Rip the Pessimism

I was interacting with a Junior team member and he was saying that, "There is no importance for QA". He was referring to the speech of head of the company. 

Suddenly I did flashback about the year end speech. I remembered one of the statement that stuck me hard "we have delivered lot of products this year, this was possible due to quick iterations".

I was wondering what does he mean by quick iterations? Now I relate this with the juniors complain that QA is not valued. Then I tried to explain him. How are quick iterations possible? you cannot just develop+fix+deliver. This is not an iteration. develop+test+fix, This is called an iteration. test part is completely Ignored, people think that products are delivered in quick iterations without any testing efforts?

Ignorance at its best.

Quality of build delivered depends on many factors

1.Experience of a developer

2.Expertise on the technology and platform for which the app is built

3.Knowledge about the domain

4.Attitude for delivering quality code that has minimal defects if they are expected to be delivered quickly

These factors are never considered or not spoken at all. They are all assumed that they are part of a quick delivery process.

The role of QA in delivering a product in quick iterations is significant

QA gives developers 

-Freedom to make mistakes

-Experiment with design

-Helps test their solutions quickly

-Provides valuble information

-Give continous feedback

but there is no acknowledgement, because there is a lack of awareness from management. The only thing business/management is interested is to roll out the product as quickly as possible. credit being given to creator but not even a small part to the person who supported to make the product better for release. This is the sad part but we as testers have to live with it. Infact, we can proudly appreciate ourselves because we contribute without any expectations. I draw a parallel with the nature, it gives us so much still we don't appreciate and take it for granted :)

This is what I had to tell my junior team member to motivate him. I could see a broad smile on his face with pessimism turning to optimism.