Page - 42 - in The Future of Software Quality Assurance

42 P.Gerrard not do. Testers (whether they use tools or not) are not well briefed in the case for automationor thestrategies for successful tool implementation. Once Highly Respected Skillset/Mindset no Longer Valued The Year 2000 threatcausedmanycompanies to take testingseriouslyand therewasabriefperiod when testers were more highly respected. But when Agile appeared on the scene and was widely adopted, the role of testers was badly or not defined. They were expected to just ‘get on with it’. Agile, at the start at least, was mostly driven as a developer initiativewith little thought forhow requirementsand testing were done. After15years, testershavea muchbetter ideaof their role inAgile.Unfortunately, the next big thing is Continuous Delivery. The mantra is that testing, of whatever type, should be automated.Once again, testers are underpressure to re-define their roleand/orgetoutof theproject. Technology Changing at Unprecedented Rate There’s little doubt that test approaches have not kept pace with the changing technology. Although test execution tools appear within a year or two of new user interface technologies, the new risks, modelling approach and test management methods emerge very slowly.Tester skills seemtobetied to technologies.Skills shouldbeindependentof technology,enabling testers to test anything. 2.2 TheDrive toDigital Across the business world, there is a revolution in the way that IT is being specified, developed, implemented and used. There is lots of hype around the whole ‘Digital Transformation’ phenomena. Digital Transformation programs are affecting business across all industry and government sectors. There is no doubt that it also affectspeople in theirdaily lives. Digital includes traditional ITbut includes: • Mobileanything • The InternetofThings • Autonomousvehicles • Ourhome,workplace,publicandprivatespaces • Robots (physical) • Bots (software) • Artificial Intelligence,MachineLearning,DeepLearning • Andso on . . . Digital visionariespromisea lot: • No humanintervention inyoursystems (AutonomousBusinessModels) • Marketingmessagescreated, sent, followedupandchangedalmost instantly • Full rangeof data fromthesmallest locale to global in all media formatsat your disposal