WWW15: Adam Howard - Talking the Walk

Testing has a PR problem. It is "easy", "repeatable", "automatable" and "boring". And of course, "anyone can do testing". Or, to put that another way, "we don't need specialist testers". These are the predominant contemporary misconceptions of our profession, and while proliferated in part by lazy standards or over-zealous agilists, they are also a product of a collective testing in-eloquence.

Because there are many skilled testers out there who are great at doing testing, but who are almost completely incapable of talking testing. When asked to describe or justify their approach, they stutter about playing or process or instinct. This inability to vocalise cognitive processes is a symptom of a deeper malaise - if we can't talk testing, it means we can't think testing.

In this session, Adam Howard will share his own journey from being a naive, instinct-driven tester to being able to consciously express the cognitive acrobatics that accompany insightful testing. In doing so, he will describe how walking the walk is not enough - to develop as a tester and challenge the misconceptions of our craft, we have to be confident talking the walk too.