Gary Cohen, Deputy Administrator and Director, Center for Consumer Information and Insurance Oversight, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, is not a computer guy. He's a lawyer. He knows the … [Read more...] about Tyranny of the Innocents, Exhibit A: Gary Cohen
Management
Healthcare.gov and the Tyranny of the Innocents
The failure of Healthcare.gov is probably not because of sinister people. It's probably because of the innocents who run the project. These well-intentioned people are truly as naive as little … [Read more...] about Healthcare.gov and the Tyranny of the Innocents
Seven Kinds of Testers
Most of my work is teaching, coaching, and evaluating testers. But as a humanist, I want to apply the Diversity Heuristic: our differences can make us a stronger team. That means I can't pick one … [Read more...] about Seven Kinds of Testers
A Tester’s Commitments
This is the latest version of the commitments I make when I work with a programmer. Dear Programmer, My job is to help you look good. My job is to support you as you create quality; to ease … [Read more...] about A Tester’s Commitments
Technique: Paired Exploratory Survey
I named a technique the other day. It's another one of those things I've been doing for a while, but only now has come crisply into focus as a distinct heuristic of testing: the Paired Exploratory … [Read more...] about Technique: Paired Exploratory Survey
Introducing Thread-Based Test Management
Most of the testing world is managed around artifacts: test cases, test documents, bug reports. If you look at any "test management" tool, you'll see that the artifact-based approach permeates it. … [Read more...] about Introducing Thread-Based Test Management
Michelle Smith: True Test Leadership
I'm delighted to read Michelle Smith's play-by-play description of how she is coaching new testers. Take a look. Let me catalog the coolnesses: 1. "The team I work with was previously exposed to … [Read more...] about Michelle Smith: True Test Leadership
Yaron Sinai Says Stop Thinking, Stupid Tester
The Factory School is that community of process people who believe testing benefits from eliminating the human element as much as possible. They wish to mechanize testing, and to condition the humans … [Read more...] about Yaron Sinai Says Stop Thinking, Stupid Tester
Self-Discipline Redux
I want to follow up on what I said about discipline in yesterday's post. I said that discipline is "motivation without reason." I stand by that, as far as it goes, but there's more to discipline than … [Read more...] about Self-Discipline Redux
Question: How to Rapidly Test Maintenance Releases?
A correspondent writes: "I have a test management problem. We have a maintenance project. It contains about 20 different applications. Three of them are bigger in terms of features and also the specs … [Read more...] about Question: How to Rapidly Test Maintenance Releases?