At 9 AM on Aug 13th, 2008, Testerlock, Principal Consultant of Testers & Blocks Consulting, walks into the lobby of Seven Inc in Whitefield, Bangalore and asks for Peter, the Head of Testing. Testerlock, was supposed to attend a meeting with Peter and his team of Test Managers. There had been some testing problems in Seven Inc that had been causing concerns to top management. So, it was Peter's boss Nick Fry, who hired Testerlock to figure out what's going wrong.
After all security clearances, Testerlock was welcomed to a conference room by Peter where his team of managers, Sasha, Rubin, Maria, Vibeesh, Ratan and Ankit were waiting for the meeting. The conference room was quite big and could even fit 20 people with an oval table in the center and Featherlite chromium hand rest chairs . Testerlock's name was already written in one of the paper clips marking his seating position near the door. Everyone in the room had heard about Testerlock through his articles and published podcasts and interviews. As Testerlock sat in his seat introducing himself and shaking hand with the team, he smelled the coffee aroma and while putting his laptop bag down on the table, he asked, "Ah! Can I have a Nescafe too?" and that put Peter's team in surprise about Testerlock's ability to identify Nescafe aroma from other available ones.
The meeting started with Peter displaying the agenda planned and discussing each point with a little bit more detail than an e-mail communication that happened a week back. When Peter stopped, Sasha took over.
While these things were happening Peter was getting confused if Testerlock was listening to all that because Testerlock was constantly writing something on his Moleskine. Testerlock had to several times nod to acknowledge what Peter had said. Nodding has been a practiced way in India to acknowledge having heard something from the other.
Sasha, a Test Manager with Seven for about seven years. That's right, 7 years. Sasha had been a star performer at Seven's Texas office and she looked like one and spoke like one, too. Sasha then started explaining her team's challenges of unable to achieve 100% testing and test case being complex, bugs not being fixed and so on....
Testerlock had just one word to say, "Interesting".
From Sasha to Ankit, and from Ankit to Ratan the problems the team faced were...."productivity of testers, tester developer relationship, lack of good process, best practices not working, budget is too low for good testing to be done, test automation not yielding ROI..." and yet again Testerlock had to say one word, "Interesting" and kept writing a lot of notes on Moleskine.
When it moved from Ratan to Vibeesh and Vibeesh was explaining the challenges his team faced, Testerlock interrupted the meeting asking for directions to a rest room. Before he left for the rest room, Testerlock asked the team to continue sharing the problems faced by them.
When he walked into the room again, he had a kind of style in his walk that meant that he knew what the problem was.
By then it had shifted from Vibeesh to Maria, and then new set of problems being listed. By then Testerlock had stopped making notes and was sitting and listening to what Maria was saying.
By then it had shifted from Vibeesh to Maria, and then new set of problems being listed. By then Testerlock had stopped making notes and was sitting and listening to what Maria was saying.
It was about 11:45 AM when Maria completed flushing her list of problems. Peter was excited to ask Testerlock a question and without hesitating much, he asked, "So, Mr Testerlock, what do you think the actual problem is?"
This time, Testerlock stood up and gave a one word answer. It wasn't the word, "Interesting" but the answer to the question Peter asked.
If you were Testerlock, what would your answer be? ( Your answer need not be one word but it could be. If your answer was already listed by other people who commented think about a different answer or expand on the latter. Maybe you might hit a better one )
37 comments:
"Communication"?
They all have different problems, and different solutions. Together they might have all the experience they need to solve each others problems.
It is Just the CHAK De India Team when they were enjoying the Lunch offer by SRK and What follows After that .........
They all have there Intention for Working but not Working Together
Mr Testerlock Brought them Together and should have given a Lecture that SRK has Given to the Hockey Team
"Management!"
It looks like there aren't "testing problems", but rather that the expectations on testing are wrong.
Many of the problems they told about looks like they could have been solved by managers (together with the teams); you cannot solve a problem if you don't own it.
So, it is a matter of finding out who owns the problem and find out who can solve it.
I agree. Communication is the problem. In fact I thought of it righ when "...left for the rest room, Testerlock asked the team to continue sharing the problems". The whole team must know what is going wrong and should be involved and committed to a rescue plan definition and implementation.
My guess ... "its people problem". The problems associated with people working in a social context that is often mistaken for being a technical, engineering or natural scientific context.
A people problem where every player is confused about the context they are in - social context.
To me, problems like poverty, world peace, climate change, morality in society, education system and so on are social problems - software problems are in social sciences realm - in other words - people problem - problems of people working in groups.
Shrini
"So, Mr. Testerlock, what do you think the actual problem is?"
'Management'. Management is the actual problem here.
Why I think that TesterLock could have answered 'Management'
Let us look at the Challenges that are identified by Sasha/Ankit/Ratan and others:
1. Unable to achieve 100% testing - Hard to make it possible (The eternal 100% Coverage question)
2. Test case being complex - From what I understand, there appears to be a strong emphasis on Test Case Design and Documentation which in turn is forcing the testers to forcibly document tests at a very high level making it too complex for the managers and other testers to understand (these are the people who view it as a good training material)
3. Bugs not being fixed - Emotional bonding with the bugs being filed and expectations of the testers that all the bugs need to get fixed just because the testing team has filed them
4. Productivity of testers - if testers are expected to attain 100% coverage as in (1) above, they would only get drained out, demotivated eventually resulting in reduced productivity
5. Tester developer relationship -
linked to (3) and (4) above. In addition to that, the management unable to see the friction being created between testers and developers and not resolving them before it goes out of control
6. Lack of good process - trying to tie the people down with a lot of strict processes hence increasing the overhead of getting things done
7. Best practices not working - the concept of best practices is very shaky. A practice that works for one company may not work for another. A practice that works for one project may not work for another project within the same company. Practices are Contextual and cannot be best at any given point in time. They can be good again based on a context. Forcing people to follow some practices in the name of best practices because it has worked in the past might get difficult to digest over a period of time.
8. Budget is too low - with so many problems, budget is going to be a problem. Attrition, Employee Retention, Increased Hiring, Poor Quality work, Delayed deliverables and/or releases etc. etc.
9. Test Automation - In general, when few people talk about automating the tests in a product, they dream of automating the entire product as soon as possible. They do not bother about what works best for test automation. More often, they would end up automating the entire product and once the requirements or the technology itself changes, those automation scripts are just kept there without any use.
There could be some 'good rebels' in the company who slowly and quietly revolt against the so called good processes and best practices and overall against the management. However, no matter how big the number, unless the management gets convinced, it is very hard to bring in a change and to convince the management is a herculean task. Probably, this is where TesterLock is brought into picture.
Happy Testing,
Parimala Shankaraiah
http://curioustester.blogspot.com
My answer would be communication...
The managers et all appararently never has a chance/did not want to discuss the various problems that they faced , before testerlock arrived .
And he was proabably just a medium to bring them together and set the ball rolling !
would wonder though would testerlock still charge his regular consulting fees for just one word of advice and fre coffee :)
Nice post, Pradeep have posed quite good meeting room environment :)
"productivity of testers, tester developer relationship, lack of good process, best practices not working, budget is too low for good testing to be done, test automation not yielding ROI"
Problems identified by the team members,are quite interlinked with each other,
we have to address each problem seperatly,bit i am sure of one thing, these are not enough technical issues, First of all efforts required to realize people to work in a team,and boost up their morale,
I thought on the same lines what others have mentioned already. but my answer is bit different
"So, Mr. Testerlock, what do you think the actual problem is?"
'Mismanagement'. It is the actual problem here.
As Parimala said and linked different problem areas it seems they already knew what the problem was but no one took a call to move above the rest and see the gaps.
Communication gap among the concerned parties.
on Automation - Not asking and realizing what to Automate and what not to automate, because automation should be done only when the underlying task is repeating and largely stable.
My 2 cents for this would be:
Problem is with Seven Inc's Management Mindset , inability to look for new solutions and continuous usage of Traditional working methodologies even though they are not yielding expected results. In this case, I would be applying PROOF [Past, Results, Obstacles, Outlook and Feelings] as suggested by Jonathan Bach.
My answer is approach.
Approach is reason both for management and communication problems.
Too much depending on documents and processes and forgeting people.
1) achieve 100% testing - it is imposible and it is in direct opposition with detail test case documentation. Prioritize, define what quality means, ask what bugs you can miss if you want usecase coverage or code coverage. Improve testing mix.
2)Test case being complex - it is too expensive! Too expensive and people unfriendly. Only basic test cases writen in detail, lot of hight level test cases - one sentence, idea what to test.
3) Bugs not being fixed - it is specification misunderstanding or managing problem? It allways means that managers do not support or understant quality.
4) Productivity of testers - writen test cases are allways ineffective. It is not testing but documentation.
Or they do not think that their work has sence. Do not feel supported. It is again approach. If I know my work is not important for you, why do it?
5) Lack of good process and Best practices not working
- with bad approach nothing will work
6)Budget - of course, if you want huge test documantation and 100 coverage, you do not have enough money even with generous budget. And if you are not supported by management, than you will have small budget too.
7) Test Automation - there is always low ROI, if you change a pruduct too much. May be only low level automation - only unit tests would be better.
8) Relationships - if approach to testing is not team oriented a friendly, other people do not support testing, comunication will suffer.
'Approach'
"Continue Discussing" is what I think Testerlock should have told.
As the scenario unfolds, there seem to be good testers (/leads) in the room and as each of them are sitting inside the individual challenges, I believe they failed to see the power of collective problem solving and thats exactly what Mr Testerlock would have realized when he stoped noting.
The coffee which I had was the problem. And thays why I always prefer Nescafe.
I personally would not give a one word answer, having not asked any questions up to that point.
However, there is a one word answer that I could give that would be accurate and useful, if my client challenged me to give one. That word would be:
"Ambition."
Ambition tempts us to try things that we don't really know how to do. From the sound of some of the troubles being discussed, it seems to me that the management team is fumbling around with high concepts and unsettled as to which of those many vague ideas are the culprit. If indeed ALL are the culprit, fine, but if they know that, why not fix them, instead of hiring me?
Ambition has put these people into a situation where they feel they are flailing.
This is a useful answer, because it's the first step in normalizing the problem (making them feel that the problems they are having are reasonable, rather than evidence of reckless stupidity or negligence). That helps them calm down so they can start to sort things out.
It may be that communication and management are problems, too. I think that is likely. But those problems would be far less of an issue if they were trying to do less demanding projects.
(BTW, I was writing down everyone's name and job role in my Moleskine. I always forget that stuff.)
-- James
Sharing :).
I know it is a short answer, but this is it (in my oppinion).
I find it hard to think of a one word issue here, since Testerlock has not asked any questions.
But, within the context my one word answer to the problem is "Nick Fry"
Nick Fry peter's boss could be the one demanding all these metrics which in turn has put the team off guard on how to create those numbers to satisfy Nick.
I feel everyone of them in the team are sharing similar issues because of the expectations set on them from their management.
-Sharath.B
I had 2 answers in my mind but I was not willing to post maybe it might sound silly,but well i am posting finally.....
The First Answer:
Peter:"What do u think the actual problem is?",
TesterLock:"Nothing"
Peter:"What!!!!!?"
TesterLock:"It is the Process which you are following is the problem"
The Second Answer....
Peter:"What do u think the actual problem is?"
TesterLock:"The Traditional Approach"
Peter:"So what can be the solution for this?"
TesterLock:Changing the approach....
>>>>> Freedom!
>>>>> Mission! Test Mission for their growing model day by day, which might have turned out and appeared as huge for them.
>>>>> Probably if they had Freedom, they could have seen within themselves by discussing what is that making, all them so worried about their outcome of the test project. And they would have identified the Mission for their testing of growing and expanding model day by day. The heuristic that helped me to identify their model was huge and growing day by day was -- few words of the managers in the meeting that was said to consultant. The managers and people of Seven Inc, had strong desire for the achievement, but the freedom of finding mission and mission that identifies their freedom was not seen or overseen by them. Or the desire which they saw was agreed by all the team members (includes every employee or person in the test project and management.)? Also the heuristic that helped me to identify this may be fallible as heuristics are fallible.
>>>>> I look FREEDOM and MISSION as interrelated in the context said in blog post. It is Freedom! It is Mission, the Test Mission.
>> Freedom from designation. Making to sit a person in a place by writing a name of her or him, next to door, looks like a person in the company was given the seat (designation) but no freedom. If wanted it very close to the doors.
>> The designated person did not make use of freedom what he or she had to question herself or himself with the scene that looked like a bothering puzzle for them.
>> The freedom to ask help of other manager or employee was limited or not at all used. Might be EGO. (Sasha, a Test Manager with Seven for about seven years. That's right,7 years. Sasha had been a star performer at Seven's Texas office and she looked like one and spoke like one, too.)But today she was sitting in Whitefield along with other managers or employees (who might or might not be recognized as her though others have performed similar to her or not as per their belief and self reflection).
>> When consultant said 'Interesting' no thought or question came, what looked so interesting for consultant with their problem(s) or challenge(s), when they did not find it. Freedom to question or share or growth was in the hands of higher designated person, in this case Nick Fry. But he did not come down to see and resolve what the team saw it as problem(s) and challenge(s). He appointed some other consultant to solve it, though they had Saha -- the star performer as said in the written context or other employee who would have same abilities to turn around. Freedom to believe did not exist in each other. They found other house lamp is brighter than their lamp without knowing both are lamps which (can) give light.
>> Looks like interaction of designated people happens only when they the witnessed problem's problem(s), but not when defining what is problem(s) -- underlying or going to come or that they can anticipate in their test project.. Freedom to tell the identified problem might did not exist or they did not make of use it well enough if existed. Probably if they had done it, the Mission of testing would have helped them to guide them ahead, provided the mission was available.
>> "Sasha then started explaining her team's challenges of unable to achieve 100% testing and test case being complex, bugs not being fixed and so on...." Probably others did not understand how she looked the challenges she saw. 100 % testing -- was it possible to go beyond 100% also from her team? What did she measure in the testing to say 100%? When she measured something which made her to tell “unable to achieve 100%” -- what % did they achieve as per her and her measure and with her measurement parameter(s) and criteria(s)? “bugs not being fixed and so on” -- what kind of bugs were not fixed? Why they were not fixed? Who reported the bugs? Where and how they reported the bugs? Did the model used for recording the bugs did overrun of memory or required resource or people who saw the bugs in the tracking system ran out of time or did not see what were reported at all or something else (I can get many context)? What are the bugs that she said? What she meant by bugs? What would have been the customer(s) words for the bugs that she said about and how did they react or would have reacted?
>> "where his team of managers, Sasha, Rubin, Maria, Vibeesh, Ratan and Ankit were waiting for the meeting." Looks like every one are waiting instead of initiating themselves. Freedom of initiation was not made use here. Did they have mission, for what they all desired from their huge model test project (as per their words)?
>> "The conference room was quite big and could even fit 20 people with an oval table in the center and Featherlite chromium hand rest chairs ." Team members who witnessed such problems (which appeared as problem to them) were allowed? (looks like they were not present in the meeting). 12 members could have brought in their thoughts. But the question is why they were not allowed to sit for meeting or is that they did not know such meeting with consultant is on or they were not allowed or they did not understand what the problem is? Freedom lacks or mission had not yet its birth here?
>> “Ah! Can I have a Nescafe too?" and that puts Peter's team in surprise about Testerlock's ability to identify Nescafe aroma from other available ones." -- looks like they did not know that they too have that potential or freedom which can be given by themselves for them to smell anything when some thing is going as they thought or not.
>> "The meeting started with Peter displaying the agenda planned and discussing each point with a little bit more detail than an e-mail communication that happened a week back. When Peter stopped, Sasha took over." Why only Sasha took it over after Peter or only why Peter did start the meeting? Any test managers would have known what they are looking as problem better than Peter possibly. Designation Freedom and Freedom of designation could have over covered the problem they thought it was a problem.
>> "While these things were happening Peter was getting confused if Testerlock was listening to all that because he was constantly writing something on his Moleskine." The confusion shows here, that they did not try to understand the problem which was not a problem but looked like a problem for them. Might be the MISSION and freedom to work towards the mission was not used. Variance in the understanding of what was there in front of them had grown day by day and turned to be a confusion later, which might have looked like a problem for few and as a challenges for few.
>> "Testerlock had to several times rise his head, nod to then acknowledge what Peter had said. Nodding has been a practiced way in India to acknowledge having heard something from the other." Nodding shows here people nodded for designated people when ever they said by acknowledging or not acknowledging their words, though they did not understand what he or he said, whether he or she said was wrong or looked like wrong from them. But, they were acknowledging to the designation and freedom which they did not have. And none asked or requested consultant, “how can I understand your nodding?” Looks like all nodded, and none asked what was understood by each others. This might also have donated to their problem(s) and challenge(s).
>> "Sasha, a Test Manager with Seven for about seven years. That's right, 7 years. Sasha had been a star performer at Seven's Texas office and she looked like one and spoke like one, too." Did Sasha was the only person who really bothered or hit her head with questions why these grew day by day --- 'looked like one and spoke like one, too'. (I can interpret these words in many ways and contexts).
>> "Sasha then started explaining her team's challenges of unable to achieve 100% testing and test case being complex, bugs not being fixed and so on...." Only Sasha and Vibeesh looked it as a challenge but others looked it as a problem. Might be the freedom and views of what they are seeing was limited within themselves, by designated people and by positions.
>> "When it moved from Ratan to Vibeesh and Vibeesh was explaining the challenges his team faced, Testerlock interrupted the meeting asking for directions to his the rest room. " Did the consultant taste the words of Vibeesh as challenges his team faced. Then probably (or not probably) Vibeesh would have approached others, but he was put down and also his ideas or did he approach others earlier or is he talking today as a challenges (same with Sasha too)? Acknowledge others and art of acknowledgment when some come up with initiation ideas might not have been practiced or did not exist in the higher level (which they thought) management.
>> "Testerlock interrupted the meeting asking for directions to his the rest room." When some one interrupted and went in or out, saying this does not work or thinking they are with scrap ideas, probably the team did not feel free to challenge with their thoughts and ask for the opportunity to prove i.e., MISSION if they had framed and freedom to work to reach their MISSION. Might be the freedom was not given to them and only doors would be opened to go out by making him to sit near the door. Or no one did make or did create the opportunities or make use of the opportunities.
>> "From Sasha to Ankit, and from Ankit to Ratan the problems the team faced were...."productivity of testers, tester developer relationship, lack of good process, best practices not working, budget is too low for good testing to be done, test automation not yielding ROI..." and yet again Testerlock had to say one word, "Interesting" and kept writing a lot of notes on Moleskine." They new the terms which were grown and growing day by day as germs. But looks like they did not attempt to see behind the terms for what lies there. Is that terms helping them in anyway, if so how, when and for what? Did they see and reminded themselves with their TEST MISSION and to use the freedom to get the desired mission result(s)?
>> "When he walked into the room again, he had a kind of style in his walk that meant that he knew what the problem was. Vibeesh to Maria, and then new set of problems being listed but by then Testerlock had stopped making notes and was sitting and listening to what Maria was saying." Did consultant see the Vibeesh speaking even when he was not there. If yes, Vibeesh would have put his thought always but they were not tried. If Vibeesh had not spoken after consultant went to rest room, probably the people there, would have thought it is not my problem any more as I have said what I wanted to say (this is one context and I can get such many context). Did the consultant hear the voice of Vibeesh speaking, voice of other people discussing when left out of the meeting room and while he was coming to meeting room, but not entered the meeting room yet? If consultant heard voice(s), what kind of voice(s) and emotions in voice(s) was heard by consultant? While consultant came back what they were discussing, if they continued the discussion when the consultant went out? For how long did the consultant did go out of meeting room, asking the way for restroom?
>> "It was about 11:45 AM when Maria completed flushing her list of problems. Peter was excited to ask Testerlock a question and without hesitating, he asked, "So, Mr Testerlock, what do you think the actual problem is?" When some consultant could able to identify the problem in less than 120 or 140 minutes, why the employee(s) (includes every people responsible for the test project being discussed) in the organization were not able to identify them? Is that the time, freedom of time, freedom to interpret was not given, mission was not available? If the employees had a meeting, at what time did they had meeting about this and where and how? Did the time, place and people also influence to their understanding of the problem as unsolvable for them?
>> "This time, Testerlock stood up and gave one word answer. It wasn't the word, "Interesting" but the answer to the question Peter asked." What was the emotion, reaction, words of people in the meeting room, when the consultant stood up? Were the employee in the company allowed to stand up and say anything or any employee did not make that courage to tell or were they not encouraged to talk by standing up or they were said you are paid for this and you do that?
>> From the written blog post, looks like no one questioned Consultant at any time while each said their problems and few others when said their challenges.
>> Did employees of the organization who were in the meeting did discuss to each other while they were telling their problems and challenges (how they looked it as) earlier i.e., before consultant came to the Seven Inc?
>> "When it moved from Ratan to Vibeesh and Vibeesh was explaining the challenges his team faced, Testerlock interrupted the meeting asking for directions to his the rest room. Before he left for the rest room, Testerlock asked the team to continue sharing the problems faced by them." Also I get the question, that people did not feel free (and had open talk) while they had other gender (male or female) present while discussion (of the so said problems and challenges faced by them).
When I think and question for myself further, might be people did not understand well enough what they were building (model or application) and their model would have grown and continue to grow day by day. Might be Peter would have said this while he started the meeting. What did customer want? What they were giving? Why their testing look like not yielding result(s) for them (and how did they come to this conclusion) and looked as problems for few & as challenges for few others? Lack of information or incorrect understanding of information -- might have made them to see this i.e., below said. Probably Mission and Freedom would have helped them if they had and made use of it.
>> "Sasha then started explaining her team's challenges of unable to achieve 100% testing and test case being complex, bugs not being fixed and so on.... "
>> "From Sasha to Ankit, and from Ankit to Ratan the problems the team faced were...."productivity of testers, tester developer relationship, lack of good process, best practices not working, budget is too low for good testing to be done, test automation not yielding ROI..." "
If this was their challenges and problems -- might be the test mission made was incorrect or no test mission was present, but still continued the testing which did not give the result what they were looking for. TEST MISSION or MISSION was missing for lack of information in knowing the product or understanding the product.
So, Mission and Freedom which are interrelated in this blog context (as I understood it in one view) would have helped the Seven Inc to understand what they were seeing for what they desired or over desired or if did not have desire yet from their test project.
>> No Problem.
>> Nothing new problem
As the prolems they have stated are there in every testing projects.
OR
Awareness between the team members.
Strategy is the answer, a lack of strategy arranged all these problems. A strategy contains an approach, communication, ambition.
Without a strategy and vision a team is like a ship without a captain. Having a strategy you know where to go.
Q : "So, Mr Testerlock, what do you think the actual problem is?"
A : "Teamwork.", replied Mr. Testerlock. "Because if each one of you guys can come up with a new set of problems in this meeting of minds within the walls of this conference room, I don't see a point where you would need a third party mediator to sort out your problems. I guess, if all you guys had discussed among yourselves initially in a similar forum prior to reaching me, I am sure you would have found a way, at least a workaround, to the problems. This conference room is big enough. You could have brought in your best resources from each of your teams, discuss, come to a conclusion or to a point of transparency from where you are confident of pulling yourselves out of this mess".
I would say, "Interesting, there is nothing new here. Same old problems, experienced people. But they dont want to solve it"
Pradeep,
When are you gonna post the correct answer................I am very curious...
Cheers,
Jassi
@Jassi,
When are you gonna post the correct answer................I am very curious...
All answers posted here are correct answers :) Note: The puzzle was: If /you/ my dear reader was Testerlock what would your answer be.
So, you are testerlock.
i am not good in puzzle but i like your blog and going to read other post of yours.
All right ....second try ....
Pradeep,
Was this puzzle derived from you professional experience ?
Are you the testerlock in this story ? or do you know he is ?
if yes,can you please enlighten us with the answer which testerlock actually gave ?
thanks
@Anonymous,
Was this puzzle derived from you professional experience ?
Well, it is a combination of experience and imagination.
Are you the testerlock in this story ? or do you know he is ?
You are the testerlock ( if you have attempted to answer the puzzle )
I know who she / he is - she/he lives in every tester and just that they dont awaken testerlock they dont realize it.
if yes,can you please enlighten us with the answer which testerlock actually gave ?
I have an answer but I will not give it out because it might look like I had a "one right answer" in my mind and was looking for other people to say it.
The puzzle isn't a how many eggs did the hen lay after being pregnant for 5 times if each time it laid 2?
So, the good answers to testerlock puzzle will vary and the value for my audience is in the comments section in reading different perspectives.
Wondering why people who post good questions need to ask as Anonymous. Write a mail to me :)
Thanks for second try. It worked. I love perseverance and I think you have it in more than average quantities.
My answer would be "CONTEXT".
The solution to all problem varies from context to context. We can not apply same type of Proceess to solve all the problems.
Like
Unable to achieve 100% testing , Test case being complex,
Bugs not being fixed,
Productivity of testers ,
Test Automation and so on...
All these problems/issues varies from context to context. The solution we applied in one project might not work in other project.
I am not saying that we should not follow the same process in all projects. I mean to say that we should modify the process (if it is not working) and adopt new processes and ideas to resolve the issues we are facing.
Thanks
Mukesh Dhingra
this scenario can be compared with a pragnent women goining to doctor and telling her problems,doctor listens to her and says all are common just carry on..
Communication, Co-ordination, Management would be my answer.
The team started sharing their problem with the testerlock, if there would have been proper communication and co-ordination between the team they should have already had a meeting and discussed the problems and tried to get a solution. Instead of waiting for a outsider to come and listen to the problem and give a solution the team should have had a discussion within themself. Its the team who is having the problem and again its the team which will have to come up with the solution and resolve the problem. The testerlock might not understand the problem properly in just a meeting but the team can much better understand the problem of eachother.
Management - The manager should have understood the problem and should have tried to have this meeting and asked everyone to share their problem - thats what testerlock did while leaving to the restroom - he asked them to keep sharing their problem.
Regards, Suhas M.
As rightly said by Ravisuriya. "FREEDOM"...
"Too much of freedom" may be the cause of the problem...else "No freedom" may be the cause....
This issue has to be resolved only by means of "Freedom of knowledge"...
I am not answering the puzzle, just sharing my thought.
I think, though Sasha were a star performer as a Tester, she is failed yet to prove herself as a good Test Manager.
[reason of my late comment is because i have read this post just now :( ]
-Selim
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