Experimentation is important, if not essential, if we want to have successful high performing teams. It allows us to try things without needing months to review and phase in a new way of working. Instead encourage trying something different, reflect and start again. In theory, I really like it. In practice, it was difficult within […]
So far I’ve written a few blog posts around conducting RCAs where I’ve focused on the people and questions. However what I’ve yet to touch upon is the documentation side. In a similar idea to the concept that the activity of coming up with a test plan is more important than the document itself, I […]
I’ve already talked about how we need to tap into unleashing our inner toddler by asking “why”. But what questions do we ask? Background Before getting into the guts of the RCA I like to go through the background. This is partly to act as a refresher for everyone as it may have been a […]
I love collaboration and making exercises something that people can engage with. It is usually the discussion that matters more than what gets written on paper. For this to be successful, you need to have the right people in the (virtual) room. As we’ve touched upon already, the RCA should touch upon all areas of […]
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Meaningful RCAs: Asking Why
I did my first RCA back in 2019. We looked at each stage of development and used a “5 whys” approach to tap into why it wasn’t caught at this stage. We maintained this approach over the next few years and when I switched to my more coaching/leadership role in 2023, I started running them […]
I’m currently writing about RCAs in a series of posts. If you aren’t familiar with them, check out my Meaningful RCAs page first. One of the key things that I would emphasise before every RCA is that there needs to be either zero blame or full org blame. As I’ve written before, it takes a […]
Software development is tricky. It can involve complicated tools, languages, domain spaces and a variety of teams & roles. The world in which we work is constantly changing and evolving and we need to adapt. On top of that, knowing best working practices isn’t instinctive like shark hunting or bird migration patterns. We need to […]
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What is quality?
This is my favourite question when meeting people for the first time. For some people it is about the software doing what it is meant to do. It might be robustness & reliability or adherence to specifications. Other people spoke about the value and solving customer problems. Is it useful? Some people referred to the […]
One of the first things I did when joining my previous organisation was pitch testing throughout the SDLC. I wanted to share the importance of testing everything that we do. However not everyone shares that idea of continuous testing throughout the SDLC. For some continuous testing is continuously running the same tests over and over. […]
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Devs can test
I repeatedly hear the notion that developers can’t test. I’m not sure if this is because we’re protective of our role (testing has been a dying role for decades) or to excuse developers who can’t be bothered to test. So let me be clear… Devs can test. In fact if I had a high risk […]