Faking Experience in Software Testing from India to USA via Europe

The entire e-mail conversation between me and someone is available for you without his permission. I have masked his mail id and name to protect his privacy.

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hi,

this is XXXXX from chennai, now married and settled in XXXXXX, USA.

i saw ur blog on testing and found it very useful. i am applying for testing jobs with some fake exp, just wanted to know some complicated bugs u encountered and some show stoppers that u faced. since i was asked this questions in interviews I wanted some experienced person's input.

thanks

Regards

XXXXX

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To which I replied:

Listen to this : http://www.skilledtests.com/testertested/FIET.mp3 and thanks for spoiling India's name in US.

The industry needs more people like you. Your parents will be so proud of you. By the way I think you would be happy to know that your father also got a job faking.

Thanks,

-- Pradeep Soundararajan

and the conversation continues

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Hi

You dont have to be so angry for this. I am not saying that I am doing the right thing. I am searching for a job for 9 months. first i put fresher and searched for intern projects, no one called me. then i put 2 years and i searched no called me. then i put 3 years, 2 recruiters called me. I need a job badly for family reasons, I am ready to work my soul off, but nobody is willing to take me trusting my abilities, i am pushed to this situation. its not like i can walk away with a job using fake experience, there are 3-4 level rigourous interrviews where i have to explain all the QA concepts, tell about the projects i have put in my resume ok.... its tougher for me than for someone who has true experience. When i get a job i am not gonna ease off, i have to work 12 hours a day in US to keep that job.
without knowing about my bitter experience, rejections and mental agony, please dont pass judgements.

what are u talking about my father ?

bye

XXXXX

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Hi XXXX,

If you went through the podcast I ,you would know what I meant or why I sound angry.

Its not the situation pushed you to do it, it is you who pushed yourself to do so.

<<>>

The most bitter experience in your life would be faking and not the struggle. Assume you get caught and is black listed, you would never make it big in your life. You might want to focus on your long term goal of becoming successful and not give up.

<<>>

Assume, you discover today that your father faked experience and lied all over his profession, wouldn't you be disappointed to know that?

Tomorrow, your child would feel the same. In this 9 months you could have worked on an open source project, gained true testing experience and be honest to interviewers.

If you appear to win today with faking experience, your future is dark. Testing is about speaking truth and you start a career in testing with a lie.

-- Pradeep Soundararajan

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hi,

I am daily preparing test cases and test plan for yahoo, google, youtube as a practise.... i cant work as intern since i have to earn money for my son's daycare. Even if they ask for freshers, they want college students, people like me who took a gap for marriage and child birth are left with no choice. so dont jump to conclusions that i am a fruad and cheat.

i am determined to get a job at the earliest, but its the employers who totally crush my efforts by saying that I need to know Perl, VB script, java script, Java, Oracle etc for manual testing, which i am not even gonna use in reality.

Its not that, if i put fake i am immediately gonna get a job, i have to first answer all the questions and prove myself to them, so only if i am brilliant I am gonna get hired. So faking exp is only a small gateway pass I am using so that my resume shows up in the random keyword search done by recruiters.

My son will understand the struggles i have been through surely, but what really matters is if i do my job nicely and sincerely.

Regards

XXXXX

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Hi XXXX,

I am surprised to know that you have a son to feed and you haven't yet settled in a job. But those reasons wouldn't get any sympathy for you in the IT industry.

By practicing to write test cases to the ones you mentioned, you aren't practicing testing. Instead some open source project would have helped by now to demonstrate that you really did test something.

Also, if you are applying to jobs that ask for VB, Dot Net, XYZ and you either dont have them or dont want to work on them then you are applying for incorrect jobs.

The more time you spend on applying for a wrong job then the less time you have for the jobs you might be suited to.

Did you try LinkedIN?

How about putting up a post in LinkedIN stating that you want a job and blah blah blah is your situation and you don't want to fake your experience. People would appreciate your honesty.

<<>>

If your son is now of the age he understands your problem then I might agree. As your son grows, can you say what he will become?

If you can predict that, get into prediction and you will make more money than being in testing.

I dont know your personal problems but if you have to feed your son till he gets big enough to feed himself and probably you then you might not want to fake. Its tough but not impossible.

How about putting all your test cases online and send a link to the people who have job openings who might look at that want to appreciate your practice and efforts?

There is just one way of being truthful and its the most courageous way.

Thanks,

-- Pradeep Soundararajan

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hi pradeep,

I just got my work permit a year ago. so since then i am trying hard preparing and studying all QA books, practising the training material, testing my intership project etc.... I dont apply to companies that ask for scripting langs. just to companies which ask for manual testers with exp in test cases and test plans.... so my margin is very very less. I am not a IT degree holder so languages are very unfamiliar to me. so my choice is very less.... with all these drawbakcs, the little i apply is rejected coz of no exp. thats the reason i had to put....

i really need a job to put my son in school.... so when it comes to my son's education or my principles, i chose the former. i know IT industry is merciless, i am telling u all this since u asked why i put fake, do u think i will tell all this to the hiring manager .... they care a damn.

we both are strong in our respective opinions, so lets just agree to disagree...

all the best with ur blog, it was great.

bye

Regards

XXX

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Hi XXXX

It appears to me that you dont want to learn. For instance there appears to be no tinge of fear in you after me letting you know that you may be jailed for faking. It also might affect your own self respect. I am asking you to be concerned about your own future but the present appears to be more burning for you.

I dont understand how you wanted to be a QA/Test Engineer. I am sure its not your passion but an entry point or maybe you think testing or getting a job in it is easy. Probably that's how someone misguided you.

Jerry Weinberg said something like, "When we are confused our mind falls prey to infertile suggestions from others" and I see it in action in your case, too.

You may make a big name in something you are passionate about in the non-IT space. What organizations ask for is experience and they have the right to ask for it. What people like you do after seeing those ads is to fake the experience hoping that you might get job that way.

I hope your son would prefer not to go to school because despite whatever education the schools you studied has taught, you have grown up to be a faker.

Why send your son to school when all the school teaches is "Speak truth" and "Honesty is the best policy" - none of which you haven't learn? What's the value of education you want to impart when he discovers that he need not practice the good things he learns?

Is IT industry merciless?

You want the IT industry to show mercy against you people? It's business that drives IT and not charity and sympathy towards fakers like you.

I believe in God apart from believing in truth and other good things. I shall pray that you get a job but I shall also pray that you and your son doesn't realize the mistake you are committing for if you or your son ever realizes it in your life, life will become miserable.

Thanks,

--
Pradeep Soundararajan

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hi

i am passionate about testing, i dont want to go in any other fields which i actually got offers, like bank and teaching. i want IT, i love computers and software and its workings.. thats why i took a course and working so hard. I dont fear fake exp because, i have prepared so hard and i can speak for the years i have faked. the jailing and stuff is irrelevant for me since i have put that i worked in my friends company for which he will give reference.

why are u making this a big issue. did anyone put fake exp and go ahead of u and excelled more than u ? has that deeply affected u ? u seem to really over exagerate stuff. this is the way of life, its the survival of the fittest.... since i had visa problems i was backlagging, now i am in the race too.... at the end of the day hardwork and brilliance counts.... whether u have exp, knowledge or principles it doesnt matter. whether u deliver a quality software before the deadline is what employers look for. as my QA instructor said "its a open secret that everybody at point or another fakes exp"

Regards

XXXXX

hi

lets finish this never ending argument.

i am amidst of huge personal problems, i have no time for honesty. only an empathetic person can feel for me.

goodbye.

Regards

XXXX

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A software tester from Oracle Corporation in India had e-mailed to me last year, mentioning that I am spoiling India's name globally after listening to the podcast http://www.skilledtests.com/testertested/FIET.mp3

I replied to him that he should probably be mailing it to people who fake their experience and not me because I am helping people to be aware with the problems of faking experience.

When I search for fake experience in my Gmail inbox, I get to see 67 conversations that has happened between me and about 67 fakers, none of whom wanted to learn its a bad idea and most people did not reply after my first reply to them. I don't know why many testers in India don't consider this as a problem and educate other people and their own college juniors about it. I do that. I have had a person from Hyderabad, India who wanted to travel to either UK or Europe with a fake experience certificate. I spoiled his happiness by letting him know why I think its a bad idea and might not make him successful and he called me up, not to thank but to scold me for the good job I did.

In this context, I have a message to you, your manager, your HR managers:

• Test the tester: Do not test a tester for his ability to memorize. You might end up hiring a person who is good at memorizing than testing. You might want to give him a software to test and ask him to demonstrate his testing skills. BUT if you'd want to test a tester, your staff should know how to test a tester? You might want to consider going through this video

• Know the truth about your staff: If your staff doesn't know how to test a tester for testing skills then they don't know testing. You might be disappointed to know they are eating up your profits but might be happy when you get them off.

• Learn what's good stuff to ask for it: If you don't know what kind of skills attributes testers skills, you would end up asking stuff like Techniques in testing, SDLC Models, Certifications, Tools and other things that are easy to fake.

• Recognize that it is your problem: Going back to Jerry and Don Gause's question: Whose problem is it? If you think its not your problem, you might think less about it when something goes wrong and you would never know what caused it but might attribute it to something else, try fixing it and end up in pleasing someone that "it worked".

• Act against fakers and make it public: I know of some organizations in India who have fired people when they found out that they faked and even some went to jail because they put the organization's credibility at stake in front of their customers. All of which is not public news. If you make the news public, you are giving a strong message to those planning to fake to work hard. In turn the community is cleaner than what it is today.

OR

How about faking to people that you didn't know people fake?

You don't need to share or forward this to anyone, its just for you. Keep all good things within you because if you share the community becomes better.

I want to see the community becoming better. Is that a problem?

So, whose problem is it? Its my problem. And remember, not yours. If its mine, I better do something about it.

A problem is the difference between what is desired and what is perceived -- Jerry Weinberg

--
Pradeep Soundararajan - http://testertested.blogspot.com - pradeep.srajan@gmail.com

Happy testing and Sad Testing

I don't know from where I heard "Happy Testing", the first time and fear to think if it echoed within me. I also don't know how I caught those words to sign all my e-mails to testers I communicate, writing "Happy Testing" at the end of the e-mail. I noticed that a lot of other testers to whom I communicated also started doing that in their e-mail communication to me and in their blog posts. I didn't know what "Happy Testing" meant when I started using it long back but I think this post explains what I mean by Happy Testing.

For the moment, forget about people ( that includes me ) asking you to do good testing, better testing, great testing, pleasing customers, pleasing managers, and getting great hike. Think about doing happy testing.

As a tester what makes me happy is when I find 'a' bug. What makes me more happy is when I find more than a bug. What makes me the happiest is when I find more and more bugs in every product I test.

I come across a lot of Sad testers and observe a pattern of the bugs they find. Most Sad testers that I come across are the ones who follow test scripts or cases to find bugs. You might observe that those Sad testers say "These test cases found those bugs". I am sure if test cases have life, they would be happy set of organisms because a lot of Sad testers owe credit to the test case for whatever bugs they ( humans ) find.

Its not that those Sad testers are always unhappy about the bugs they find, its that they are happy and not happy enough to recognize how they can be more happy.

If finding a bug doesn't make you happy, how sad a tester you are!

Don't ask me the secret of being a "Happy Tester". I am sure a lot of Sad testers won't believe my reply, "Rapid Software Testing, Exploratory Testing and Context Driven Testing that provides me freedom to think, experiment and find a lot of bugs".

In every Skilled Exploratory Testing corporate workshop I do, I challenge testers on testing their product for 90 minutes and find a lot of bugs within that short span. One of the recent experience was in SAS, Pune, where testers started clapping after the 90th minute witnessing the Happy Testing I did. It felt like a Hero to receive clapping from testers for demonstrating Rapid Software Testing.

What I heard from Rajesh K , one of the managers who nominated his team and attended the workshop in SAS over an e-mail was "The bug count has certainly gone up". Happy Testing Rajesh, Vikram, Manoj Nair and their teams.

Jerry Weinberg revamped his website recently and a sentence in his revamped website made me think what Jerry was trying to say and here is the sentence for you "Dedicated to Helping Smart People be Happy". It made me wonder if smart people can be unhappy. I then thought about all those talented testers in India ( and probably other countries, too ) who have been forced to write and execute test cases and follow best practices that might have worked for someone else. That reminds me to say, I get happy when I read Jerry Weinberg's books because reading his work makes smart and I made myself a lot happier when I bought Jerry's books for about 300 US dollars during my trip to Canada.

Speaking of all that, let me ask a question to myself: Am I never unhappy?

Oh yes, whenever I come across people who are unhappy and they don't want to listen to stuff that can make them realize they are smart and can be happy enough, too.

Am I talking as though I am Mr Perfect?

Oh well, I forgot to share with you that an important lesson I learned is that - Humans are fallible and so are their ideas. Everything is a heuristic and it is a choice of heuristics in a suitable context that makes a person smart. If you think Perfect Software and Software Testing is possible, read Jerry Weinberg's Perfect Software and other Illusions about Testing.

Unfortunately, I want so see those sad testers I come across as happy as me. Unfortunately, they aren't happy that I am claiming to be happy by doing things that they think is impractical or hard.

Fortunately there are some sad testers who are smart and want to be more happy. I live to help them. Oh! Did I forget to tell you that I get happy when I help testers find more bugs.


-- Pradeep Soundararajan - http://testertested.blogspot.com - +91-98451-76817 - pradeep.srajan@gmail.com

"The test doesn't find the bug. A human finds the bug, and the test plays a role in helping the human find it." --

Testing to avoid being sued or embarrased

North American, European Union and some Asian countries laws and law enforcements are much stricter than those in India. Most testers in India who have not known much about it, tend to ignore that fact while they test. I too didn't know till I actively kept reading. The value of reading is - I know to focus on problems that matter to my clients in countries like North America.

You might want to know that the cost of being sued is heavy on the organizations. All investment on a product and estimated profits go for a toss on that single day of verdict. Organizations like Microsoft, Apple, Sony and a lot of them have suffered losses by being sued or have withdrew released products on the fear of being sued.

As usual, I was browsing through Orkut today [ 8th August 2008 at 14:00 hours ] and recognized a problem. Please go through the following screen shot carefully before you read further.





One of the newly introduced feature from Orkut is an option to let friends know what I am updating in my profile and vice versa. A friend of mine hadn't added his gender in his orkut profile since he created the profile . He probably decided to do it yesterday.

What I ( and you ) see as an update is "XYZ updated gender". Well, he just added his gender and nothing else.

An update of Gender column could mean, "I have changed my gender" - which sounds absurd or might offend people to know that their friends are thinking that he changed his gender or their friends are thinking that she changed her gender.

This might invite trouble to Orkut or Google if there exists a law in any country that organizations should not mislead or misinform about one's gender. If there exists such a law in any country then they might be susceptible to be sued for showing something that mentally hurt one's gender status amongst their friends and other society members to whom the profile is visible. It also causes a lot of embarassment to someone whose friends make a joke of him/her updating "gender".

Orkut has been in news all over India after people claimed it responsible for being a channel for pranksters who even ended up killing for money and a lot of other cases. What if someone attempts a suicide attempt and blames it on Orkut saying "I could not withstand the embarrassment of my friends asking about my gender".

Do you think its worth Google's time to fight such cases?

Do you also think such problems can be found by test case base approach?

Minutes before I was planning to post this, I thought of getting this post tested from Ben Simo and Jonathan Kohl. Ben Simo shared with me that Facebook came out with some gender issues recently.

A lot of other testers might have seen the problem that I highlighted in this post while they were browsing Orkut, why didn't they find it?

Answer Ben's question to find out the answer to above question : Will you recognize a problem if you see it?

--
Pradeep Soundararajan - http://testertested.blogspot.com - pradeep.srajan@gmail.com