Alternative usage of Test Process Improvement Rikard Edgren
Last week I attended SAST VÄST seminar (Gothenburg section of Swedish Assocation for Software Testing) with two interesting presentations.
One of them was about experiences of TPI, Test Process Improvement, and a sneak peek of the improved TPI Next.
I am not fond of TPI, or TMM, or CMM, or anything else that tries to objectively measure how “good” something is.
I think you miss what is most important, and just because you are at level 5 doesn’t mean you will find all important defects.
But there are interesting things and good suggestions in Test Process Improvement, so an alternative usage is to make a TPI analysis with your colleagues, throw away the book, and focus on what you think is most important.
Or have I missed something about TPI?
Maybe it is the only way to sell process improvement to your managers?
And getting an external test expert to look at your work should always be fruitful?
I’m not fond of those either, still I have been able to use the TMM once. Or rather, I took a look at some of the things in it when I created a new test department from scratch. It is a good way to critize your thinking of what is important with testing, because I went my own way and did not follow their paths.
I did write a Test Strategy for the whole company, but it was more like a foundation for the general plan where I wanted testing to go over. I honestly thought more on Ongoing Revolution in Software Testing by Cem Kaner than any thing else.
In one stage of my life I was enthralled by TPI and tried to force that onto an organisation, but I came to clarity later on.
It was a long time since I studied them, but do TMM and TPI want you to focus more on testing than administration? Or rather, is their focus on adminitration? I think it is, I think testing is the most important thing.
If you are context-driven in your testing and are looked at by a non context-driven external test expert you might not get the feedback that you would find fruitful.