What Air Crews Can Teach Software Testing Teams - XBOSoft Webinar w/Peter Varhol
Aircrew resource management principles enable any team member to question decisions and directions that seem to be wrong. Testing teams, whose members have diverse experience and expertise that give them different perspectives, need to embrace these principles to make the right decisions.
United Flight 232 should have crashed with 296 lives lost. In contrast, Asiana Flight 214 should not have crashed at all. The critical difference between the two was the interactions of their respective aircrews. Aircrew resource management refers to how cockpit crew members work together to make flights as safe and efficient as possible. These principles have been applied to other professional fields, and should be a central practice of every testing team.
Testing teams require expertise in all aspects of software design, development, test, delivery, and operations. There can be no “command pilot” whose expertise over all aspects of testing is greater than the combined expertise and experience of others. And while the leader of the team is the final authority, he or she must listen to and consider team members whose knowledge and experience can make the difference between success and failure.
This presentation discusses how aircrew resource management has evolved to focus on expertise, collaboration, and decision-making in the cockpit. It applies these lessons to testing teams, where complementary expertise is necessary to deliver high quality and working applications, updated continuously. It highlights the characteristics of successful aircrew teams and how those characteristics apply to building and delivering great software.
Attendees will learn:
1. What testing teams can learn from successful teams in other fields.
2. How testing teams must work collaboratively, especially in crises and under pressure.
3. How blind deference to authority and automation can be detrimental to a testing team.