Seite - 229 - in The Future of Software Quality Assurance

Next-Generation Software Testers: BroadenorSpecialize! Erik vanVeenendaal Abstract Software has become immensely important for today’s society. Despite many quality initiatives, the IT-industry is still far from being able to deliver zero-defect software. In recent years the way software is being developed has changed dramatically in most world regions. In addition to the rapid and dynamic changes currently in the software development arena, there is an increased growth in innovation, new technologies, and expansion of IT throughout most industries. There has been a large shift towards adopting an Agile and/or DevOps way of working. Agile typically provides benefits such as the ability to better manage changing priorities, improved project status visibility, increased team productivity and better delivery predictability. However, many organization are struggling with Agile and scaling Agile, and it has become apparent that moving towards Agile doesnot automaticallyalso guarantee improvedsoftware quality.Testing, although in Agile organized differently compared to traditional organizations, is still and will remain an important part of software development. This is not only due to the importance of software in today’s society, but also due to the many (technical) challenges that ITprojectare facing,e.g., increasingcomplexity,newtechnologies, systems-of-systems, variety of devices and OS’s and security vulnerabilities. What doesall of this mean for the software tester, and to the knowledgeand skill set that is expected of a tester? This chapter will look in detail at the knowledge and skill set required for a tester to add value and survive in the rapidly changing IT world. Twooptionswillbe providedto the tester: • Broadenyourskill set andbecomeaso-calledT-shaped tester. • Choosea test specialization,butchoose thiswithgreatcareandavision towards the future. Keywords Software testing · Softwarequality · Software tester · Software testingskills E.van Veenendaal TMMiFoundation, Dublin, Ireland ©The Author(s) 2020 S.Goericke (ed.), The Future of Software QualityAssurance, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-29509-7_18 229