As a sole tester, how do you know you’re doing a good job?
This question, to me, and being on this panel answering it was a joyous revelation.
So, thanks @dianadromey and @jamesespie for the opportunity,
And @rdn12 for the answer while I was reflecting “wait, how do I know that?”
Because the joy of being on a panel, is you can riff off of something someone else says;
And @rdn12 reminded me that,
I know I’m doing a good a job when I look in the rear view mirror.
When something comes along and you go “Oh, if this had happened 3 months ago, before we did X, Y or Z, it wouldn’t have gone so well”
For me, quality work is about improving; and my day to day is pretty much always at the edge of my knowledge and expertise; casting from familiar knowns to find unknown unknowns. And when you’re at that edge, it’s really easy to feel like if you were just a bit more, you could go further. It’s really easy to see what is lacking in front of you;
But that ignores the temporality of the job; what I can do today builds on my experience, knowledge, the relationships with my team, creating systems that help; the work that I have done before. What I have been seeing as lacking is much more where I am growing
So, thanks TestBash NZ 2020 for bringing me to clarity that, and I’ll let these gifs say it;
I have no idea what I’m doing, but I know I’m doing it really, really well.