The pros and cons of working under a Software Engineering manager VS a QA manager?

[nsegal (Nitin Segal)]

I have come across some jobs in which the QA people of a team are lead by a Software Engineering Manager/EM of that team, who has zero experience as a QA manager/QM or has never lead a QA team before. In most of these cases, the team or company was moving in the direction of no QA people or few QA people (Exceptional experts only). That is, Developers are expected to do most of the testing.

I was wondering what are the pros and cons of working as a QA under an EM vs a QM, especially as a “beginner” or with “intermediate level” experience i.e. not an expert.

My gut says that its probably bad because the EM has no experience in being a QA or leading them, and therefore won’t be effective at guiding QAs on the job or providing general career guidance. They are likely to expect the QA to just do the work well, with little to no guidance. So, such a setup seems suitable only for an expert QA i.e. not “beginner” or “intermediate” level QAs. I guess there is also the risk of turning into more of a button clicker and script generator QA in such a team, due to lack of mentoring.

[andrewkelly2555 (Andrew)]

I used to manage on of those QA teams, test teams and also a testing center of excellence for a while.

The test center of excellence did not a bad job, aligning global practices, sorting training and that guidance and development side, it had a fairly clear testing remit.

The QA team less so as none of the developers, designers or project managers reported to me so I had very little authority to change quality, I experimented in servant leader to these groups but really ended up back as test manager and not QA. Note I that I have been both developer and a senior project manager which gave me a better chance of QA influence but still it was a bit of an odd role.

I do not manage people any more and from my experience the separation of the team was less effective than being embedded in teams. I do though still dual role as a coach and now and again I help teams get up and running with quality planning activities including those other roles.

I am fine reporting into engineering managers and multiple PM’s on any given day on the work activities. The development of the testing craft though does need a different model, we went the testing guild option, mainly for testers but we also had others, this is where a lot of the skill development, guidance and practice shifted to rather than from the manager. This works well in my view, on balance better than the separate team managers for QA or testing.

There is a risk the testing craft gets diminished by not having a person of influence on your side, be the person of influence if you need to, set up monthly knowledge and guidance sessions focused on QA or testing, make sure others have access to this group, invite other roles so they understand your value better.

The engineering manager approach can have other benefits like better understanding of other roles and picking up new skills beyond your primary area.

There is an argument on independent testing, I tend to take the view I can change hats and create a distance from the build that lowers that risk though and make a judgement if I think that is threatened and call a friend.

Anyway test guild of some sort is likely what you need in that model so it does have a vehicle for focusing on your craft whether its QA or testing or something else, we have mobile development and design groups as well so this is not just important for testing.

[nsegal (Nitin Segal)]

Related answer -

Where did all the Test managers go?

I thought I’d add my experience here, in case it’s useful. My title is “Senior QA Manager” and currently, I line manage 9 people (mix of SQA and SDETs) who are spread across 6 agile** development teams. Each of those teams has a Development Manager, who line manages the developers in the team and the overall development work, along with a Product Manager. I line manage those who test and provide direction and guidance on all things test, while also helping out with industry specific knowledge …

@geoffd

[nsegal (Nitin Segal)]

One answer which shares my concern -

Where did all the Test managers go?

What I miss is not support managing testing, but having a line manager knowledgeable in testing who can coach me in my career growth. With no test management, comes a lack of support for tester career growth, and that sucks.

@fullsnacktester

It seems that the intention of many companies is to get rid of testers for the most part or entirely, and replace them with Developer testing and ad hoc testers/contractors when needed. I don’t know if it will work out in the long run.

[nsegal (Nitin Segal)]

An excellent reply from personal experience by @ckenst

Where did all the Test managers go?

I’ve been thinking about your questions in terms of my career progression and it’s worked like this: My first job I worked for a big insurance company. I reported to a QA Manager and I think that position went all the way to VP. I don’t ever recall seeing a career ladder but I know people held higher positions. Second job was for a bank. I reported to a QA Manager and I know there were Directors and VPs of QA. My first startup I reported to the VP of Professional Services because the CTO thou…

@ckenst

The vast majority of my career I’ve been in your position: not getting a ton of useful feedback on how to develop my testing skills. No disrespect to my early test managers but I didn’t learn much about testing from them.

This has been my experience too. I did get a little bit from my QA manager initially because I was new, but was mostly self taught. Honestly, I think I have lagged far behind due to a lack of mentoring and coaching for the most part of my career.

ckenst:

I’ve learned a ton by being alone and having good CTO / Dev Managers who have challenged me. Which I guess goes to show that what I’ve really needed are places that are challenging and supportive to grow the most.

I haven’t got such support in my career. I am not wasting my time hoping or finding it now. I searched hard and tried lots of stuff, but nothing worked out. I took care of myself the best I could.

Now I am thinking of switching to a Developer role eventually. They have way more books, courses and mentoring resources than QA. Of course, I’d bet that most Devs don’t get access to mentors either (I suspect that mentoring is an anathema at most companies), but it feels like the might have a better chance than a QA. Besides most Devs are going to end up doing QA anyway. So if you really love QA, then it might be good to become a Dev.

[nsegal (Nitin Segal)]

Unfortunately, I have the same experience as @ipstefan

Where did all the Test managers go?

+1 to the feeling mentioned here by Ben I’ve worked 12+ years in testing in 3 different European countries and have never had a test manager in the proper sense of the profession. I’ve had managers that: approved my holidays, rejected my training requests, and sometimes gave me a raise, I reported the testing progress to, or rarely discussed with(every quarter).

…and have never had a test manager in the proper sense of the profession.
I’ve had managers that: approved my holidays, rejected my training requests, and sometimes gave me a raise, I reported the testing progress to, or rarely discussed with(every quarter).

[nsegal (Nitin Segal)]

An entire post related to replacing QM with EM -

QA reporting to development managers

Hi all! I’ve been through a couple of reorgs in my career so far that have unfortunately resulted in QA management/lead positions being completely removed. On both occasions QA analysts and engineers ended up reporting to development managers in their respective scrum teams. In my experience this has been a bit of a mixed bag; it’s nice to have a little more freedom, but the lack of meaningful guidance/feedback for QA related practices (from someone who fully understands the context of …

I have seen this too and share the concerns of @adamjfoy

[ckenst (Chris Kenst)]

There’s an article by Jon Bach (I think) called the Expert Game - the premise is basically that when you get hired into a company or project and you are the only person doing it - you are the expert. Which means you have to figure out how to be valuable / helpful in your role.

I wouldn’t judge have an EM vs QM as necessarily bad or good. Even if you get a QM the chances of them having some testing education are pretty low. I try to aim for managers that (regardless of their position) will support me in learning what I want to know. Support might be financial (buying conference tickets, classes, or even books).

[nsegal (Nitin Segal)]

Jon and James Bach wrote the doc Playing the Expert Game

“…I am continuously learning without my manager needing to push, prod, or pay much attention to my learning process. I manage my own learning process…”

I think one’s career is too important to leave it in someone else’s hands like an EM or QM even for a little bit. I remember reading two useless books and taking one useless course (after work hours) just because the EM felt it would be useful. I waited a whole year after learning and never used it. I could have used that time to teach myself something else.

More importantly, I don’t see any incentives for someone to mentor others in a company. All potential mentors are likely to be busy with company work. So its unlikely that they have sufficient time or energy to mentor someone. Moreover, its unlikely that they get a bonus for mentoring.

I think that in the rare occasions when a company offers one mentoring, one should ask them about the incentives and expected outcomes. The answers will reveal whether they actually know what mentoring involves or whether they are just doing it to pat themselves on the back. I’d also watch out for a “mentor” whose only goal is to be able to put the word mentor in their promotion docs or Linkedin profile without doing any real mentoring.