Test Management

Test management in the modern world

Silk CentralSilk CentralAgile Whitepaper

Successful test management underpins the processes and practices which in turn ensure the quality of software delivery.

Organizations are under pressure to deliver increasingly complex, high quality software to the business, faster than ever before to reflect the speed in which the market moves. Process and automation has to optimise the Software Development Life Cycles (SDLC), regardless of the development methodology they have adopted. 

Successful test management ensures visibility, traceability and control through to the delivery of high quality software. Approaches to test management may vary across organizations but are based around three key principles:

Validation – Does it meet the business need?

  • Evaluating the software during or at the end of the development process to determine whether it satisfies the specified requirements. [IEEE-STD-610]

Verification – Does it function as designed?

  • Evaluating the software to determine whether the products of a given development phase satisfy the conditions imposed at the start of that phase. [IEEE-STD-610].

Analytics – Understanding level of quality achieved

  • Acting on intelligence revealed by the data  and using it to understand the issues, manage the process and improve software performance

Successful test management

Successful test management supports the three key principles using visible metrics, sound analytics and robust quality checks executed against the application under test (AUT). Well-structured test management tools create a central hub where organizations control and maintain their test assets, from manual tests through to automation and maintain functional and non-functional testing from ‘Unit’ through to ‘Performance Test’.
Introducing disciplined test management into your SDLC will deliver better software and immediate business results:

  • Reduced time to market through speed of delivery
  • Improved productivity by reducing rework
  • Better analytics results through increased visibility and control through dashboards
  • Increase in business agility by embracing change, not resisting it

Methodology agnostic test management

The ‘methodology agnostic’ approach to test management supports both the traditional, ‘waterfall’ approach to development and the iterative version, which includes ‘agile’ and its variants. This approach meets modern requirements – current software development regimes require flexibility to adapt and support growing demands while working within mobile, cloud and – for example – Software as a Service (SaaS) environments.

While tooling allows developers to implement the test processes and practices that align with relevant industry best practice and processes, such as Test Maturity Model Integration (TMMi), the work of the International Software Testing Qualifications Board (ITSQB) remains relevant and important.

Better test management

As organisations rarely achieve 100% complete testing within the original project timescales and cost, test management solutions are important in helping organisations make better-informed decisions on what – and where – to test.  And risk-based test management allows developers to focus their time and efforts on achieving what 100% of businesses need – ensuring success.

Successful Test Management is therefore about enabling a centralised view across all aspects of testing. It includes everything from manual through to automated testing, the development stage through to QA and the functional phase through to performance – all while ensuring full collaboration and control at every stage.

By adopting the right practices and processes, developers can re-use assets and provide support across all areas of test planning, execution and reporting across the entire test process. Well-executed test management gathers analytics from requirement coverage through to test coverage, execution coverage through to defect coverage. There is traceability, visibility and control throughout the process, all helping organisations make an informed decision on quality of the software delivery. 

Learn more about our test management solution

Silk Central™

Collaborative test management

Silk Central collects prioritizes and controls all aspects of test and test management by automating collaboration across the organization to ensure you deliver higher quality software faster.

Enable collaboration and visibility across all areas and phases of testing.