No matter where in your testing career you are, we all have times when we need to influence teams or individuals. Sometimes leading to some tricky conversations. Making sure our feedback is fabulous can help.
What You’ll Learn:
The CANDY heuristic and how it can help improve feedback
What feedback loops are and how to improve them
How to use CANDY in the SDLC
Tips on how to overcome the challenge of change
After reading, share your thoughts:
What tools or techniques do you use when trying to influence?
Do you have a story of a difficult conversation? What did you do to create a positive result?
I use JIRA to manage my pending tickets and their story points, which plays a vital role in deciding ticket allocation for the next or future sprints.
Apart from that, I rely on mind maps to influence decisions related to testing strategies. Instead of just discussing what needs to be tested, I use mind maps to visually represent the actual testing requirements, making it easier for everyone to understand.
Lastly, I use Confluence to document important testing processes, especially those where the team might need input from developers. Since everything is documented in one place, the team refers to the same resource, and it is continuously maintained by everyone. This not only ensures consistency but also influences the team’s decision-making, as they rely on these documents for clarity on processes, dependencies, and testing coverage before moving forward with any implementation.
The tool to use to influence is listening to people 100%.
I think to influence the key really is as you mentioned, not being put off if your suggestions aren’t adopted. If you truly believe there is an opportunity to improve the workflow, be prepared for a rejection but take a step back analyse how you framed it. See the other persons perspective, seek to understand it. Maybe there is another way to engage the area of concern, other people that could help you influence, a different angle to present the benefits etc. Just don’t give up, don’t take it personally, its just communication. Stealing the Stephen Coveys “Seek first to understand and then to be understood”.
Using this technique, I have an example where a dev was totally anti a particular process around production defects. It started off with a stand off on the fact this process wasn’t working. The dev would pull up scenarios where it didn’t work but I would reiterate what the process was for those scenarios proving it wasn’t a process issue - but that didn’t seem to hold them back with their criticisms. So I spent time with him separately listening to the problems that he was having to deal with and it turned he was getting frustrated because he felt that these tickets were always coming to him and he wanted more feature development. So his complaint about the process was “why are these tickets always coming to me?”
So I spoke to his Dev Lead and the fix was to change how we assigned the tickets going through the process and made sure he had more variety in his work load. Then he was happy with the process. So he got candy and he understood the process wasn’t the issue.
Whatever the problem, to influence people, listening to them is the most powerful thing you can do.
Love this example!! Along the same vein, I started reading Adam Grant’s book, “Think Again” and what he’s shared so far really falls in line with what your talking about. Listening, figuring out what the real problem is, and seeing what solutions are available. I’m barely into it but it seems to be really relevant. Not taking it personally, like you said, can be so hard. I’m trying to practice this in my own life. Thank you for sharing!
Mind maps are something I have not yet dived into! I’m curious, is this an activity that I could do on my own? Or, is it better with a team present?
Also, documentation is so important. Having a culture that is willing to not only document but maintain documentation saves the team so much time. Thanks for this reminder!
Mind-map is a tool used for flow-chart, user journey, test-plan, testing strategy, etc.
It’s a kind of digital note that contains a branch like structure and then many sub-branches, where the main branch is the main topic you mind-map focus on and sub-branches focus on sub-topics. Visual representation of mind-map makes it easy for anyone to understand.
It is creative and easy to share with others. And obviously, you can do that on your own. And when you do it on your own there are lot of things you will explore and learn irrespective of topics.
This website is popular for creating mind-map, you can check it Apart from this website there are many other websites also in the market which offer mind-map features:
No matter where we are in our testing career, influencing teams and individuals is a skill we all need. Tricky conversations are part of the job,…n the way we navigate them can make or break collaboration…
One approach I have found valuable? is Answer the next logical question. Take the next logical action
Anticipate concerns, address objections before they arise. Don’t just raise problems guide the team toward solutions. Acknowledge emotions, then steer the conversation with facts and possibilities.
This is such a great approach. Love the "Acknowledge emotions, then steer the conversation with facts and possibilities." piece. I think I’ll try this in my personal life as well
Great article, though “yarely” in my mind sounds like how one friend would pronounce “yearly”. Get feedback only once a year?
A previous boss of mine used data a lot when driving decisions - if he could show that the test team was burning time on activity X () then it was easier to argue for change. I always thought the messages particularly hit home when he presented the data graphically; maybe people are more willing to believe a line on a graph or a pie chart!
