Modern Testing Principles: The Evolution of Quality in Agile Teams

@conorfi
Modern Testing Principles
The Evolution of Quality in Agile teams
Based on the work of Alan Page and Brent Jensen,
who have built on the foundations of many others.
Conor Fitzgerald: Head of Testing – Poppulo
https://conorfi.com/talks/

@conorfi
Modern Testing (MT) Podcast
Talking about similar topics of interest
7 Concise and clear Principles
Community - Slack OneOfTheThree
Influenced by similar books

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What is Modern Testing (MT)?
“It’s not very modern, and it’s not really about testing”
Lean Principles and Quality
“Modern Testing is the Antidote to Traditional Testing Methods”

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Why Modern Testing (MT)?
Shipping faster (Agile, DevOps, CD)
Technology has increased competition
Lower Customer switching costs(friction free)
Traditional Testing viewed as a Cost and Delay
“Accelerate the Achievement of Shippable Quality”

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Traditional, Agile and Modern Testing?
Source: Ministry of Testing, Modern Test course by Alan Page

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What are the MT Principles?
Principles In Brief - TestBash Home Talk by Alan Page
Everyone can test
Lead a Quality Culture
Business First
Accelerate the Team2
1
Always Learn and Improve3
4
The Customer is King5
Data trumps intuition6
7

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My Journey with the MT Principles
1. Each principle explained
2. A real world example
3. A suggestion for you to try

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1. Business First
“Our priority is improving the business.”
“A good test mind applied to a feature
team is a value-add, not a cost.”

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Feature Toggles
“Feature Toggles/Flags are a powerful
technique, allowing teams to modify system
behavior without changing code”
Martin Fowler

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16 Splits - Status Unknown

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16 Splits - Status Known

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16 Splits - Status Improving

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Suggestion
Ask how can we improve the business?

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2. Accelerate the Team
“We accelerate the team, and use
models like Lean Thinking and the
Theory of Constraints to help identify,
prioritize and mitigate bottlenecks from
the system”

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Acceptance Queue Bottleneck

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Acceptance Queue Unblocked

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Suggestion
Ask what things speed up or slow
down the team?
How can your testers help you release
higher quality software faster?

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3. Always Learn and Improve
“We are a force for continuous
improvement, helping the team adapt
and optimize in order to succeed,
rather than providing a safety net to
catch failures.”

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Learning and Improving
Improved Retrospectives
Introduction of Post-mortems

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Suggestion
What key Improvement could your
team make right now?
What or who would it help?
How will you know if it has improved
something?

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4. Lead a Quality Culture
“We care deeply about the quality
culture of our team, and we coach,
lead, and nurture the team towards a
more mature quality culture.”

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Quality Definition
“Quality is value to some person, at
some time, who matters”
Jerry Weinberg(extended by Michael Bolton)

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Quality Consists of
Dan Ashby

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Quality Culture Definition
“Shared Mindset that delivering high
quality to our customers is our top
priority, and that all our practices
support this effort”
Alan Page

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Quality Culture Transition Guide
A framework that teams can use to drive discussion
Not a Capability Maturity Model
Focus is more on areas for improvement than levels
9 Capabilities and 4 levels
http://bit.ly/QCTGuide

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Chaos Growing Competent Optimizing
Testing Breadth X
Quality and Test Ownership X
Technical Debt and
Maintenance
X
Code Quality and Tools X
Customer Data Analysis X
Development Approach X
Learning & Improvement X
Customer Success X
Leadership Emphasis X

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Suggestion
Could you try the Quality Culture
Transition Guide with your team?

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5. The Customer is King
“We believe that the customer is the
only one capable to judge and
evaluate the quality of our product”

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Controversial?
“The Customer is the only one that knows
whether or not the product is solving their
problem.”
“Quality is customer happiness. (not leads
to… is)”
Brent Jensen https://testastic.wordpress.com/

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Talking to Customers
1. Qualitative
2. Quantitative (Next Principle)

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Suggestion
Is there a customer your team should
be talking to right now?

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6. Data Trumps intuition
“We use data extensively to deeply
understand customer usage and then
close the gaps between product
hypotheses and business impact.”

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Data can help you answer
Before we update this feature, how many customers are
using it?
If usage is low can we freeze or remove the feature?
When we deliver this feature what does success look like?
Can we create a user journey to represent success?

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Suggestion
Have you already got data that could
help answer your questions?

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7. Everyone can Test
“We expand testing abilities and
knowhow across the team;
understanding that this may reduce
(or eliminate) the need for a
dedicated testing specialist.“

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Controversial?
NO – Context Based
Wording: reduce (or eliminate)
If you successfully implement the
principles, you will always be in
demand

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Testing Knowledge & Skills
“Human-Centric Testing”
Janet Gregory
● Workshops
● Pairing and Mobbing
● Department/Company Bug Bash
● “Dogfooding”
Exploratory
Testing

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Exploratory Testing
“Tested = Checked and Explored”
Explore It!
Elisabeth Hendrickson
Checking(Binary) - Known Unknowns (automatable)
Exploring(Open Ended) - Unknown Unknowns
A thoughtful approach which involves “simultaneous
learning, test design, and test execution”
Cem Kaner

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Suggestion
If your team has a tester, what would
happen if they stopped testing?
What happens when they go on
holidays?

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Potential Challenges/Concerns
Resistance to Change
Support for your Ideas
Concerns around Principle 5 and 7
“Dev don’t want to do test”

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Learnings
Principles are a guide, not rules
Testers can be a force multiplier
Shared Ownership of Quality - no safety net
Importance of Collaboration & Communication

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Summary
Modern Testing
7 Modern Testing Principles
Journey with the Modern Testing Principles
Suggestions
Challenges and Learnings

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Conclusion
Testing is not Dead, it’s Evolving
MT is another Evolution
Complements and builds on other Principles
“A good test mind applied to a feature team
is a value-add, not a cost.”

@conorfi
Could the Modern Testing
Principles help your team
Accelerate the Achievement of
Shippable Quality?

@conorfi
Thanks
Thanks to those who reviewed
the slides and gave feedback

@conorfi
References
Introduction to Modern Testing
https://www.ministryoftesting.com/dojo/courses/introduction-
to-modern-testing-alan-page
Modern Testing Podcast
https://www.angryweasel.com/ABTesting/
Modern Testing Mind Map
https://github.com/mwyrodek/ModernTestingMindMap

@conorfi
Recommendations
Lessons Learned in Software Testing: A Context-Driven Approach. Cem Kaner, James
Bach, Bret Pettichord
Explore It! Reduce Risk and Increase Confidence with Exploratory Testing. Elisabeth
Hendrickson
More Agile Testing: Learning Journeys for the Whole Team. Janet Gregory and Lisa
Crispin
Perfect Software: And Other Illusions about Testing. Gerald M. Weinberg
Leading Quality: How Great Leaders Deliver High-Quality Software and Accelerate Growth:
Owais Peer and Ronald Cummings-John
A Practical Guide to Testing in DevOps. Katrina Clokie

@conorfi
Recommendations
Kanban in Action. Marcus Hammarberg and Joakim Sundén
The Goal: A Process of Ongoing Improvement. Eliyahu M Goldratt
The Lean Startup. Eric Ries
The Phoenix Project. by Gene Kim, Kevin Behr and George Spafford
Accelerate: The Science of Lean Software and Devops. by Nicole Forsgren , Jez Humble
and Gene Kim
The Devops Handbook: How to Create World-Class Agility, Reliability, and Security in
Technology Organizations by Gene Kim, Patrick Debois, John Willis
Team Topologies: Organizing Business and Technology Teams for Fast Flow by Manuel
Pais and Matthew Skelton

Modern Testing Principles: The Evolution of Quality in Agile Teams

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