I read a really interesting blog about software testers rotating through different roles to help increase their overall knowledge of the product they are testing. This type of rotation provides all sorts of benefits for both employer and employee. You can’t argue with the principal. However I believe the list of potential roles they suggest (e.g. customer support and product management) are far too narrow.
If you pair it back to basics the essential point of the software tester is to act as a customer advocate. In that I mean the software tester is expected to argue the case on behalf of the potential customer in terms of the quality level the customer expects and the functionality the customer needs or desires. To say that a software tester will benefit from working with the development team, is missing a major the point. If you want a software tester to get the maximum benefit from job rotation then get them to work in roles which help them understand the product from the customers perspective. By that I mean you must consider these roles for job rotation :
Support: this is the obvious candidate for job rotation. I’d suggest though that this is far to late is the development life cycle for it to really benefit the software tester. At this point the product has already been released and you’re playing catch up. You will be resolving issues and failures in requirements that have already been missed. You need to capture these issues and requirements at the front end of the product life cycle. For this reason I suggest these roles as the ones that would really benefit the software tester:
Beta testing: Again this is a little late in the product life cycle, although there is still scope to make changes before a release depending on the feedback from your beta customers. Having the test team manage, or contribute to, the beta program will put the software tester in direct contact with customer feedback before the product is formally released. However, I would still say that moving the software tester – to – customer interaction earlier in the product life cycle would provide far more benefits. For this reason I would suggest considering job rotation within the marketing and sales teams.
Marketing: Roll rotation within the Marketing team allows the tester to put forward the features of the product in more detail. So the marketing team get more product information and the tester gets to see what it is that the marketing team are pitching to potential customers.
Sales: Roll rotation within the Sales teams allows the tester to hear first hand what is important to the customer. The sales team get to demonstrate to potential customers just how committed the company is to delivering a quality product (which is always a strong selling point).
Building a relationship with the sales and marketing teams has benefits both for the test team and the sales/marketing teams. The sales team gets someone who knows the product inside out. As a tester you get the chance to see exactly what it is the sales/marketing teams think they can sell and feed that back into the product development cycle.
This isn’t conventional but if you want your software testers to understand the demands of your customers, and ultimately drive increased sales of your products, then you should make certain that your software testers understand your customers. And the only way your software testers will ever understand your customers inside and out is if they start interacting with your customers at the start of the product development life cycle. So get your software testers talking to your sales and marketing teams, now!