The task conflicts I believe highly dependant upon how good are we with “context switching” and coming back to it. Now not only that, but the team we are working with. Context switching can be challenging for some teams or an individual.
As a QA I reckon context switching is the norm cause we often pulled into something urgent. So, how can we decide how to prioritise or pause the nearly completed critical task or wrapping it up causing delay in other tasks?! is a very valid concern.
I have always resolved such conflicts using below questions:
- The weightage of the both tasks: time already spent on task 1 vs time needed to spend on task 2.
- The strategic front: is task 1 more aligned with business needs or task 2?
- The availability of the team of task 2: Eg: While wrapping task 1, but the team for task 2 is only available now and they wont later. In this case I might pause task1 and start task2 to take notes and might shift back to task1- cause why not?
- Time sensitive: which task can afford delay? task 1 or task 2?
- Last but not least: “Asking question - simple & classic” - if we are not in deciding position ie: we don’t have enough context on task 2 yet, we can always ask from POs, Leads, Manager. It will take the burden of decision making off us and we can continue both tasks simultaneously.
- Communicate: We need to communicate whatever as only QA or team we have decided to do and timeline of the tasks completion.
This will not only give us clarity as a QA also to entire team on how we are managing both critical tasks at once! 