Each day, everyone at Springworks comes into work with a true passion for building products and tools for the HR ecosystem. We are artists, innovators, achievers, and dreamers, with a one-track mind to fine-tune the products that we build. Through this series of posts, we showcase our team members, their roles, and what a typical day looks like for them. You can check all the posts here.
Sheetal Tamta joined the SpringRole team in October, 2017 as a blockchain tester. She has been extensively involved in testing the SpringRole platform and helping solve issues for our users who, on occasion, find something not working as expected.
What does a day look like in the life of a Quality Analyst (QA) testing a platform built on blockchain, let’s find out.
Explain your role. What does a Quality Analyst do?
“Testing is an infinite process of comparing the invisible to the ambiguous in order to avoid the unthinkable happening to the anonymous.” — James Bach
If there was a succinct definition for the role of a QA, in my opinion it’d be this: “We don’t develop software, we make it better.”
Each day in the life of a QA engineer is different. You are essentially living the roles of different user personas that would use your product which includes, (but not restricted to) testing your product using different browsers and devices.
As a Quality Analyst, I perform many roles at a time — apart from ensuring that the product works as expected across platforms and devices, on any given day I could be the Project Board handler, or even a bridge between the product requirements team(PM) and product development team.
Having a good understanding of the product flow is one of the biggest responsibilities of a QA. Ultimately a QA is driven by the goal of always doing what’s best for the product and the users.
Building on blockchain must present a few unique challenges. How has your role evolved to fit into the Blockchain product ecosystem? How do you overcome these challenges?
The very first question that comes in every tester’s mind, when thinking about a blockchain-based product is how does one go about testing a new technology.
What are the limitations they have to deal with? Do they need to equip themselves with new testing techniques and tools?
In my opinion, the basics of QA critical thinking remain the same. I only needed to learn very few specialised techniques to deal with blockchain products.
However, a blockchain QA should be more focused than anyone else because the product involves Ethereum transactions and interactions on various browsers and devices.
I have to keep in mind that not all users might be familiar with the blockchain UX. The blockchain ecosystem is still evolving and finding out solutions for its UX challenges. This increases the complexity of possible scenarios for each individual product flow.
It needs a planned approach. Here’s one that I personally follow:
1. Identify functional components and design test plan/cases/documentation.
2. Run/create test cases/checklists on a daily basis.
3. Manage/remember all the test scenarios or edge cases and verify it before any deployment.
4. Explore upcoming developments on the blockchain network and be updated.
5. Gather requirement specifications and touch base with developers.
6. Maintain bugs on the basis of priority — highest, high, medium, low and lowest.
7. Learn new tools to make the testing process easier, faster and easily manageable.
8. Do thorough scrutiny of all the transactions on the chain.
Above all, being attentive to user queries and being ready to learn new scenarios from users is an attitude that has helped me in this journey.
With every bug I report, I feel like like I’m contributing to the product and the team; I feel motivated to find another one, andI feel happy that I took another step towards providing a seamless user experience.
Walk us through a day in the life of Sheetal!
1. Start my day with a cup of hot water and lemon, and checking Slack.
2. Do Yoga and meditation. (an absolutely essential part of my routine)
3. Review task in hand for the day ->go through the Jira board -> prepare my breakfast & lunch.
4. Reach office by 12 noon. [I like to stick to this timing]
(Editor’s side note: At SpringRole, we work from 1PM-8PM.)
5. Testing and bug re-verification.
6. Around 2.30 I have my lunch with office-mates. (Sometimes I talk to my mother/friends while having lunch)
7. Continue testing, discuss with teammates, delegate/manage workload if required.
8. (Usually) Wrap up work by 8.15pm. (leaving office is dependent on bugs and deployment status)
9. Workout from 8:40 PM to 10 PM. (acts as a stress buster and helps me stay fit)
10. Prepare dinner between 10–10.30PM (I use the time to have a call with my parents too)
11. 11 PM-2.30 AM is time spent on Slack/Jira board (if there’s anything urgent work-related), WhatsApp, reading articles, shopping and setting up my to-do list for the next day.
What is the SpringRole product and dev team like?
Releasing products and new functionality demands several diverse perspectives, and it can only be done with a bunch of skilled people with the right execution abilities. Luckily, I am part of a team that has all these qualities.
We all have different strengths and skillsets and we really gel together well which is helping us during this phase of accelerated growth at SpringRole.
What advice do you have for other peers looking to break into the QA role?
One of the keys to success in Software Testing career (and to shine among thousands of peers) is to master the ability to think like the end user. By honing this ability you’ll be able to find various scenarios to test the same flow.
A QA Engineer should be able to reproduce hundreds, and even thousands of users, in terms of different user interactions which will help release a bug-free product.
Quality is not an act, it’s a habit. — Aristotle
Secondly, you should be always keen to find bugs and your perspective to view the product should be unique.
Lastly, troubleshooting is the skill that you need to develop, grow and, pay more attention to. Knowing the exact root-cause for the problem will solve multiple issues as well as save development time — a super-valuable asset.
I believe #NoCompromiseOnQuality should be our motto as Quality Analysts.
Don’t miss the first three posts in this series.
Building on Blockchain: a Day in the Life of a Product Designer
Building on Blockchain: a Day in the Life of a Blockchain Engineer
Building on Blockchain: a Day in the Life of a Product Manager
About SpringRole
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SpringRole is the platform where people can view, share and get attestations on their professional profile, thereby creating a verified resume that they can share and use. A user’s educational qualifications and work experience are verified by the organisations themselves and written directly to the blockchain. To assess a user’s skill set, SpringRole has a system of weighted endorsements that let users objectively look at people’s profiles and assess their skill level.
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