In business, quality assurance is essential to improving your bottom line and keeping your customers satisfied. Are you struggling with the structure of your quality assurance process? Here are five ways to make improvements.
Starting Testing
Traditionally, quality assurance specialists wait until the end of the requirements phase to begin testing. An increasing number of professionals have determined that test development should start at the very beginning and extend through multiple steps of the project.
Your specialists should be able to write test cases before code is written, based on clear requirement documentation provided by software developers. Pushing up testing can pinpoint and remove bugs at significantly lower costs than you’d encounter at the end of the project lifecycle.
Review Documentation
It’s important to know as much as you can about the product being tested. If design and architectural documents are available, your quality assurance team should read through them.
Specialists will be able to draw more accurate conclusions if they know how a product was created, why that product should be effective and how that product can be improved. Thorough documentation of edits makes future changes and troubleshooting more effective and less stressful.
Research Past Defects
Would you decide to build a cutting-edge program without learning why other companies failed before you? Probably not. In the same way, your quality assurance team has a clear understanding of past defects when preparing and undergoing tests.
Have your team conduct research and outline any predictable patterns that emerge. This will help organize the structure of your tests, making them more accurate and efficient.
Go Above and Beyond
Rather than focusing all of your attention on testing functionality, think about the front-end and back-end interactions of your application. Have your team ask some less-than-obvious questions.
Are the details sufficiently logged? Are responses taking a reasonable amount of time? Is there anything in particular you should check that isn’t required by your testing standards, but might determine whether the product is effective?
Being proactive with quality assurance solves future problems rather than just what’s right in front of you. Your team might not find anything worth mentioning, but you’ll know your specialists did a thorough job.
Consider Automation
Automation has become the new go-to in quality assurance, and for good reason. Throughout the quality assurance process, certain tests will be run dozens of times. Coding and manually running these tests can be frustrating, if not debilitating.
Automation can take away the repetition, increasing productivity, boosting quality, and reducing your overall costs.
Contact an Expert to Learn More
At Excel SoftSources, we take great pride in our ability to piece together a constructive and effective quality assurance team. Our representatives work hard to provide consistent employee retention, talented resources, and simple collaboration. Contact us to learn more!
