March 22, 2024 • 36 mins
Welcome to another installment of the "Testing Experts with Opinions" podcast! This episode dives deep into the evolving role of Test Managers in modern software development, specifically in Agile and Waterfall methodologies.
The conversation begins with a discussion around the traditional role of Test Managers in software development structured under Waterfall models. The panel then transitions into examining the changing responsibilities of these individuals in the Agile context, where they often operate as Test Leads or Heads of Quality.
Challenging convention, the speakers explore the diminishing need for the traditional Test Manager role in Agile environments, where responsibilities like budgeting, team management, and defect handling are often shared among project managers and or scrum masters. Instead, the conversation leads to a consensus around the importance of having an individual to coordinate and guide activities across different testing types and levels.
The episode wraps up with a forward-thinking perspective, suggesting some Test Managers may adapt into 'program level' roles, acting as Agile problem-solvers while demonstrating flexibility in a transforming test environment.
Immerse yourself in our invigorating discussion as we unpack the changing landscape of software testing, present solutions to enhance testing effectiveness, and anticipate the next steps for Test Managers in the Agile world.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to Testing Experts with Opinions, an inspired testing podcast aimed
at creating conversations about trends, tools and technology in the software testing space.
Everyone to, I guess, technically the second podcast, although we split the
first one into two because it ended up being so long.
So maybe let's refer to this as the third episode.
(00:23):
Everyone well? Yes, thank you, Leon. Yes, very well. Thank you.
Thank you. Yeah, very well. Thank you.
(00:58):
I guess disappearing role within
agile or whether it's an evolving role
so what I mean by evolving role
is is is there maybe a an evolution that's happening with that test management
role in that yes maybe there's not a place for it in agile but maybe it's it's
(01:19):
transit transitioning into something else so what I want us to discuss and get
your opinions on I guess it goes without without saying,
or maybe it goes without saying, let's just create this baseline first.
Do we all agree that a test manager role is still very pertinent in organizations
which follow Waterfall?
(01:40):
Now, I would say I believe so.
I think in the traditional sense of how Waterfall approaches a project,
that role is still very pertinent as that overarching control from a longer-term
end-to-end perspective is needed.
I do concur, particularly when you look at the activities which happen in a Waterfall project.
(02:03):
The testing lifecycle, reporting of defects, and
ensuring that all performance and non-performance aspects are looked at is the
role of the traditional test manager to ensure that all those activities are
performed and that the information is given back to business in terms of how
(02:23):
all the testing activities would have gone.
So yes, I do agree in a waterfall setup, the test manager role is still very relevant.
Same here.
I think I beg to differ. I think a test manager role is applicable in waterfall as well as in agile.
(02:44):
Because if you have testing in agile, then you will still need test management
processes to be in place.
So that is my take. Okay, well, we'll debate that in a second.
So if we think about, sorry, go for it.
No, I just wanted to add to, okay, so not just to come back to Matthew and Jan's comment.
(03:09):
I'm just thinking, I said same here, but I mean, I just want to say why I think
in a lot of the times in the old way, not the old way, but the waterfall,
the test manager is almost that gatekeeper or the glue between what happens before.
The testers are generally a lot more disconnected from what happens beforehand.
I know it's not always supposed to be like that, but in a traditional
(03:30):
way that was more like that obviously in agile it's more they
should be involved everywhere through the sdlc but yeah i
guess in the traditional test management role there was there was a lot of planning
monitoring i guess control of the testing process resource allocation risk management
but with with agile there's more of an emphasis on cross-functional teams,
(03:54):
I guess, shared responsibility,
continuous testing, and to some degree, there's a shift away from,
I guess, that command and control style to a more collaborative advisory role
for test managers in an Agile context,
if that role still has a place within Agile.
(04:14):
So if we think about the traditional activities that the test manager,
I guess, fulfilled filled in a waterfall type of setup, so that planning, resource allocation.
Reporting, risk management, et cetera, where do we feel that responsibility
sits within Agile and Agile teams?
I think you make some good points, which some of them I disagree with.
(04:39):
I do, where Mamatla came in and said, well, there's still a role.
I think there's still a need for someone to realistically look at the test organization
and the effort of testing within an organization.
I agree with you that the closeness of the test manager to the team and especially
the agile team isn't there anymore necessarily.
(05:00):
But there's still a big need for a person or group of people to create governance
and monitor how testing is faring within the organization.
Especially because, as you said, there's autonomy in teams, and testers are
sitting in cross-functional teams, and quality is the responsibility of that team.
(05:22):
We often find that organizations go into a little bit of a Wild West style in a.
Actually doing testing. Now, I feel there's still a role for someone to govern
that a little bit and guide how testing should be done, and then also monitor
that testing is being done in the right way within those teams.
Yeah, I agree with you. And I think that overarching role is super important,
(05:45):
especially if you have many pods or different teams.
And the thing is, in the pure Agile way, the assumption is that everybody in
the team are subject experts in the field, and they're all mature.
But the reality is many times there's a tester or multiple testers in an agile
team and they need guidance.
And it's not necessarily even on a governance layer, it's leadership or guidance
(06:08):
that they need specific to the project or the product that they're supporting.
And if there's no lead or a manager in that space, that sort of falls down to
the scrum master who's not an expert in testing.
So I think there's definitely, I think a lot of those responsibilities that
used to be a test manager falls now filters down to a test lead perhaps in a space.
(06:30):
And I think that's a key role.
So maybe the modern test manager of today is more of a test lead kind of title,
possibly, with the test manager being more that overarching governance layer
that hovers across multiple teams.
So although we're saying that there's a governance layer required,
and I think we probably all agree because I can see nodding heads,
(06:50):
that that governance layer is required, it's not necessarily in the guise of a test manager, right?
So if we think about the traditional test manager and all of those responsibilities
that that person had, I think a lot of that has now been brought into the Agile team.
So a lot of those activities are getting picked up by the team as a collective responsibilities.
(07:15):
So are we saying that, and Stefan and Jan, And actually, Mamatla,
you all said there is still a role for a test manager, but I think what I'm
hearing is it's not the traditional test manager.
It's maybe not even that job title. It's maybe some of those activities.
But not all of them, is that fair to say? Yeah, that's my view at least.
(07:37):
I would say that traditional test manager role has split, and Stefan puts it
nicely to say a lot of those activities are now the testing lead person in the
team, whatever that role title is.
But then the other half of that test manager, and I've seen a lot of organizations
then talk about the head of quality, head of quality assurance,
head of quality engineering, that then fills that governance role.
(07:58):
So the test manager is split into two. Two, if you go downwards,
it's that test lead or the person responsible for testing.
If you go upwards, it's the more overarching responsibility,
almost like an enterprise test manager used to be in the past,
that falls governance and quality gates and filters that through.
Leon, I personally believe the traditional or conventional test manager role
(08:20):
was mainly more focused on resources, budget, and also management of defects and delivery itself.
But if you look at the modern way in an Agile kind of setup,
team management, the team members are managed within their squads.
In terms of budgeting, you see that the project manager or scrum masters,
(08:42):
they start coming in to help with that.
So you realize that looking at now, what really does the test manager do?
Is it just defect management?
In the truest sense of Agile, defects are not supposed to be managed separately.
They're supposed to be managed within the sprints.
Pick them, test them, fix them. There's no need for those defect triages because
(09:03):
we are assuming everything's being dealt with right there and there as we pick it.
So in my view, the conventional test manager is slowly fading away and might
lose value because managing a team, a team lead can do it, a QA lead can do
it, or an automation lead can do it.
Performance testing, managing that, a QA lead can do the same.
(09:26):
So that then brings a question to say, what is the test manager going to do?
Okay, so I think what Johan said, the test manager role, playing that overarching role,
because if you leave test management to automation test lead,
(09:47):
who knows nothing about performance testing, that's still not going to help.
We still need that role that will look at coordinate activities for functional
automation, performance, even security.
So for me, I think that role is still relevant as long as we have different
testing types, as long as we have different testing levels as well as cycles.
(10:16):
Yeah, I think I'd like to ask a question to you guys.
I mean, from big corporates, a lot of the time in the historic days,
there used to be a lot of test managers.
Now, if you look at saying a test manager now becomes more of an overarching
governance layer, sometimes it feels like there's almost too many test managers left now.
(10:37):
That's not a job that needs to be done by 20 test managers.
So I'd like to hear your opinions maybe of what you've seen,
what roles have test managers typically morphed into?
Because from the clients that I've seen on big corporates, they've moved into
more almost like a program level kind of role where they almost manage resources
and help to assign sign them between projects.
It's almost like a bit of a project manager kind of role and then sort of dive
(11:00):
into certain projects maybe to help out where there's fires burning and then
they move out again. It's more of a hybrid role.
So it'll be interesting to hear what you've seen where test managers have moved
into after test managers have now become sort of a historic name that nobody wants to use anymore.
Yeah, great question. Give you some examples of what I've recently seen at clients
(11:21):
and conversations I've had with the community is that I agree with you.
We are sitting with a lot of test managers and they can only be one or two that's
the head of quality for an organization.
So once that spot is filled, you sit with this layer of senior people.
Now, to your previous point, what I've seen organizations do is to make those
quality engineering leads or quality assurance leads in that space.
(11:44):
So the title has changed slightly and the scope is still pretty much the same,
right? But they don't necessarily manage budget and people, to your point.
They manage the test activities. And their responsibility is to implement what
the governance layer asks of them and monitor that.
So they still kind of have the same scope, the management of the people and the budget part of it.
(12:11):
And one of their main responsibilities now is to implement that governance and
report on that governance.
So they manage that. that what we have seen and what I want to caution.
What I want to raise a caution to is that companies got rid of that level completely,
and let testers just be in the teams, right?
Without leadership, and Stephanie made a good point around that leadership and
(12:33):
guidance, without that guidance.
And then they slowly started turning around to say, well, testing isn't working
in my organization, but it's because that layer is completely gone.
So we're not saying, I'm not saying get rid of that layer completely,
saying move that layer closer to the cross-functional agile team and support the testers in there.
And work with the governance person up top to start implementing some of those
(12:54):
things so that the tester is still not left on his or her own devices.
There's still guidance, but it's guided guidance from a governance perspective
and then help them to implement that.
So the tester has a home, as a developer would.
We still sit with development leads and development managers.
We can't get rid of that from a testing perspective completely.
It's just, as I said, it's just splitting that role a little bit and defining
(13:16):
what those people would do.
Stefan, I've got a few colleagues, I think about five of them, who were test managers.
So what happened to them is their employer gave them options to say,
this role is being phased away.
You've got an option either to look for a job somewhere or you have to upskill
yourself to become a QA lead.
(13:38):
So what they then did was to just go through a certain program where they were
taught some technical skills and they had to retake some technical exams to
prove that they are a bit technical enough to become QA leads.
So they still continue with the test manager functions, but now they added a
little bit more on the technical side, particularly automation.
(14:01):
So that is what some organizations are doing. They keep maintaining the people,
but they have to upskill them to become QA leads and to be more relevant in agile setups. Okay.
So when we say QA leads, are we talking here about having a QA lead in every
squad or in every scrum team and taking on some of the responsibilities of the
(14:25):
traditional test manager?
Because then my question will be, well, what about those organizations who can't
afford to have a QA lead in every team or potentially goes for juniors and intermediates
as cross-functional team members?
So what happens in those organizations?
(14:45):
I guess in the example where you don't have a test manager, you work on the
assumption that the QA leads are picking up those responsibilities,
but the organization doesn't necessarily have the budget to have QA leads in every team.
I don't think what I'm saying is QA lead per cross-functional team.
(15:06):
I think it's more QA lead per stream or project.
Project um so on a broader scale if you
i think it's overkill having a qa lead in every scrum
team i think that's just from a cost and overhead perspective
it's not worth it but per program or per
stream or per piece of work absolutely per project absolutely that's that's
(15:26):
where that qa lead looks after a couple of scrum teams in in that sense matthew
brought up brought up an interesting point which i just want to go back to briefly
sorry so i see your hand but it was interesting thing to hear,
and I don't necessarily disagree,
that you're saying that test managers now need to upskill to become leads, right?
And I know what you mean, but I just want you to explore that a little bit further
(15:48):
as well, because it's an interesting statement.
Right. So what I mean by that is the traditional test managers are purely non-technical.
They don't get involved in any automation.
And if there are performance testing issues,
they are not capable of chipping in, assuming maybe
one of their two members is not available so what
(16:11):
the transition needed them
to do was to be able to at least pick or
to understand to read or to review source code remember
as a lead there may be some structures you
may have so your senior automation engineers but at
some point you may need to authorize or approve code majors
you need to have an understanding of what are you doing there are pull requests
(16:33):
that are coming you need to to be able to to have a view or a say to identify
code quality issues the traditional test manager will not have a say in code
quality beat on automation uh beat on performance testing all they do is just
to aggregate information,
present it at high level but now
the qa lead you are supposed to be able to interpret what is happening on the
(16:56):
lines of code even if you are not required to write but understand it interpret
it and explain to others so that's that's what I meant there to say they have
to be a little bit more hands-on as much as they are not required to be doing
that on a day-to-day basis,
Okay, so Matt, if we have a test manager, that is very technical,
maybe coming from an automation background or a performance engineering background,
(17:22):
because we have some test managers who were previously performance engineers.
So in that scenario, do you still upskill them?
Do you still, if we downgrade, okay, we say upskilling them from being managers
to leads. So if you were a manager and you already had the technical skills, then what?
(17:43):
Are you saying you're going to change the role still just to say,
OK, like you still have the skills, but we're just going to change your role
now from test manager to QA lead?
Yeah. So it's more than just changing the title.
It's all about the capabilities of the respective person.
So if the person, like you rightly said,
(18:05):
has previous performance testing experience or was a previous automation engineer
and happened to fall into that title, in my view, there is no need for any further assessment.
If the person is capable, it will just be a matter of the organization aligning
their roles and responsibilities depending on their strategy.
(18:25):
So are you saying there's still a need for a test manager if a test manager
has the technical capabilities?
We're just going to change it to a QA lead role because the issue right now,
we're basing it on lack of technical skills.
So I'm saying if we already have a manager with technical skills,
then you agree that we still need a test manager role, be it in agile or waterfall management.
(18:51):
Yeah, so basically, in my view, it may be a need to just change the title as
long as that person has technical capabilities, whether we call him a lead or a test manager.
All we need for one in an agile setup is someone with a bit of technical capabilities
so that they can support the team better.
So in this case, if the person is technical, we may just need to change the
(19:15):
title. That's how I would take it.
I want to give my view on what Mamatla has asked. So I think,
as we said before, it's a bit more than just the technical skills.
Like I said, we're splitting that role. And Matt's example was,
if you're going to split the role and you want to continue to play a similar
role, then you want to be that lead.
And I think there's a big difference between, and that's where the word manager and lead.
(19:38):
So the manager was managing people, budget, while the lead doesn't do that.
The lead leads the testing effort by implementing governance.
So I think if you have the technical skills, that's one part of the conversation.
But the second part of the conversation is, do you have the ability to lead
the test effort in a team versus managing resources and budgets and things like that?
(20:00):
Except now if you go to that governance layer, the aid of quality type of thing.
So I think it's more than just the technical part.
I just wanted to maybe put a different spin on it. I understand the logic of
saying a test manager should possibly become a test lead and then be entrenched
within a specific project.
Portfolio or a product or or a project perhaps
(20:22):
i think there's an opportunity for test managers to fill the role of a maybe
the term should be test coach you and you mentioned earlier about implementing
the governance layer on the ground level so i think there's some maybe there's
opportunity for them not to be stuck get stuck into one specific area but actually hover across.
Move in assist the team get them up
(20:43):
to a certain maturity level and then move out the plan is not to become entrenched
in a product forever in a day it's sort of say saying i'm coming in i'm assessing
your maturity of testing i'm helping you overcome your problems get you to a
certain level give you the tools you need and then i'm moving out because in
pure agile we want you to be self,
self-managed i mean one of the best scrum masters i ever
(21:04):
met that was my first project when i
was in scrum he moved in he helped us he was
like doing everything and then he said my role
is now to start moving into the shadows and i will be speaking less
and less and just watching and helping until you actually don't
need me anymore and then i'm actually gone because now you're self-sufficient and
i think in a way that's sort of a possible approach that
(21:25):
test managers can also take and i think that's an exciting challenge it's because
there's a lot of insight that test managers bring it's not just technical things
i think they have a layer of almost let's say testing wisdom that they bring
i think there's a lot that can add to hovering across different different products
rather than just getting stuck into one if they were to change their role.
You almost took the words out of my mouth because what I wanted to say is it's
(21:47):
almost like that test lead plays a sort of servant leadership role within that program of testing.
So it's advisory and how can I help you? How can I make you better as a tester?
How can I help you achieve more in this project?
What can I do to enable you to hit your goals in terms of a sprint or a a project.
(22:10):
So I completely agree with that.
I've listened to everyone's opinion and,
It's almost a bit silly in that we have test managers at the moment.
So let's take the example that Jan made in terms of having different programs
of work and potentially having a test lead sitting at the top of that program
of work or that project and sort of playing that governance champion role.
(22:35):
Aren't we just playing with job titles here?
Is that not essentially just, well, we're just renaming a test manager to a
test lead now? And yes, the responsibilities are slightly different.
And yes, you don't control the resourcing anymore. You don't control the budgeting.
But is it just semantics here?
I don't think so. If you look at the traditional test manager today,
(23:01):
and bar the outliers, so I get that, right?
But if you look at a traditional test manager today, they are typically people
who aren't as technically savvy as a technical automation person will be or
performance person would be.
So the historic test manager is someone that really knows testing very well,
knows the test process very well, but it's not as technical to actually lead,
(23:25):
to your example, lead and come in and help in the team itself.
So I think it's definitely more than that. Yes, if the test manager is that
technical, then I suppose in that scenario it is.
But the average test manager that we see in the market today,
at least the ones I deal with, and I don't want to generalize too much,
are the very senior test professionals who have been in the testing world for
(23:48):
a very long time, but have lost the technical ability a little bit.
They can talk about it, but they can't serve on that level to actually help you within the team.
So I do think, though, it is a little bit different.
Okay. So if we go with this notion of having these leads, working within the
(24:08):
different programs and platforms,
et cetera, the challenge is that in the traditional sense, a test manager kind
of owned the governance, owned the resourcing, owned the budget,
and therefore had line responsibility for all of the testers.
So you could more than just influence.
Now what we're seeing is the squad or the scrum team, et cetera,
(24:33):
probably report to either a scrum master or someone else, not necessarily someone
who's actually trying to enforce that governance layer.
So you could get into a situation where you have that governance layer in place
and you want to enforce it, but your whole test team is actually reporting to someone else.
So are they realistically going to listen to you? And if they don't, kind of so what?
(24:57):
Because teams work independently and they work in the way that that fits that team.
So I guess that's a natural challenge of this and a consequence of this where
I guess now you're having to influence –.
As opposed to be able to direct and command. So how do you get around that problem?
(25:21):
Leon, I think one of the, or maybe the reason why I strongly believe that QA
leads is the way to go to close all these gaps, which you mentioned,
is because at one point I was also a QA lead.
So the reason why a QA lead helps to reduce issues where maybe they don't believe
(25:42):
their lead knows is because a QA lead would have done most of those things.
I myself was responsible for
testing the processes. I knew the testing processes. I knew the systems.
I had the domain knowledge. I had the IP.
I also knew the automation frameworks. I knew the performance testing.
So literally, it was a way of me to share the knowledge that I had with the team.
(26:05):
So I wasn't a QA lead because I was getting tired or I wasn't competent enough.
It's because I had so much domain knowledge and it was easier for me to share
with the rest of the team.
So to circumvent the issue where you said, maybe the testers might not really
feel like why should they report to the test manager when on a day-to-day basis,
they're busy reporting to the scrum masters.
(26:27):
Basically, a QA lead should be knowledgeable in terms of the system, the processes.
Yes, there's the governance layer, which is also critical, but technically, it's
Product-wise and system, I think that is also what is very key.
That's where there is so much value in a QA lead.
Somebody who has done it, not only leading, but he has been through the trenches
(26:49):
and possibly gone up the ranks. That's my contribution.
I think we are in the same boat as when we started with Agile.
Because remember, when companies introduced a scrum, they said a role called
a test that does not exist.
In scrum. Everybody is a developer.
(27:10):
So are we now starting the same debate where we have to convince people to say
like, yes, in agile, you don't have a role called a tester, but you still need testing.
So I think this is where we are with this test manager role as well.
I just want to comment back on Leon's question about that command versus now advisory.
(27:33):
I think as a tester, although you don't really necessarily report into the governance team,
I think one leg should always be in there and know that you've got that backup
and you can report any fluctuations or if your team goes all vigilante and doesn't
really conform to what your company has bought into,
(27:54):
then you can report it almost and ask for guidance.
But I think another strong influence in the team is the Scrum Master.
So I think as a governance team, they should be very close to the scrum masters
and get the scrum masters buy into the governance layer because they are the
ones that assign allocation per sprint to different activities.
They are the ones that should be lobbying to say, guys, we should allocate sufficient
(28:16):
time for testing as a subtask for each user story.
Did we allocate enough time for test automation, all those things.
I think your scrum master is
almost a key person. If you have them buying into your governance layer,
then a lot of the fights have already been won because they're lobbying internally
for your team, as long as together with the testing community or the testing people within a team.
(28:39):
Beyond to your question around reporting lines, I think it's something I'm seeing
more and more, and the traditional test managers and head of test organizations
are raising that more and more. is it's around responsibility and accountability.
Now, what we are seeing in these cross-functional teams and squads are they
(29:00):
take responsibility for the testing and the leaders and the scrum master,
for example, happy to take responsibility for it until something goes wrong.
And then they go to the head of quality and say, okay, you are accountable for quality.
What has happened? And then it creates quite a dynamic in organization to say,
well, I put in governance, but they don't report to me. so I can't really enforce that governance.
(29:23):
And I think that's maybe where the test lead plays a bigger role and structuring
your test organization the right way.
And again, I'm taking it back to the development effort.
A development manager puts down how you do development, the coding standards.
The reviewing standards, and that whole process.
And similarly, the developers adhere to that process, and the development manager
(29:45):
is accountable to make sure that it happens.
What has happened when testers actually move now into these cross-functional
scrum teams on squads is that that role for the test organization went away.
We created a test manager or head of quality that oversees this and from accountability
perspective, but not necessarily from a responsibility perspective.
(30:07):
And then it creates that weird dynamic where it's all fine until something isn't,
and then who is then accountable for that?
So I do think that role, and that's what I'm seeing now in the tasting community
as well, is tasters are starting to dotted line report back into this industry.
Historic test manager that's now the head of quality because they are actually accountable,
(30:31):
and by doing that the tester can now push back harder
to say these are the standards that we need to follow i agree
scrum master or product owner or dev manager that you want things done in a
certain way but my manager that that i'm accountable to now holds me accountable
to do things in the right way i'll still from responsibility perspective do
(30:51):
what i need to do but from accountability perspective i want things done in a certain way.
In summary, then, we feel that there's a need for a test manager,
albeit in the guise of maybe a QA lead within Agile.
I think it sounds like predominantly that's what we're saying.
Is there ever still a need in an Agile setup, maybe at an enterprise level,
(31:17):
maybe a massive organization following Agile?
Is there still if you think about hierarchies within testing is there still
a need for a traditional test manager within agile anywhere or do we feel that
that qa lead will pick up most of those if not all of those responsibilities
which aren't already i guess picked up by the team.
(31:41):
Plus person responsible governance governance yeah so both of if both of those
boxes are ticked I don't think a test manager is needed in traditional scenes in the new Agile world.
So I would agree with that statement.
I concur. In Agile setup, traditional test manager would be irrelevant.
(32:01):
And yes, I have a very strong opinion that QA lead is the way to go in Agile setup.
Okay. So the test managers who do not want to go down the technical route,
they either don't have the ability or they just don't want to.
In a similar vein that you have manual tests that don't want to necessarily
become automation engineers.
So those test managers who do not want to become leads, who do not want to go
(32:25):
down that technical upskilling route, because let's be realistic as well.
Probably most test managers are people with 15, 20 years worth of experience.
And what you're now asking them is to totally reskill. Is there still a place
within testing for those test managers who do not want to go down the QA lead role.
We did discuss earlier potentially transitioning into a program type manager
(32:50):
or a project type manager.
Is that the only avenues available to them?
Release management is also one of them because remember partly a test manager
approves the quality gates at the different stages of a release.
So that's another role that they can transition into maybe test.
(33:12):
And a release management role. Yeah, I agree with that. That's a good point.
And similarly, scrum master, I've seen taste managers going to scrum master, product owner.
So those kind of roles, depending on your technical ability from our potential perspective.
Yeah, so there's definitely still a place for you as a taste manager,
but I have seen that the market is slowly being flooded by taste managers looking
(33:38):
for work because of what we just discussed.
And it's making that shift into either adjacent to the testing team or then
up, as we discussed, or down into a lead position.
Yeah, and I think you also literally took words out of my mouth.
Some of the test managers are becoming product owners, but it also depends to
(33:58):
what extent they were involved with the detail and to what extent can they be
subject matter experts within the organizations. Yes.
So that's one route which other test managers are taking.
And the other sad reality is, unfortunately, if they don't transform,
their careers are becoming limited more and more.
(34:19):
And it's a sad reality. I've seen it.
I think in the test managers that have been there for a long time in a company,
I think they won't struggle to find a different position because they have so
much knowledge of different products and systems.
I think if they want to jump ship to another company, it might be a little bit
trickier because then they come in as a pure test manager with no experience with a new company.
(34:41):
I think that's where the tricky bit comes in. So unless there's upskilling and
willingness to, shall I say, adapt to the times and the roles,
then the avenues that that they might want to go in becomes less opportunities for them.
Amatla? Yeah, so I think we just need to be clear that what we are saying,
we're not saying the responsibilities of a test manager or the tasks of a test manager will fall away.
(35:09):
So those test activities that needed to be completed within the software development
lifecycle will still be in place, but they will be fulfilled by a different role.
So like the same, my statement earlier where I said in Agile,
they say we don't need testers, but we still need testing.
(35:30):
So it's the same with the test manager responsibilities.
Okay, excellent. Okay, I think we're going to wrap it up there.
So thank you very much for your opinions. It was an interesting discussion.
Appreciate it. And we'll see you again in a week or two.
Thank you. thank you everyone thanks everybody this has been an episode of testing
(35:53):
experts with opinions an inspired testing podcast find us on linkedin twitter
facebook instagram youtube and tiktok where we're driving conversations.
Welcome to Testing Experts with Opinions, an inspired testing podcast aimed
at creating conversations about trends, tools and technology in the software testing space.
Everyone to, I guess, technically the second podcast, although we split the
first one into two because it ended up being so long.
So maybe let's refer to this as the third episode.
(00:23):
Everyone well? Yes, thank you, Leon. Yes, very well. Thank you.
Thank you. Yeah, very well. Thank you.
(00:58):
I guess disappearing role within
agile or whether it's an evolving role
so what I mean by evolving role
is is is there maybe a an evolution that's happening with that test management
role in that yes maybe there's not a place for it in agile but maybe it's it's
(01:19):
transit transitioning into something else so what I want us to discuss and get
your opinions on I guess it goes without without saying,
or maybe it goes without saying, let's just create this baseline first.
Do we all agree that a test manager role is still very pertinent in organizations
which follow Waterfall?
(01:40):
Now, I would say I believe so.
I think in the traditional sense of how Waterfall approaches a project,
that role is still very pertinent as that overarching control from a longer-term
end-to-end perspective is needed.
I do concur, particularly when you look at the activities which happen in a Waterfall project.
(02:03):
The testing lifecycle, reporting of defects, and
ensuring that all performance and non-performance aspects are looked at is the
role of the traditional test manager to ensure that all those activities are
performed and that the information is given back to business in terms of how
(02:23):
all the testing activities would have gone.
So yes, I do agree in a waterfall setup, the test manager role is still very relevant.
Same here.
I think I beg to differ. I think a test manager role is applicable in waterfall as well as in agile.
(02:44):
Because if you have testing in agile, then you will still need test management
processes to be in place.
So that is my take. Okay, well, we'll debate that in a second.
So if we think about, sorry, go for it.
No, I just wanted to add to, okay, so not just to come back to Matthew and Jan's comment.
(03:09):
I'm just thinking, I said same here, but I mean, I just want to say why I think
in a lot of the times in the old way, not the old way, but the waterfall,
the test manager is almost that gatekeeper or the glue between what happens before.
The testers are generally a lot more disconnected from what happens beforehand.
I know it's not always supposed to be like that, but in a traditional
(03:30):
way that was more like that obviously in agile it's more they
should be involved everywhere through the sdlc but yeah i
guess in the traditional test management role there was there was a lot of planning
monitoring i guess control of the testing process resource allocation risk management
but with with agile there's more of an emphasis on cross-functional teams,
(03:54):
I guess, shared responsibility,
continuous testing, and to some degree, there's a shift away from,
I guess, that command and control style to a more collaborative advisory role
for test managers in an Agile context,
if that role still has a place within Agile.
(04:14):
So if we think about the traditional activities that the test manager,
I guess, fulfilled filled in a waterfall type of setup, so that planning, resource allocation.
Reporting, risk management, et cetera, where do we feel that responsibility
sits within Agile and Agile teams?
I think you make some good points, which some of them I disagree with.
(04:39):
I do, where Mamatla came in and said, well, there's still a role.
I think there's still a need for someone to realistically look at the test organization
and the effort of testing within an organization.
I agree with you that the closeness of the test manager to the team and especially
the agile team isn't there anymore necessarily.
(05:00):
But there's still a big need for a person or group of people to create governance
and monitor how testing is faring within the organization.
Especially because, as you said, there's autonomy in teams, and testers are
sitting in cross-functional teams, and quality is the responsibility of that team.
(05:22):
We often find that organizations go into a little bit of a Wild West style in a.
Actually doing testing. Now, I feel there's still a role for someone to govern
that a little bit and guide how testing should be done, and then also monitor
that testing is being done in the right way within those teams.
Yeah, I agree with you. And I think that overarching role is super important,
(05:45):
especially if you have many pods or different teams.
And the thing is, in the pure Agile way, the assumption is that everybody in
the team are subject experts in the field, and they're all mature.
But the reality is many times there's a tester or multiple testers in an agile
team and they need guidance.
And it's not necessarily even on a governance layer, it's leadership or guidance
(06:08):
that they need specific to the project or the product that they're supporting.
And if there's no lead or a manager in that space, that sort of falls down to
the scrum master who's not an expert in testing.
So I think there's definitely, I think a lot of those responsibilities that
used to be a test manager falls now filters down to a test lead perhaps in a space.
(06:30):
And I think that's a key role.
So maybe the modern test manager of today is more of a test lead kind of title,
possibly, with the test manager being more that overarching governance layer
that hovers across multiple teams.
So although we're saying that there's a governance layer required,
and I think we probably all agree because I can see nodding heads,
(06:50):
that that governance layer is required, it's not necessarily in the guise of a test manager, right?
So if we think about the traditional test manager and all of those responsibilities
that that person had, I think a lot of that has now been brought into the Agile team.
So a lot of those activities are getting picked up by the team as a collective responsibilities.
(07:15):
So are we saying that, and Stefan and Jan, And actually, Mamatla,
you all said there is still a role for a test manager, but I think what I'm
hearing is it's not the traditional test manager.
It's maybe not even that job title. It's maybe some of those activities.
But not all of them, is that fair to say? Yeah, that's my view at least.
(07:37):
I would say that traditional test manager role has split, and Stefan puts it
nicely to say a lot of those activities are now the testing lead person in the
team, whatever that role title is.
But then the other half of that test manager, and I've seen a lot of organizations
then talk about the head of quality, head of quality assurance,
head of quality engineering, that then fills that governance role.
(07:58):
So the test manager is split into two. Two, if you go downwards,
it's that test lead or the person responsible for testing.
If you go upwards, it's the more overarching responsibility,
almost like an enterprise test manager used to be in the past,
that falls governance and quality gates and filters that through.
Leon, I personally believe the traditional or conventional test manager role
(08:20):
was mainly more focused on resources, budget, and also management of defects and delivery itself.
But if you look at the modern way in an Agile kind of setup,
team management, the team members are managed within their squads.
In terms of budgeting, you see that the project manager or scrum masters,
(08:42):
they start coming in to help with that.
So you realize that looking at now, what really does the test manager do?
Is it just defect management?
In the truest sense of Agile, defects are not supposed to be managed separately.
They're supposed to be managed within the sprints.
Pick them, test them, fix them. There's no need for those defect triages because
(09:03):
we are assuming everything's being dealt with right there and there as we pick it.
So in my view, the conventional test manager is slowly fading away and might
lose value because managing a team, a team lead can do it, a QA lead can do
it, or an automation lead can do it.
Performance testing, managing that, a QA lead can do the same.
(09:26):
So that then brings a question to say, what is the test manager going to do?
Okay, so I think what Johan said, the test manager role, playing that overarching role,
because if you leave test management to automation test lead,
(09:47):
who knows nothing about performance testing, that's still not going to help.
We still need that role that will look at coordinate activities for functional
automation, performance, even security.
So for me, I think that role is still relevant as long as we have different
testing types, as long as we have different testing levels as well as cycles.
(10:16):
Yeah, I think I'd like to ask a question to you guys.
I mean, from big corporates, a lot of the time in the historic days,
there used to be a lot of test managers.
Now, if you look at saying a test manager now becomes more of an overarching
governance layer, sometimes it feels like there's almost too many test managers left now.
(10:37):
That's not a job that needs to be done by 20 test managers.
So I'd like to hear your opinions maybe of what you've seen,
what roles have test managers typically morphed into?
Because from the clients that I've seen on big corporates, they've moved into
more almost like a program level kind of role where they almost manage resources
and help to assign sign them between projects.
It's almost like a bit of a project manager kind of role and then sort of dive
(11:00):
into certain projects maybe to help out where there's fires burning and then
they move out again. It's more of a hybrid role.
So it'll be interesting to hear what you've seen where test managers have moved
into after test managers have now become sort of a historic name that nobody wants to use anymore.
Yeah, great question. Give you some examples of what I've recently seen at clients
(11:21):
and conversations I've had with the community is that I agree with you.
We are sitting with a lot of test managers and they can only be one or two that's
the head of quality for an organization.
So once that spot is filled, you sit with this layer of senior people.
Now, to your previous point, what I've seen organizations do is to make those
quality engineering leads or quality assurance leads in that space.
(11:44):
So the title has changed slightly and the scope is still pretty much the same,
right? But they don't necessarily manage budget and people, to your point.
They manage the test activities. And their responsibility is to implement what
the governance layer asks of them and monitor that.
So they still kind of have the same scope, the management of the people and the budget part of it.
(12:11):
And one of their main responsibilities now is to implement that governance and
report on that governance.
So they manage that. that what we have seen and what I want to caution.
What I want to raise a caution to is that companies got rid of that level completely,
and let testers just be in the teams, right?
Without leadership, and Stephanie made a good point around that leadership and
(12:33):
guidance, without that guidance.
And then they slowly started turning around to say, well, testing isn't working
in my organization, but it's because that layer is completely gone.
So we're not saying, I'm not saying get rid of that layer completely,
saying move that layer closer to the cross-functional agile team and support the testers in there.
And work with the governance person up top to start implementing some of those
(12:54):
things so that the tester is still not left on his or her own devices.
There's still guidance, but it's guided guidance from a governance perspective
and then help them to implement that.
So the tester has a home, as a developer would.
We still sit with development leads and development managers.
We can't get rid of that from a testing perspective completely.
It's just, as I said, it's just splitting that role a little bit and defining
(13:16):
what those people would do.
Stefan, I've got a few colleagues, I think about five of them, who were test managers.
So what happened to them is their employer gave them options to say,
this role is being phased away.
You've got an option either to look for a job somewhere or you have to upskill
yourself to become a QA lead.
(13:38):
So what they then did was to just go through a certain program where they were
taught some technical skills and they had to retake some technical exams to
prove that they are a bit technical enough to become QA leads.
So they still continue with the test manager functions, but now they added a
little bit more on the technical side, particularly automation.
(14:01):
So that is what some organizations are doing. They keep maintaining the people,
but they have to upskill them to become QA leads and to be more relevant in agile setups. Okay.
So when we say QA leads, are we talking here about having a QA lead in every
squad or in every scrum team and taking on some of the responsibilities of the
(14:25):
traditional test manager?
Because then my question will be, well, what about those organizations who can't
afford to have a QA lead in every team or potentially goes for juniors and intermediates
as cross-functional team members?
So what happens in those organizations?
(14:45):
I guess in the example where you don't have a test manager, you work on the
assumption that the QA leads are picking up those responsibilities,
but the organization doesn't necessarily have the budget to have QA leads in every team.
I don't think what I'm saying is QA lead per cross-functional team.
(15:06):
I think it's more QA lead per stream or project.
Project um so on a broader scale if you
i think it's overkill having a qa lead in every scrum
team i think that's just from a cost and overhead perspective
it's not worth it but per program or per
stream or per piece of work absolutely per project absolutely that's that's
(15:26):
where that qa lead looks after a couple of scrum teams in in that sense matthew
brought up brought up an interesting point which i just want to go back to briefly
sorry so i see your hand but it was interesting thing to hear,
and I don't necessarily disagree,
that you're saying that test managers now need to upskill to become leads, right?
And I know what you mean, but I just want you to explore that a little bit further
(15:48):
as well, because it's an interesting statement.
Right. So what I mean by that is the traditional test managers are purely non-technical.
They don't get involved in any automation.
And if there are performance testing issues,
they are not capable of chipping in, assuming maybe
one of their two members is not available so what
(16:11):
the transition needed them
to do was to be able to at least pick or
to understand to read or to review source code remember
as a lead there may be some structures you
may have so your senior automation engineers but at
some point you may need to authorize or approve code majors
you need to have an understanding of what are you doing there are pull requests
(16:33):
that are coming you need to to be able to to have a view or a say to identify
code quality issues the traditional test manager will not have a say in code
quality beat on automation uh beat on performance testing all they do is just
to aggregate information,
present it at high level but now
the qa lead you are supposed to be able to interpret what is happening on the
(16:56):
lines of code even if you are not required to write but understand it interpret
it and explain to others so that's that's what I meant there to say they have
to be a little bit more hands-on as much as they are not required to be doing
that on a day-to-day basis,
Okay, so Matt, if we have a test manager, that is very technical,
maybe coming from an automation background or a performance engineering background,
(17:22):
because we have some test managers who were previously performance engineers.
So in that scenario, do you still upskill them?
Do you still, if we downgrade, okay, we say upskilling them from being managers
to leads. So if you were a manager and you already had the technical skills, then what?
(17:43):
Are you saying you're going to change the role still just to say,
OK, like you still have the skills, but we're just going to change your role
now from test manager to QA lead?
Yeah. So it's more than just changing the title.
It's all about the capabilities of the respective person.
So if the person, like you rightly said,
(18:05):
has previous performance testing experience or was a previous automation engineer
and happened to fall into that title, in my view, there is no need for any further assessment.
If the person is capable, it will just be a matter of the organization aligning
their roles and responsibilities depending on their strategy.
(18:25):
So are you saying there's still a need for a test manager if a test manager
has the technical capabilities?
We're just going to change it to a QA lead role because the issue right now,
we're basing it on lack of technical skills.
So I'm saying if we already have a manager with technical skills,
then you agree that we still need a test manager role, be it in agile or waterfall management.
(18:51):
Yeah, so basically, in my view, it may be a need to just change the title as
long as that person has technical capabilities, whether we call him a lead or a test manager.
All we need for one in an agile setup is someone with a bit of technical capabilities
so that they can support the team better.
So in this case, if the person is technical, we may just need to change the
(19:15):
title. That's how I would take it.
I want to give my view on what Mamatla has asked. So I think,
as we said before, it's a bit more than just the technical skills.
Like I said, we're splitting that role. And Matt's example was,
if you're going to split the role and you want to continue to play a similar
role, then you want to be that lead.
And I think there's a big difference between, and that's where the word manager and lead.
(19:38):
So the manager was managing people, budget, while the lead doesn't do that.
The lead leads the testing effort by implementing governance.
So I think if you have the technical skills, that's one part of the conversation.
But the second part of the conversation is, do you have the ability to lead
the test effort in a team versus managing resources and budgets and things like that?
(20:00):
Except now if you go to that governance layer, the aid of quality type of thing.
So I think it's more than just the technical part.
I just wanted to maybe put a different spin on it. I understand the logic of
saying a test manager should possibly become a test lead and then be entrenched
within a specific project.
Portfolio or a product or or a project perhaps
(20:22):
i think there's an opportunity for test managers to fill the role of a maybe
the term should be test coach you and you mentioned earlier about implementing
the governance layer on the ground level so i think there's some maybe there's
opportunity for them not to be stuck get stuck into one specific area but actually hover across.
Move in assist the team get them up
(20:43):
to a certain maturity level and then move out the plan is not to become entrenched
in a product forever in a day it's sort of say saying i'm coming in i'm assessing
your maturity of testing i'm helping you overcome your problems get you to a
certain level give you the tools you need and then i'm moving out because in
pure agile we want you to be self,
self-managed i mean one of the best scrum masters i ever
(21:04):
met that was my first project when i
was in scrum he moved in he helped us he was
like doing everything and then he said my role
is now to start moving into the shadows and i will be speaking less
and less and just watching and helping until you actually don't
need me anymore and then i'm actually gone because now you're self-sufficient and
i think in a way that's sort of a possible approach that
(21:25):
test managers can also take and i think that's an exciting challenge it's because
there's a lot of insight that test managers bring it's not just technical things
i think they have a layer of almost let's say testing wisdom that they bring
i think there's a lot that can add to hovering across different different products
rather than just getting stuck into one if they were to change their role.
You almost took the words out of my mouth because what I wanted to say is it's
(21:47):
almost like that test lead plays a sort of servant leadership role within that program of testing.
So it's advisory and how can I help you? How can I make you better as a tester?
How can I help you achieve more in this project?
What can I do to enable you to hit your goals in terms of a sprint or a a project.
(22:10):
So I completely agree with that.
I've listened to everyone's opinion and,
It's almost a bit silly in that we have test managers at the moment.
So let's take the example that Jan made in terms of having different programs
of work and potentially having a test lead sitting at the top of that program
of work or that project and sort of playing that governance champion role.
(22:35):
Aren't we just playing with job titles here?
Is that not essentially just, well, we're just renaming a test manager to a
test lead now? And yes, the responsibilities are slightly different.
And yes, you don't control the resourcing anymore. You don't control the budgeting.
But is it just semantics here?
I don't think so. If you look at the traditional test manager today,
(23:01):
and bar the outliers, so I get that, right?
But if you look at a traditional test manager today, they are typically people
who aren't as technically savvy as a technical automation person will be or
performance person would be.
So the historic test manager is someone that really knows testing very well,
knows the test process very well, but it's not as technical to actually lead,
(23:25):
to your example, lead and come in and help in the team itself.
So I think it's definitely more than that. Yes, if the test manager is that
technical, then I suppose in that scenario it is.
But the average test manager that we see in the market today,
at least the ones I deal with, and I don't want to generalize too much,
are the very senior test professionals who have been in the testing world for
(23:48):
a very long time, but have lost the technical ability a little bit.
They can talk about it, but they can't serve on that level to actually help you within the team.
So I do think, though, it is a little bit different.
Okay. So if we go with this notion of having these leads, working within the
(24:08):
different programs and platforms,
et cetera, the challenge is that in the traditional sense, a test manager kind
of owned the governance, owned the resourcing, owned the budget,
and therefore had line responsibility for all of the testers.
So you could more than just influence.
Now what we're seeing is the squad or the scrum team, et cetera,
(24:33):
probably report to either a scrum master or someone else, not necessarily someone
who's actually trying to enforce that governance layer.
So you could get into a situation where you have that governance layer in place
and you want to enforce it, but your whole test team is actually reporting to someone else.
So are they realistically going to listen to you? And if they don't, kind of so what?
(24:57):
Because teams work independently and they work in the way that that fits that team.
So I guess that's a natural challenge of this and a consequence of this where
I guess now you're having to influence –.
As opposed to be able to direct and command. So how do you get around that problem?
(25:21):
Leon, I think one of the, or maybe the reason why I strongly believe that QA
leads is the way to go to close all these gaps, which you mentioned,
is because at one point I was also a QA lead.
So the reason why a QA lead helps to reduce issues where maybe they don't believe
(25:42):
their lead knows is because a QA lead would have done most of those things.
I myself was responsible for
testing the processes. I knew the testing processes. I knew the systems.
I had the domain knowledge. I had the IP.
I also knew the automation frameworks. I knew the performance testing.
So literally, it was a way of me to share the knowledge that I had with the team.
(26:05):
So I wasn't a QA lead because I was getting tired or I wasn't competent enough.
It's because I had so much domain knowledge and it was easier for me to share
with the rest of the team.
So to circumvent the issue where you said, maybe the testers might not really
feel like why should they report to the test manager when on a day-to-day basis,
they're busy reporting to the scrum masters.
(26:27):
Basically, a QA lead should be knowledgeable in terms of the system, the processes.
Yes, there's the governance layer, which is also critical, but technically, it's
Product-wise and system, I think that is also what is very key.
That's where there is so much value in a QA lead.
Somebody who has done it, not only leading, but he has been through the trenches
(26:49):
and possibly gone up the ranks. That's my contribution.
I think we are in the same boat as when we started with Agile.
Because remember, when companies introduced a scrum, they said a role called
a test that does not exist.
In scrum. Everybody is a developer.
(27:10):
So are we now starting the same debate where we have to convince people to say
like, yes, in agile, you don't have a role called a tester, but you still need testing.
So I think this is where we are with this test manager role as well.
I just want to comment back on Leon's question about that command versus now advisory.
(27:33):
I think as a tester, although you don't really necessarily report into the governance team,
I think one leg should always be in there and know that you've got that backup
and you can report any fluctuations or if your team goes all vigilante and doesn't
really conform to what your company has bought into,
(27:54):
then you can report it almost and ask for guidance.
But I think another strong influence in the team is the Scrum Master.
So I think as a governance team, they should be very close to the scrum masters
and get the scrum masters buy into the governance layer because they are the
ones that assign allocation per sprint to different activities.
They are the ones that should be lobbying to say, guys, we should allocate sufficient
(28:16):
time for testing as a subtask for each user story.
Did we allocate enough time for test automation, all those things.
I think your scrum master is
almost a key person. If you have them buying into your governance layer,
then a lot of the fights have already been won because they're lobbying internally
for your team, as long as together with the testing community or the testing people within a team.
(28:39):
Beyond to your question around reporting lines, I think it's something I'm seeing
more and more, and the traditional test managers and head of test organizations
are raising that more and more. is it's around responsibility and accountability.
Now, what we are seeing in these cross-functional teams and squads are they
(29:00):
take responsibility for the testing and the leaders and the scrum master,
for example, happy to take responsibility for it until something goes wrong.
And then they go to the head of quality and say, okay, you are accountable for quality.
What has happened? And then it creates quite a dynamic in organization to say,
well, I put in governance, but they don't report to me. so I can't really enforce that governance.
(29:23):
And I think that's maybe where the test lead plays a bigger role and structuring
your test organization the right way.
And again, I'm taking it back to the development effort.
A development manager puts down how you do development, the coding standards.
The reviewing standards, and that whole process.
And similarly, the developers adhere to that process, and the development manager
(29:45):
is accountable to make sure that it happens.
What has happened when testers actually move now into these cross-functional
scrum teams on squads is that that role for the test organization went away.
We created a test manager or head of quality that oversees this and from accountability
perspective, but not necessarily from a responsibility perspective.
(30:07):
And then it creates that weird dynamic where it's all fine until something isn't,
and then who is then accountable for that?
So I do think that role, and that's what I'm seeing now in the tasting community
as well, is tasters are starting to dotted line report back into this industry.
Historic test manager that's now the head of quality because they are actually accountable,
(30:31):
and by doing that the tester can now push back harder
to say these are the standards that we need to follow i agree
scrum master or product owner or dev manager that you want things done in a
certain way but my manager that that i'm accountable to now holds me accountable
to do things in the right way i'll still from responsibility perspective do
(30:51):
what i need to do but from accountability perspective i want things done in a certain way.
In summary, then, we feel that there's a need for a test manager,
albeit in the guise of maybe a QA lead within Agile.
I think it sounds like predominantly that's what we're saying.
Is there ever still a need in an Agile setup, maybe at an enterprise level,
(31:17):
maybe a massive organization following Agile?
Is there still if you think about hierarchies within testing is there still
a need for a traditional test manager within agile anywhere or do we feel that
that qa lead will pick up most of those if not all of those responsibilities
which aren't already i guess picked up by the team.
(31:41):
Plus person responsible governance governance yeah so both of if both of those
boxes are ticked I don't think a test manager is needed in traditional scenes in the new Agile world.
So I would agree with that statement.
I concur. In Agile setup, traditional test manager would be irrelevant.
(32:01):
And yes, I have a very strong opinion that QA lead is the way to go in Agile setup.
Okay. So the test managers who do not want to go down the technical route,
they either don't have the ability or they just don't want to.
In a similar vein that you have manual tests that don't want to necessarily
become automation engineers.
So those test managers who do not want to become leads, who do not want to go
(32:25):
down that technical upskilling route, because let's be realistic as well.
Probably most test managers are people with 15, 20 years worth of experience.
And what you're now asking them is to totally reskill. Is there still a place
within testing for those test managers who do not want to go down the QA lead role.
We did discuss earlier potentially transitioning into a program type manager
(32:50):
or a project type manager.
Is that the only avenues available to them?
Release management is also one of them because remember partly a test manager
approves the quality gates at the different stages of a release.
So that's another role that they can transition into maybe test.
(33:12):
And a release management role. Yeah, I agree with that. That's a good point.
And similarly, scrum master, I've seen taste managers going to scrum master, product owner.
So those kind of roles, depending on your technical ability from our potential perspective.
Yeah, so there's definitely still a place for you as a taste manager,
but I have seen that the market is slowly being flooded by taste managers looking
(33:38):
for work because of what we just discussed.
And it's making that shift into either adjacent to the testing team or then
up, as we discussed, or down into a lead position.
Yeah, and I think you also literally took words out of my mouth.
Some of the test managers are becoming product owners, but it also depends to
(33:58):
what extent they were involved with the detail and to what extent can they be
subject matter experts within the organizations. Yes.
So that's one route which other test managers are taking.
And the other sad reality is, unfortunately, if they don't transform,
their careers are becoming limited more and more.
(34:19):
And it's a sad reality. I've seen it.
I think in the test managers that have been there for a long time in a company,
I think they won't struggle to find a different position because they have so
much knowledge of different products and systems.
I think if they want to jump ship to another company, it might be a little bit
trickier because then they come in as a pure test manager with no experience with a new company.
(34:41):
I think that's where the tricky bit comes in. So unless there's upskilling and
willingness to, shall I say, adapt to the times and the roles,
then the avenues that that they might want to go in becomes less opportunities for them.
Amatla? Yeah, so I think we just need to be clear that what we are saying,
we're not saying the responsibilities of a test manager or the tasks of a test manager will fall away.
(35:09):
So those test activities that needed to be completed within the software development
lifecycle will still be in place, but they will be fulfilled by a different role.
So like the same, my statement earlier where I said in Agile,
they say we don't need testers, but we still need testing.
(35:30):
So it's the same with the test manager responsibilities.
Okay, excellent. Okay, I think we're going to wrap it up there.
So thank you very much for your opinions. It was an interesting discussion.
Appreciate it. And we'll see you again in a week or two.
Thank you. thank you everyone thanks everybody this has been an episode of testing
(35:53):
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