6 Ways to Boost your QA Team’s Productivity

QA managers and team leads are continuously looking for ways to improve their QA process and software testing processes, but they also need to increase the productivity of their team members. However, during different testing activities and building up bug reports, they do not find enough time to perform these changes. Although increasing the productivity of a QA Team should not be complex, it is easy to create targeted wins, that allow them to implement additional ways to keep the team members motivated. Since there are a number of tasks that QA teams have to handle, and there is a lot on their plate, increasing productivity can boost a company’s sales and revenue. However, when QA teams use test case management software, it helps them in saving time and effort instead of managing all test cases manually. 

Following are 6 tips to increase the productivity of your testing team:

1. Test Automation 

A company does not have to break a bank to improve its processes with the help of automation. It is important to automate the test cases that require significant time when performed manually or test cases that need to be executed multiple times during the development cycles. These include the automation of unit testing, smoke testing, functional testing, regression testing, integration testing, etc. 

2. Use Effective Communication Tools 

When teams are performing manual testing, they need to collaborate with the team members. Thus it is vital to integrate the communication tools so that they can spend more time on the app rather than turning to their emails with issues or questions that are waiting in queue for answers/replies. Effective communication tools can help in improving the QA process as it speeds up and provides a smooth communication flow between QA teams and the other stakeholders.

Communication is a key to enhance productivity, as communication tools offer chat functionality, group online calls, screen sharing, recordings, document sharing, etc. QA managers also need to observe how often do teams reach out to each other, how they respond to queries and concerns posted by other team members, etc. All these factors are important and should be considered in the QA process. 

3. Test Case Management Software

Writing unique test cases and executing them is a time-consuming job if performed manually. Gone are the days when teams used Excel Sheets to manage the test cases. Software testing teams now use test case management software that offers a wide range of features to assist their testing efforts. They can also integrate this software with other testing tools for boosting the QA process. 

4. Providing the Necessary Information 

Another tip to improve QA is to ensure that all proper information is available. This should include the design specifications, documentation, etc. all available at a central location for the entire team. They should pick the right tools designed to keep the teams on track. When choosing a tool, make sure you consider the adaptability, features, functionality, and cost of the tool so that your teams invest more time and effort to improve the QA process. QA teams need access to critical information that is a way to ensure the success of a project. 

5. Start Testing Early

In order to make the most of your QA team’s time during the initial phase, it is important to engage it in requirement review to find the mistakes before they begin the implementation phase. This type of approach helps in reducing the development costs and gives them a deeper insight into the software app right from the beginning. 

6. Spread Domain Knowledge

Companies create software for a given domain such as finance, medical sciences, healthcare, etc. This is why the domain knowledge of the testing team can be valuable depending on the project in which they participate. It is important to provide them with considerable knowledge in the given area allows testers to better understand the functional and business requirements of the app under test. this type of understanding can have a huge impact on the productivity of a testing team. So the question remains how to spread this domain knowledge to the testers? Well, QA leads should organize a special training session with someone who knows the context provided for a given project. Providing materials among the QA teams can also assist them in preparing for participating in new projects.

Conclusion 

QA managers can use these six tips to improve the performance of the testing teams and also help them collaborate between different teams within the same project.