Key Points

• Test Outsourcing as a strategic organisation model
• Humanity as a cause of errors
• Human behaviour when dealing with errors
• The benefits of a dedicated Test Partner

Presentation Abstract

This presentation explains why Test Outsourcing is the only way to organise testing correctly. Test Outsourcing is explained as a strategic and corporate decision. It concerns setting up long-term relationships with test services suppliers. The motivation behind this idea is found in the paper below.

The presentation starts by explaining from a human perspective how errors are made. It explains why our humanity is the most real cause of bugs. In a second part the presentation discusses our human behaviour when encountering errors. Here the logic is built to come to the solution of Test Outsourcing. The third chapter of the presentation provides first a model on how to define responsibilities and secondly gives an example of how developers and testers should be organised in an outsourced situation. Examples are given of the distribution of tasks, the use of metrics and the definition of the accountabilities.

Where relevant, real cases will be used to illustrate the model. These real cases are not mentioned in the paper below for reasons of confidentiality.

About the Speaker

Jens Pas is Managing and founding Partner of I2B and President of the Board of Directors. Jens Pas is an authority in the business of Software Testing. He developed a unique method for structured software testing. His method was introduced in and adopted by major Belgian and Dutch companies. He has also development Test Assessment programs and has conducted them at directors and top-management level at various sites in larger IT environments. He published various articles regarding the methodology of Software Testing and is the author of the textbook that accompanies the course ôIntroduction to Structured Software Testingö. He is a speaker and track chairman on many Software Engineering and Quality Conferences (Eurostar 98 Munich, 99 Barcelona & 2000 Copenhagen, Quality Week Europe, Fesma Brussels, Software Automation, Novi Amsterdam, Technological Institute of the Royal Society of Belgian Civil Engineers, SQE Europe Test Congress 2000). Currently he is specialising in Innovation Management services.

Jens Pas was co-founder and General Manager of a Belgian consultancy company specialised in testing. Previously he was responsible for the re-engineering of the pan-European IT-support department of Quaker Oats Europe and for setting up the Application Support department of the ETS division of Barco Graphics.

Jens Pas is an engineer and holds an Executive International Master in Business Administration degree from the Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School.