Transfer the right knowledge
Bringing on a new QA partner is just like bringing on a new
employee: in order for them to do their very best work, they need to know
everything they can about the company, the product, the culture, and the
existing workflow processes. Though partners that have been in the industry for
a while will know the ropes and can get up to speed quickly, you should still
be prepared to share knowledge, documentation, and other learnings about your
product and any existing testing infrastructure.
Here's a quick guide that will help you successfully onboard
your new software testing company:
Your QA partner needs clear, actionable project requirements
before they take any action related to testing. Project requirements help
engineers formulate a thorough and effective test plan, so you'll need to
specify the type of testing required (in detail), your technical requirements
(environment, language, platforms, etc.), and any caveats that you feel the
team needs to know.
Just as important as the initial requirements is your
availability at this early stage in onboarding. Make sure you are around to
answer any clarifying questions your engineers have about the requirements
list.
If your software testing company is staffed with plenty of
domain experts, skip this step. But if not, you'll need to make sure that you
pass on plenty of knowledge about your product and its place within the market
-- especially if you work within the financial, healthcare, or retail space,
where huge amounts of sensitive user data consistently pass through your
product. Domain experts will have a good feel for the nuances of your product
based on years of previous experience, and they'll uncover weak spots that are
easily missed by dev teams and those QA engineers who may be totally competent,
but just not as experienced in the domain.
The other benefit of contracting with a company rich in
domain expertise is improved communication. Experienced QA engineers will be
able to relay bugs to stakeholders using the correct terminology, and explain
how the issue affects other processes within your product: what it breaks, and
how it can be fixed.
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