Iām doing some research for my upcoming talk at the National Software Test Conference in May and Iām capturing peopleās thoughts on testing skills.
Basically, Iām trying to find out from as many people as possible what one word sums up a key skill that a tester needs. All responses are very welcome.
Thank you 
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As each post must be at least 20 charactersā¦
Curious
Analytical
Tenacious
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The first thing that comes to mind is Adaptive.
I have some more:
Thinker
Detective
Pusher
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autodidactic
tactful
eloquant
pervicacious
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Love this one! Canāt count the times this has been a requirement.
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This is the first time anyone has mentioned autodidactic in a list of key skills. Great stuff.
@morshaul @kinofrost @inkyfreak All of these replies are really helpful - words I wouldnt have thought of. Thereās a definite theme here.
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In an earlier (non-testing) role which didnāt have a clear remit (it was a new role in a new organisation dealing with a new discipline), after a couple of weeks my line manager described me as āa ferretā.
Ferreting as a testing skill? Quite possibly.
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Predictable
Virtual
analyzer
Skeptical
Interstitial
My word would be Approachable.
As a tester, I bring many technical skills to a project however I find that testing is a very social activity. An attitude of collaboration, an ability to converse at different levels, and respectfully asserting your needs as a tester are often, in my opinion, just as important.
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More great responses - thank you!
@devtotest - Approachable - absolutely. No point in being someone in a team that no-one wants to talk to.
A couple of questions from me, if I mayā¦
@katepaulk - by Interstitial, do you mean living inbetween the spaces? Iām interested in your context around this.
@satveerqa - Iām intrigued by āVirtualā - could you elaborate why please? Would be really helpful to understand your thoughts.
I think for me the key single work would be
Questioning
For whatever aspect, context or point in the project Iām at/in Iām always questioning, whether to help my understanding, to discover (asking questions of the product/application/stakeholder etc.) or remove ambiguity
Sounds interesting, I hope there will be somewhere we can hear what you say Steve?
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By interstitial, I mean living between the gaps - gaps between users and software, gaps between expectations and whatās delivered, etc.
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Inquisitiveness
Reasoning behind this is the way you interact with the thing you are testing, you apply the āwhat if I do thisā¦ā and then see it behave in a completely unexpected way! It also applies to the requirements and the implementation, having that desire to understand why something is either needed or designed the way it is and applying that otherwise unknown knowledge to the testing itself.
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Yeah Virtual means that being a tester we have to imagine all scenarios during testing for eg. if particular no of users are accessing the same web application concurrently than what would be effect on performance ā¦ like we have to keep in our mind all scenarios that s why we can say ourselves virtual ā¦That makes sense ?
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logistics, thatās my word for you!
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I would also like to add fine-tuning, as sometimes the role of the tester is to ensure that the software is more than just āworking fineā
Often in Agile we get told that we are focusing on a āworkingā version, but for a mature product which works then the focus needs to include what can we improve, or āfine-tuneā
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Thoughtful
Knowledgeable
Persistent
Communicative
But the one I think you need most:
Investigative
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Thanks everyone - I now have a great list of words, but Iām happy to collect even more.
The purpose of this is to share with the conference audience what we as testing professionals think the key skills are - as opposed to hiring managers and recruiters who focus on just one area (but I dont want to say too much as yet!).