Page - 213 - in The Future of Software Quality Assurance

Subconscious Requirements: The Fright of Every Tester 213 Fig. 2 The Cynefin framework Althoughinitially intendedfordecision-making,itcanalsobeusedtocategorize ITprojectswithrespect to thelevelofuncertaintythat theymustdealwith(ignoring “disordered,”a temporarystate that changes intoanotherafter clarification): • ObviousprojectsdevelopITsystems thatoffersupport forclear, straightforward business processes, like order processing or accounting. Everything relevant to thisdevelopment isknowninadvance(“knownknowns”), so evensubconscious requirements will be documented in the specifications. In these projects, devel- opersand testerscaneasily relyonbestpractices. • Complicated projects are, as the name implies, a bit more complicated. They often relate to the integration of different business processes, for instance, the development of ERP systems. There, developers and testers may be confronted with unexpected and subconscious requirements that are not present in the specifications. However, the type of requirements itself is known (“known unknowns”), so with a sufficient amount of domain knowledge testers will be able to dealwith thembychoosingfromexistinggoodpractices. • Complex projects are projects that develop IT systems for innovation, with well-known examples like Spotify and Uber. Here, developers and testers face “unknown unknowns.” Cause and effect can only be deduced in retrospect, and therearenorightanswersupfront.Developmentteamswillhavetodeveloptheir own emergentpractices to deal with the inherentuncertainties.DesignThinking offersclues tofind the inevitablymissingsubconsciousrequirements.