From the course: Succeeding in Software Testing

The skills to succeed

From the course: Succeeding in Software Testing

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The skills to succeed

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- So, you're a software tester, what are the skills you need to succeed? A pro tip I tell anyone who's interested in becoming a software tester or for upskilling in their current career as one, is to do yourself a favor and to look at the frameworks for your current role at your job, or to take note of the job description online for software testers. This is more of a hack and sets great testers apart from those who really just test. It helps you to either plan accordingly for what it is that you need to do to up-level yourself, or to build on the skills that you already have to plan growth beyond your current experience. Skills within software testing are highly technical and are those that involve in-depth and clear communication with peers. For example, it's not just knowing what to do, building test plans, executing on test scripts, et cetera. It is also less quantifiable things that are important, often called soft skills. To be fully effective, you are successful when you understand the business you're working within and communicating it clearly, understanding the technology you're using to be able to define it and gaining a fine knowledge of the offerings of that technology you're working with, all of this to be able to gain trust with your teams. These are the software testing skills that will help you build the foundation to best explore the software. This sounds easy, however it's an intricately woven matrix of all the skills needed to execute simultaneously. And the reality is that it's not something that everyone wants to do, nor is it something that everyone can do. There's nothing better than finding out the work you do is exhaustive and or even resented by engineers in other roles on the team. Talk about quality job assurance. The special nature of the work is the joy of moving through a testing task and realizing that you are the most equipped person to do it. Tying all of your skills together, clear and informed communication, test execution, user comprehension and quality exploration done with every issue can really help uncover the value of a good software tester and further help you grow a stronger career.

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