change. While the overall message for my talk is what I delivered, how I communicated it was quite a bit different. I was going to talk about trying to fit square pegs in round holes, but instead talked about something else (again, I’ll get to that in another post).

Lightning talks were a phenomenal way to share ideas with other people, in a fast and inspiring way.

It was amazing to hear so many different ideas from so many different people in such a short amount of time. I quickly discovered who had similar interests as me, who had conflicting ideas that I wanted to explore further, and who may be interesting to pair up with on a project. I was inspired and provoked to look at my own ideas from a different perspective. It was also a lot of fun!

Try It!

I really enjoyed my first lightning talk experience, and look forward to doing another one again soon (likely at CAST 2010, in the first week of August). If you haven’t tried one yet, I highly recommend it!

You don’t need a conference or big event for lightning talks. Try setting up a weekly team meeting as a series of lightning talks one week, or even do a lunch and learn for lightning talks. You will be amazed by the idea’s you hear, and by the energy created. Lightning talks are a great way to mix up the daily flow, generate new ideas and solutions, and find other people to collaborate with.

To learn more about lightning talks and some tips to excel at them, read more at:

http://agilecoachcampcanada.com/about/lightning-talks/

http://www.perl.com/pub/a/2004/07/30/lightningtalk.html

Agile Coach Camp Canada 2010, photo credit: Michael Lant

In my research last year, I learned that at an Open Space event, participants will create and manage their own agenda of working sessions around a central theme. This all happens onsite just before the sessions themselves begin.

What a novel idea! Meetings and conferences that are focused on what matters to the people attending, rather than being planned and decided upon by a committee or management ahead of time.

My first Open Space event was Agile Coach Camp Canada on June 11-12th, here in Waterloo, Ontario.

I was quite excited to see how Open Space would run… and how more than 60 people could possibly define and set a session schedule in less than 30 minutes.

After the unkeynote (more on that in my Agile Coach Camp Canada post), all conference participants gathered together. Our Open Space facilitator spent a short amount of time explaining what was going to happen:

• A large 8 x 4 grid was on the wall, with four time slots, and space for 8 parallel working sessions. If we needed more working sessions, we could easily add another parallel track.
• All participants were welcome to propose sessions of interest that were important to them, preferably in the form of a question. That will invite people with something to contribute to attend the session.
• Proposed sessions were written on an 8”x11” piece of paper, and signed with the session proposer’s name. The proposer then put their session into an available time slot.
• Participants juggled the session topics around to merge overlapping topics, and ensure that everyone would feel that their most important concerns and questions would be addressed throughout the day.
• The session board could change, shrink, or grow throughout the day as participants saw fit. We just couldn’t add more time slots.

Agile Coach Camp Canada 2010 - The Board; photo credit: Michael Lant

In about 20 minutes, more than 60 people had created the conference schedule for the day. It was amazing to observe and be a part of.

Who says large groups of people can’t get things done?

Our facilitator then outlined some simple “rules” in how the sessions would be run:

• Attend any session that we felt we could contribute to and learn something from (give and take).
• The Law of Two Feet meant that our feet are to be used to carry us to a place where we are contributing and learning. We could leave sessions part way through to attend another session. We could choose not to attend any session and instead have an important discussion with someone (or several people) about another topic entirely. The key was to make sure we were active participants.
• Spend no more than 1/N of the session talking to ensure everyone has opportunity to contribute (where N = # of session participants).

And that was it!

Each session involved active participants, with session leadership often changing hands throughout the hour-long time box. After the morning sessions were complete, all 16 were summarize by participants in 90 seconds apiece. This shared learnings from each session with the rest of the conference participants; a practice rarely seen at conferences. This repeated for the afternoon sessions.

To finish the day, we participated in closing activities that had people sharing highlights of their experiences, communicating appreciations to individual’s they appreciated through the weekend, and saying goodbye to both old and new friends.

The process used for Open Space sounds a bit familiar, don’t you think?

The difference between traditional conference formats and an open space format is akin to planning projects to the final detail upfront, versus using a just-in-time agile approach that addresses the most important needs at the right time. Add to that the important agile values of putting people first through collaboration, communication, appreciation, and celebration.

My colleague was right. I did love Open Space! I can’t wait to use it for future events and client engagements.

Yesterday my husband, son, and I took a road trip to seek out interesting places in our area. We have found it is easy to take local attractions for granted when they are so close, and often think “we’ll get there one day”, but that day rarely comes.  It was time to correct that for some select places of interest.

Castle Kilbride

The first stop was Castle Kilbride, a heritage site located in the small town of Baden, Ontario. We had driven past signs for it countless times over the last 16 years but had never been there. It proved to be more of a large opulent house than a castle, but it was interesting to see.

The Puzzling Tombstone

Our next stop was a small cemetery north of Wellesley, Ontario, which was purported to contain a tombstone with an inscription that was in itself a puzzle. Readers had to decipher the puzzle in order to understand what was written upon the tombstone. Being a lover of puzzles, we spent time sitting in the cemetery in front of the infamous gravestone, and proceeded to decipher the message. It took some time, but we did figure most of it out. What fun!

Take a look at the photo below, and see if you can decipher it’s message. No cheating!

So… Did you solve it?

What techniques did you use to get started?

What methods did you apply as you deciphered the message?

Did you use any heuristics, oracles, design, or testing techniques to help you solve this puzzle?

Consider how this exercise can help you in your day job, whether you are a tester, a programmer, or general agilist.

Please share your insights and thoughts!

To finish my story…

The last stops on our road trip were searching for Pioneer Tower in south Kitchener, Ontario, and Sheave Tower in Blair, Ontario. Unfortunately we did not have exact locations, and were unable to locate them.

After returning home, we did some searches online and discovered we drove right past the access points for them. They turned into an adventure for today, instead.

PS. You can see the solution to the tombstone puzzle, and the history of the origins of the tombstone at the link provided here. Please do not post this information on this blog. If you are trying to solve the puzzle, do not look at this page until you have finished. Tombstone Puzzle, Rushes Cemetery, Woolwich Township

Note: I am not an advocate for McDonald’s, own no stock in the company, and would never ever step foot in one again if I can help it, due to a variety of reasons not relevant to these postings or this particular weblog.

One of the first things I learned working in the fast food industry was how important customers were. Customers are necessary for keeping a company operating, but are also important in shaping many business operations and decision points. Here are three things that stuck with me after working the daily grind at McD’s:

Customers keep the business running, and your job intact.

Seems obvious, doesn’t it?

Sadly, it doesn’t seem to be in many companies. I bet you can quickly think of at least three bad customer service experiences you have had in the last three months. Sub-standard customer service, interactions, and expectations have become common place in today’s society.

The good news is that companies who make customers feel valued, listen to them, and actually improve their business based on customer suggestions are further ahead of the competition. Customers return when they have had great experiences.

While working at McDonald’s I focused on ensuring customers had a great experience. It all started with the first friendly and happy greeting, through to listening carefully to their requests, filling the request quickly and accurately, and finishing with a friendly good-bye. If anything happened to go wrong with an order, I quickly stepped in to compensate before they became frustrated and upset.

Customers also keep the business running and our jobs intact in the software industry.

Whether you are a programmer, a tester, a project manager, in operations, or in any other role, we need customers so we have a business. The customer may be an actual end-user of a product or service, another company who is purchasing a product or service for delivery to another customer, or even an internal user of the software.

Regardless of who they are, it is our job to provide a positive experience for that customer. That means:

• Understanding what problem they need solved
• Learning what they need to be happy with the product or service
• Determining how they will actually use it, and
• Ensuring every interaction is focused on the customers’ satisfaction and happiness.

Customers drive future products, if you listen to them.

Every customer is going to have some sort of feedback about the product or service they obtained. It may be positive in identifying how well it works for them, recommendations for improvements to improve it’s usefulness for them, or even complaints about how it doesn’t satisfy their need at all.

Running a business comes down to understanding what customers need and why they will buy something. If you don’t provide something they need and will purchase, you’ll quickly be out of business. This makes sense, but how often do you take customer feedback into account?

Context: Restaurants located in Southwestern Ontario, Canada.

In the early 90′s there were several products that McDonald’s offered that I really liked. Salads and pizza. For whatever reason, neither product sold well enough to keep them on the menu. Corporate listened to the customer feedback (which was represented in sales numbers, and in surveys and feedback forms) and removed both of them from the menu. While I was disappointed, customers were happy when new burger selections appeared on the menu to replace them.

Flash forward to early years in the new millennium, and you may remember that salads made a comeback and were added back to the menu as customers became more health conscious in their dietary habits. Additionally, as consumers became more environmentally conscious, most of the styrofoam packaging was done away with and replaced with paper and cardboard products.

Customers should also drive product evolution and new product creation in the software industry.

I have worked in organizations where someone internal to the company came up with ‘the next big thing’, developed it, and it flopped. Why? Because customers didn’t need it, want it, or it didn’t satisfy all their needs appropriately.

Learning customer needs and wants is critical for developing successful products.

• Product Owners/Managers need this information to devise user stories/requirements that will actually satisfy customers and make profits.
• Programmers need this information to ensure they program a solution that satisfies customer requests, wants, and needs.
• Testers need this information to confirm that what is developed not only fulfills a need and desire, but is actually usable for the customer in the way they will use it, continues to evolve per customer feedback, and satisfies many non-spoken product/service requirements.

This requires time to research, learn, and understand customer desires.

Customers evolve company image and business direction.

Most companies are in business to make money. To make money, businesses need customers. To get customers, they need to know how to attract their target market(s). Understanding the desired customer base, their lifestyles, and their interests is paramount for promoting an image and devising a marketing strategy that attracts, and keeps, the people wanted as customers.

Context: Restaurants located in Southwestern Ontario, Canada.

Do you remember the marketing strategy that McDonald’s used in the 80’s and early 90’s? They targeted most of their efforts at children. If children desperately wanted to go to their restaurant, parents would take them. From now-classic characters such as Ronald McDonald, Grimace, and the Fry Guys, through to the bright and bubbly in-store decor and family-sized booths, the company image was all about the kids. Some stores even had train cabooses that were used to host birthday parties, much to the delight of many children.

In the mid-to-late 90’s, McDonald’s changed their target to be less child-focused and more adult and family-focused. In-store decor evolved to be more subdued to attract a new customer base, Children’s Play Places were added so parents could have a break from their kids while knowing they were safe and having fun while in the restaurant, the Monopoly game was introduced to collect pieces and win prizes, and the infamous characters were fading away. McDonald’s was growing up.

From there McDonald’s further evolved to focus predominantly on the adult and teenage market. The company image and direction shifted to obtain customers outside of the established children-and-family market. They became more trendy, hip, and grown-up by introducing the “I’m Lovin’ It” commercials, advertisements and commercials focused on the working professional, and updated decor reminiscent of upscale cafe’s. McDonald’s touted a cool and adult-friendly image.

Consider whether customers influence the image and business operations of your organization.

• Does your company evolve its image as the target customer base evolves?
• Do marketing strategies change to acquire new target markets?
• Does the company consider customer lifestyles and interests into how it promotes itself?

Customers aren’t just the people who make a purchase for an end product or service, but are also internal to a company.

• Does your internal organization modify and adapt it’s image as other organizations in the company evolve and change?
• Do you know how to appeal to them so that working relationships remain strong over time?
• Does your organization evolve as your internal customers evolve?

Let’s go one step further. 

Suppose you have an external customer who likes to be heavily involved in defining a project, makes many changes, and likes to have flexibility in what the final end-product is.

• Does your organization evolve to use more agile practices that can work with this customer more effectively?
• Or does it stick with heavy-documentation, everything-is-planned-upfront, and nothing-can-change approaches? Guess how well that customer relationship will work out.

This isn’t just about company image and branding.

It is also about the processes and methodologies you use to appeal to, work with, and satisfy the customer. That extends from sales and marketing, product management, programming and testing organizations, operations, and customer support. If your organization isn’t adapting how it operates in order to keep up with the customer needs, you will soon be left in the dust.

What’s Next?

Take a moment and consider whether you, your organization, and your company really value your customers.

• Are customers welcomed, appreciated, and treated as a valuable part of the company/organization?
• Is customer feedback gathered and regularly used to adapt in product creation and evolution?
• Does the company image and business direction evolve according to the needs of the target market?
• Do methodologies and approaches adapt to work seamlessly with customer needs and methods of interaction?

Watch for the next part in the Food Service Lessons series, Lesson #2: Teamwork.

I remember a lot about the training I received when I started my job, from the old out-dated cheesy training video’s, to the shadowing I did with existing employees at the customer counter. I also remember smelling like grease all the time, no matter how much I showered. But I digress…

This was back in the early 90′s when the classic McDonald’s characters were still around, though waning in appearances. Back then, at least in the restaurant that I worked in, most employee’s worked hard to deliver value (a.k.a. food) to the customers. I sure did! I was getting paid to work, and work I did. We still had fun while on the job, but never at the expense of the customer experience.

I quickly moved up the ranks from the main in-store counter, to the food delivery window in drive-thru, to the high pressure first drive-thru window (I was the multi-tasking queen!), and to new-hire trainer. I even revised the outdated training program to be more relevant, effective, and context appropriate.

Note: I am not an advocate for McDonald’s, own no stock in the company, and would never ever step foot in one again if I can help it, due to a variety of reasons not relevant to these postings or this particular weblog.

That said, I had many experiences and learned a lot during the three or so years I worked there, many of which I carry with me in my work today. Believe it or not, many of these lessons are readily transferrable to other companies, and to software development (which includes testing).

What I had intended to be a single blog post has somehow taken a mind of it’s own and evolved into a number of blog posts into a full-fledged series. As this was not expected, I am curious to see how these are received.

I hope you will follow along with me! Subsequent posts in this series will be added as links from this entry as they are published.

First stop, Lesson #1: Customers Are Key