Software Testing Unleashed - QA, DevEx & Quality Engineering

Testing Needs Leaders and Not Just Testers - Kari Kakkonen

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"I think there is not enough leadership in testing." - Kari Kakkonen

In this episode, I talk to Kari Kakkonen about his Act 2 Lead model and why testing leadership is often missing in software testing. We unpack the reality that while grassroots testing within teams works well, the higher levels of organizations often lack a real understanding and leadership around quality. Kari lays out his model, a memorable eight-letter heuristic, as both a guide and a checklist for leaders at any level. It made me reflect on how companies approach testing - sometimes leaving it solely to autonomous teams but missing the big picture. I found myself wondering: is strong leadership the missing link for better quality software?

Kari Kakkonen has worked in software testing for almost 30 years. He is the Service Owner of Customer Expertise Development at Gofore, the author of Dragons Out software testing book and co-author of ACT 2 LEAD Software Testing Leadership Handbook. He’s won awards, e.g. 2021 EuroSTAR Testing Excellence Award. He works mostly with agile testing, lean, test automation, DevOps and AI. He’s active in ISTQB,

TMMi and FiSTB.

Highlights:

  • Testing leadership is missing at the senior level in most companies: management knows testing must happen but cannot explain what it actually involves, unlike their understanding of development or architecture.
  • The ACT2LEAD model structures testing leadership into eight areas: add testing to everything, context, transparency, automation and humans, learning, enable quality culture, adapt to risks, and diversity.
  • Enabling a quality culture (the E in ACT2LEAD) requires senior leaders to speak about testing and quality constantly, not delegate responsibility entirely to development teams.
  • Large organizations need a dedicated testing leader, such as a head of testing, to set minimum standards across teams, because autonomous teams each handling their own testing in different ways is not sufficient at scale.
  • Good testing requires diversity in techniques, people, approaches, and environments, because no single tool or method covers all the angles a complex software product demands.
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    Software Testing Unleashed - QA, DevEx & Quality EngineeringBy Richard Seidl | Software Development & Testing Expert