By: Johanna Färnlöf, Simone Bernardi, Celeris AB
In today's technology-driven climate, product development is a complex process. With so much at stake, testing is essential to ensuring that a product meets all the requirements and functions as intended. To achieve this, requirements are a central focus for testing, and test management plays a critical role in the product development process.
The primary purpose of testing is to verify that a product meets the requirements. Developing adequate requirements for a complex system requires a considerable amount of work. Business rules and logic must be clearly specified to ensure that the system meets all expectations. To take advantage of all knowledge in the team, it is recommended to involve the requirement analyst and tester from the beginning. This is to ensure that everyone has as good an understanding as possible of the needs and any potential problems that may arise.
Testers are especially adept at figuring out all possible scenarios from any angle, making it important to ensure that requirements cover everything from the outset. The tester can also verify the requirements to ensure that they are written in a testable and measurable way. For example, if the requirements state that the system should generate a report faster, it might be testable in one way, by verifying that it takes 1 second faster with the new system. However, this may not be sufficient if the report-generation process takes 20 minutes in the old system. In such a scenario, 1 second may be too little to meet the requirement. But, if the previous function took 5 seconds, then 1 second might be good enough.
Effective testing can be performed in a variety of methods, from ad hoc testing to a structured test plan. Regardless of the approach, it is essential to base the testing on the requirements. Without test management based on the requirements, you can only verify that the system works without showing any errors or function when clicking buttons or links. However, to determine if the product meets the needs, the testing must adhere to the requirements.
In conclusion, requirements-based test management is crucial for product development. Robust requirements are necessary for effective testing, and involving the testers early on can help ensure that requirements are comprehensive and testable. By testing the product based on the requirements, the development team can meet the objectives and ultimately create a product that meets the stakeholder’s needs. Test management is therefore an essential part of the product development process, promoting the development of stable systems, and delivering a reliable product that meets the requirements.
Source: Test Management in Product Development: The Importance of Requirements for Testing | LinkedIn
