top 10 challenges testers face at workplace and how to overcome them

8/18/2019 Top 10 Challenges Testers Face at Workplace and How to Overcome Them

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Top 10 Challenges Testers Face at Workplaceand How to Overcome Them

Challenges are normal. It is when you look at them as opportunities, a gold mineand as obstacles, a land mine. I have had my share of ‘opportunities’ over the

years in the IT industry.

Some came with the role I was playing, some general. This is my attempt to

record them and to reach out to the community to see if any of those resonate

with you and maybe, in a small capacity help you and let you know that you are

not alone.

Here’s my top 10 list:

Top 10 Challenges A Testers Face At Work lace

!1" Company’s c#lt#re:

This is the honorary rst item on the list because being in the IT services industry

had me hopping between multiple clients, teams, locations, and companies. I

loved being part of some teams and some, well, I wouldn’t repeat the

e!perience.

• " team that I worked for started at # am. "nother one insisted on working

until # pm.

• $ne made contractors enter the building through a di%erent door and another

that did not even believe in swipe card access.

• $ne made us leave all mobile devices with memory, &luetooth or any other

connectivity outside while another company played wonderful music at the

workplace all day.• Some companies follow a strict hierarchy with their C'$’s attaining celebrity

status and another that has no cubicles and everyone was e(ual.

)hat I reali*ed over time is that there is no one right or wrong way+ it is ust their

way. -iven time, we will always adapt to the circumstances, but if you don’t after

giving it a fair chance, nd the e!it nearest to you.

!$" %i&erent Time 'ones:


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o you stay at the o/ce or up at home in front of the laptop at 00 12 or 3 "m

trying to catch up with your teams that are geographically distributed4 This is all

too familiar, isn’t it4

There is really no antidote to this problem 52ay be, co%ee46 7se clocks that show

you the e!act time at di%erent locations 5world clock on your smartphone works

too6, perfect communication protocols in a way that there need not be meetings

for issues resolved over email and practice time8*one conscious scheduling to

avoid this problem to a maor e!tent.

!(" Cross)c#lt#ral di&erences:

I have worked in both India and the 7S. "lthough corporate culture is fairly non8

ethnic, where we are from impacts our behavior and understanding.

9or e!ample: ;apid

development cycles only made this more intense.


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$vertime, I have learnt to stay rm on my decision that the software isn’t ready

to test and to reect the build. I no longer look for a silver lining when there isn’t

one.

Other Challenges

!7" eople)8#irks:

id you ever have a developer bang the conference room table as soon as you

e!plained a defect4 es, that happened to me. I later came to know

that it was his form of e!pression and not aggravation.

I also had a team member who at rst came o% as uncooperative and rude but

was really ust shy. This person would hardly say a few words or meet the eye

when asked for status updates. I was very close to putting a negative

performance review and escalating had I not reali*ed that the same details can

easily and elaborately received from him through email. It is the one8on8one

conversation that he wasn’t comfortable with.

'veryone is di%erent and deserves a benet of doubt. on’t be too (uick to udge

and respect boundaries.

!9" ack o3 3eedack loop:

Sometimes you go days at an end working on and obsessing over a deliverable

only to nd out at that it wasn’t supposed to this way.

$r you work from a remote location with your team located elsewhere that you

feel isolated and have no one to bounce your ideas o% of.

$r you receive feedback that is not e!actly helpful. Det’s say you created a

process document and they said it was good. ou don’t see the process

document published or put to use and you are left wondering what happened to

it. So, the feedback ‘good’ did not do any good here and is almost a non8

feedback.


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Seek honest feedback and create a community to discuss your ideas. Bot often

the easiest to do, but without the positive reinforcement that this step provides

you are left demotivated.

!10" reconceived notions:

)ell, we know there are many preudices in the workplace around gender,

nationality etc. I am not going to go into specics here but unless we start

looking at the world as a global village and everyone e(ual, the world, and the

workplace both become to!ic.

top 10 challenges testers face at workplace and how to overcome them

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