Big organizations have big programs of work. They have
big program managers on big salaries who report to an even bigger Program Director. The prospect of
delay terrifies them. They believe that the testers are the people primarily responsible for the delay (after
all they, the program managers, never actually use the wretched systems). Therefore they ensure that the
testers are hobbled. This hobbling occurs as follows. They:
??? Don??™t have test managers, but have test ???coordinators.???
??? Let the suppliers do the testing (so the test coordinators can ???coordinate??? their testing).
??? Stick rigidly to Prince II and avoid thinking of the consequences.
??? Prevent the test manager from refusing to accept inadequate systems by accepting them behind
his back.
??? Where, by some oversight, they have any testers who test seriously, they isolate them ??” by
threatening the tester with the sack or suggesting he??™s ???not a team player??? very firmly so he knows
it will appear in his year-end assessment.
So sniff the job specification to see if it smells of anything like this. Do you really want this job?
Test Planning and Management 57
Remember: few high-flyers stay in a role more than 24 months. Some big projects last more than 24
months. All the program managers and program directors consider themselves to be high flyers. So they
will have left before the project is seen to be a disaster. If (some) investment analysts have only got 6-
month horizons why should senior managers think any farther?5
4.
Pages:
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183
184