From Software Testing to Product Quality Engineering A department transition story

Software testing is more than just testing

The role of software testers has changed the last years. For some companies it's important and enough to have software testers in a team to do the "manual" testing job and that is ok for them. There are other companies who are just looking for test automation engineers only. However, keeping an eye on the quality only on a team level is not enough. Usually there are many teams working together on a product, but only a few companies focus on the overall product quality from a more holistic point of view. The result is often that customers are frustrated, because companies tend to think and release in internal structures rather than user centric. We at MaibornWolff from the product quality department are consulting our clients in all aspects of quality, from the development process to the release and live monitoring of a product. But how are we doing this? In 2021, we decided to transform our software testing department with a single focus on testing to a broader more holistic product quality engineering department. In this talk, Daniel will share the transition process from a pure testing department to a broader more holistic product quality engineering one. He will talk about the new department structure and roles. How the new structure is giving more personal growth for team members and what benefits their customers gained from the broader view to quality. Of course, Daniel will also share challenges and problems that occur during the transition phase.