@conrad.braam , @maaike.brinkhof -
I agree we don’t need jerks and drama. Its not our duty to reason with such people. But, if we feel like it, then we could ask them why they think testers are at the bottom. Such discussions might reveal big problems in the org that might have remained unaddressed for too long.
Talking to such devs might show you whether they concede their position when presented with sound arguments and/or evidence. If they genuinely do so, then you have “created” a dev who might advocate for (good) testers. Even better if the dev is in a position to make decisions on engineering & management.
OTOH, you too might end up conceding your stance on some things, or you might realize that this person is actually overconfident and shallow (i.e. not worth talking to further). Who knows? But, you must be an intelligent and excellent tester to start such discussions. Otherwise, you’ll only reinforce their beliefs. As an aside, it would not hurt if you already had some practice in debating things and knowing how to keep biases in check.
Why do some devs think that way? Maybe they have worked with all/mostly bad testers. I know orgs that are bad in general, and their testing dept has excess headcount. No one seems to be able to fix the testing org which leads to frustration. Perhaps the org and its testers have done all the things mentioned here to kill testing link. So, I can understand why developers might be frustrated. But, venting that frustration by being a jerk is unacceptable, regardless of the reason for frustration.
Have you worked in companies with too many bad testers? Have you only worked in orgs with good testers (i.e. you have not seen cases where testers are the problem)?
PS - If you don’t have the time or don’t want to engage in discussions with such devs, then you could ask them to watch this video. Perhaps, it might show the dev the value of testing and of (good) testers. Let James Bach do some of the hard work on your behalf.
