Companies turn to communities to bolster in-house test automation

Under increasing pressure to release new digital services, apps, and features faster, many companies are resorting to automating their entire quality assurance process. While this approach is by no means new, not many companies can claim that their test automation keeps pace with the rate of development of new features. This is because software testing by nature is reactive. Despite development methodologies like test-driven development (TDD), testing still hinges on the readiness of products and components. This has made the life of automation engineers quite difficult. Often pressed for time, components are often only ready towards the end of the sprint.

In-house engineers have become so overwhelmed that organizations are turning to a community-based model to access qualified test automation engineers. Fully qualified professionals can quickly supplement the work of in-house teams to ensure that releases stay on track. It is a way of ensuring quality is assured at speed that the market demands.

Getting test automation right has many benefits. Less expensive than manual testing in the long run, reusing and repeating test scripts means automated testing can save time, accelerate development and increase productivity. What’s more, because it requires less human intervention, it is more efficient and lowers the risk of failures.

Guaranteed community access

Test automation is a specialist domain, in which engineers are required to build test automation scripts and collaborate with developer teams to ensure their work integrates with their pipelines. The growing popularity of the DevOps methodology, for instance, and the “shift left” approach that must be applied to testing means test engineers and developers are working together more closely than ever to design test automation frameworks early on in the process. This often requires them to undertake additional responsibilities and re-skilling.

Unfortunately, teams are not very vocal about their limited capacity and the pressing time crunch. As a result, product quality is suffering, having been sacrificed for speed. It is not uncommon for even the most popular apps to have very poor reviews in the days after new feature launches due to insufficient quality controls. It was hoped, of course, that automation would be the solution to such problems but, because test automation engineers are taking on so much work, this is an expectation it has failed to fulfil.

For this reason, companies are turning to community-based test automation to bolster resources, review code, and ensure high-quality releases. There was a time when organizations were reluctant to outsource this process. Now, though, they have come to realize that it guarantees access to a host of qualified engineers, capable of writing high-quality scripts and alleviating the pressure on in-house talent.

The clear community benefits

Attitudes to community-based test automation vary according to industry. Retail and travel, for example, are more open to the approach. With businesses across different regional and international markets, it’s in their interest to work with engineers that operate in different time zones, to different deadlines. Whatever their testing needs, and wherever they’re located, these organizations can be confident there’ll be someone available to address them at any hour of the day or night. Concerns around data privacy, however, mean that companies in the life sciences and financial services sectors are more averse to working with communities. However, those concerns are quickly alleviated thanks to the thorough vetting process that community-based engineers undergo and the high professional standards they adhere to.

For those businesses that do embrace it, there are clear benefits to crowdsourcing test automation. In addition to being able to select automation engineers from around the world -- and therefore around the clock -- access to a global talent pool means companies can enjoy a range of diverse and experienced perspectives, offering fresh insight into their current projects.

The range of available skills is broad, too. Historically, companies tended to buy standard software testing tools but today there are a growing number of open-source tools available, and more people using these tools. There is strong faith in community and community based development. Likewise, there are new automation tools and methodologies in the marketplace, all of which make test automation simpler and suitable for citizen development.

Keeping up with market development is crucial for any company. Someone who re-skills from one language to another is not as good as someone completely trained in that language. Rather than reskilling their workforce to support new and emerging technologies, a community-based approach enables organizations to quickly source specific engineer profiles that meet their changing needs. Indeed, it’s this level of flexibility that makes the approach so appealing to seasonal industries like retail and travel, where scalable capacity and immediate feedback are essential to their agility.

A viable option

The adoption of automated testing is necessary in enabling companies to release products faster while ensuring high quality, improving accuracy, and reducing costs. However, the growing workload and speed of delivery required means in-house testers are often unable to maintain the necessary pace. This is why the community-based model has become a viable option for many.

Some larger companies may need a certain number of engineers on a regular basis, while smaller companies may prefer a more flexible resource model with part time contribution. Whether fixed or flexible, community-based test automation offers a solution, with a wealth of experience and expertise that can only strengthen a company’s testing efforts for a faster pipeline of error-free,  accurate, and high-quality digital services, apps, and features. 

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Adonis Celestine, Senior Director & Automation Practice Leader, Applause, In this role, Adonis helps Applause’s clients to take a customer-centric approach to quality as part of their quality engineering evolution. He is an expert in test data management and compliance. Before joining Applause, Adonis was Associate Director and Lead Solutions Architect at Cognizant and held diverse quality engineering roles across the finance and telecommunications sectors, working for brands including Lloyds Banking Group, de Volksbank, DLL, Tele2 and Rabobank.