QA Professionals Speak Up!Results from our first annual QA professional's survey.In the inaugural issue of QA Insider, we explored the distinct challenges facing QA professionals — more features on every device, We also took the discussion "to the streets" in our first annual reader survey. Our goal? To provide benchmarks for where your company leads — or follows — what's happening in the industry. Some results might surprise you; but ultimately, we hope your peers' responses help you find ways to improve the quality of your contributions and your own job satisfaction. State of the union: automationWe were particularly interested in the current level of automation at organizations, reported as:
Although only 20% said they used commercially available tools, this group had a much higher level of automation — 70% compared with the 43% that was average for all participants. This would suggest that once a company becomes invested in automation tools, the benefits and ease of use lend themselves to a greater commitment to developing an automation infrastructure. Everybody wanted more automation. 85% of participants said that they had a backlog of test cases that needed to be automated — but they just couldn't get to them. Emerging trendsWhen asked to rank their most challenging tasks, it fell in this order: 
Open-ended responses further support these beliefs with consistent agreements that:
Participant profileResponses to our survey came from a mix of QA Managers, Test Automation Engineers, Test Developers and Software Developers. They all shared responsibility for the quality of networking equipment. Their test interfaces included:
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QA SHOP TALK: CUSTOMER SUCCESS: THE BUG CATCHER: 
Is there a question or topic you'd like to see us cover in QA Insider? Let us know and we'll have our writers and contributors check it out! Suggestions should be emailed to dgehringer@fnfr.com. Don't forget to leave your name, title and company name so we can share the credit! |
frequent software updates and shorter release cycles — and how commercial test automation tools for high-tech equipment are finally available to testers.
