Hello all,
It usually makes me uncomfortable to introduce myself but I will make an effort.
I got bitten by the testing bug almost by accident, in 2012, when I was tricked into testing during an internship. Loved it so much that I decided to stick around! But my ultimate goal was automated testing, and technical testing - so I worked for 3 years as a developer in critical banking systems before coming back to testing. Turned out, it was a good idea, and I had really become better after that development experience.
In 2013 (after one year of working full time as a tester), I got ISTQB certified because many companies asked for it. And recently, I became certified at the advanced level. Certifications are no guarantee that you are good at testing, really - but doing it through self learning gave me a strong incentive to learn new things by myself, well beyond the certification scope.
I led a workshop in Copenhagen last year, all in English, at the DSTB 2017 conference. In October I will give another talk at the User Conference on Advanced Automated Testing, in Paris.
By the way, I am french, and my name is almost impossible to pronounce for people who are not speaking french (Florence ROLLAND-SOULIER). English is my second language, but I use it daily and hope not to make too many silly mistakes!
Right now I work as a consultant in test automation and technical testing, mainly in banking. This month another adventure begings: going freelance to stop relying on a consulting company that does not want to invest in continuing education.
That is all for now - thank you all for being such a great community! It was a joy to find this forum and feel connected to so many great people around the world.
