Professional testers and test managers are feeling the pressures of low-cost competition and tools that claim to replace them through automation. So, how can test teams add more value to their projects and organization? In a recent survey of executives and testers, Mike Kelly and Jeanette Thebeau found major disconnects between what executives and testers believe are most important to the business. They explore new insights into the risks and concerns executives perceive and what you should do differently. In the survey, most testers believed that finding ways to cut operational costs was a low priority test objective, but executives listed operational cost reduction as a high value testing activity. On the flip side, testers believed that regulatory compliance was a high priority, while most executives reported compliance testing was a low priority. Join Mike and Jeanette to find new ways to help ensure the products you test solve the business problem, meet customer needs, reduce operational costs, scale easily as demand increases, and are built to quickly add new features over time.

1. K1
Keynote
10/2/2013 8:30:00 AM
"What Executives Value in
Testing"
Presented by:
Michael Kelly
Jeanette Thebeau
Brought to you by:
340 Corporate Way, Suite 300, Orange Park, FL 32073
888-268-8770 ∙ 904-278-0524 ∙ sqeinfo@sqe.com ∙ www.sqe.com

2. Michael Kelly
DeveloperTown
A partner at DeveloperTown, a venture development firm, Michael Kelly spends most of his time
working with teams to deliver ridiculously high quality solutions faster than they could without
rigorous testing practices. Michael regularly writes and speaks about topics on software testing,
and is a contributing author of two books, How to Reduce the Cost of Software Testing and 5
Minutes to Process Improvement Success.

3. Jeanette Thebeau
Ex2 Partners
Jeanette Thebeau is a veteran venture coach, product and brand strategist, and former CMO
with a broad range of experience. Jeanette has worked with numerous startups, as well as large
corporate brands—Brooks Sports, Disney, the Indiana Pacers, Coors Brewing Co., Pizza Hut,
and Taco Bell, among others.

4. 9/23/2013
WHAT EXECUTIVES VALUE
IN TESTING
Michael Kelly
Jeanette Thebeau
The Executives…
1

5. 9/23/2013
Founder: Build the
product and prove
the concept
CEO: Profitable,
stable, managed
growth
“Make the demo work.”
FOUNDER
“…understand that the limited
number of customers you have
will not be very concerned if they
run into a small bug here or
there.”
“If figuring out design is more
important than functionality […],
testing falls to the wayside. ”
2

6. 9/23/2013
Founders don’t hire testers.
CEO
“…more formalized testing with
documented scripts, test plans,
requirements etc. to comply
with audit regulations of our
customers.”
“Test driven development and
continuous integration. Load
testing, user experience testing,
formal user feedback process.”
3

7. 9/23/2013
“I didn't realize there's multiple
testing activities.”
- President and CEO
“Some want their products to be
tested well, some don't care that
much.”
- Test Lab
4

8. 9/23/2013
FIRE THEM ALL
REVIEW THIS TEST PLAN
5

9. 9/23/2013
Valuing Testers…
Seed Stage
developers do a lot of the testing
Growth Stage
testers start to show up, focus on pain points
– still in alignment
Established
organizational structure and disconnect from
founders/executive leadership and business
problems – pathologies emerge
6

10. 9/23/2013
“Don’t hire for pleasure; hire to kill pain.”
- 37Signals’ book Rework
Where we have alignment
7

11. 9/23/2013
What testers value
The Gaps…
8

12. 9/23/2013
Most testers ignore (or loosely pay attention
to) testing focused on controlling operations
costs. Executives think this testing activity is
important.
Executives largely don’t care about testing to
ensure that they are compliant with
regulations. Nearly half of testers feel this
testing is critical.
9

13. 9/23/2013
Executives want:
• fast and scalable
• solutions to business problems
• that don’t cost a lot to run or maintain
“All testing humanly possible on all
components of our software suite. […] Keep
me in a job…”
10

14. 9/23/2013
Bridging the gap…
Problem:
11

15. 9/23/2013
what’s at stake:
Problem:
12

16. 9/23/2013
shared language:
Opportunity:
13

17. 9/23/2013
operations:
Opportunity:
14

18. 9/23/2013
THE DARK SIDE
15

19. 9/23/2013
Facilitator:
16

20. 9/23/2013
Remember…
17

21. 9/23/2013
Questions?
18