You may notice that, being one of the last activities before a release, testing consequently occupies
a diminished space in project management??™s universe. Counter this by establishing that system
testing won??™t end until a number of criteria are satisfied (see section 4.6.5 in Chapter 4), and
ensure that the time provisionally planned for this is likely to be sufficient.
??? Deferred gratification: we all want to see instant results. Managers (you included) want to see
code written, tests running etc., ASAP, and releases hitting the market like clockwork. Counter
any tendency to cut corners by writing a process model of how you will develop and run tests,
and then identify the outputs, and monitor their development. Write a plan with dates, buffer
time, and deliverables, and watch how much you slip. Then you can both:
??“ Empathize with the project manager when he panics.
??“ Be able to answer the question ???how far behind are you??? when the project manager asks.
??“ Know how much buffer time you have left.
All those intermediate steps will ease the pain of deferring your gratification.
??? Comfort zoning: project managers have comfort zones like anyone else, and their comfort zone
sometimes consists of well-ordered events proceeding to a successful release with a few interruptions
most of which the project manager has already foreseen, and allowed for. A test manager??™s
comfort zone consists of large numbers of product-fatal bugs which he, and his trusty team have
found, through sheer-hard-work-and-ability, thus saving the company from bankruptcy, chapter-
11 restructuring, and unfortunate references in the media.
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