Saturday, May 13, 2006
Genius talking and flame on!
We had one of those project checkpoint meetings (as Sharon said, how many checkpoints do your system need????) on Thursday at 9am.
I didnt want to attend it, as i already knew my presence (or not) wouldn't change anything, and there was quite a large volume of production work that needs to be looked at in the early morning.
Andrew suddenly IM me and asked me to the conference room and join the meeting. Upon walking into the room, with lots of management folks on both the technology provider group and the business group, i was asked about a certain issue that was preventing me from completing the testing.
Apparently, the issue was fixed by the time the meeting started, so the question put to me was:
Q: "Can you accept the system as-is without tesiing this part?"
A: No.
Somehow a barrage of exchanges appeared (not unexpectedly), and we reached this stage, where:
i said: "how can you confirm if this fix will resolve the issue without testing"
Statement: "We got the expertise. You dont have to test"
As a sidenote, I've put the above statement as my email signature now. 8)
The lady that made the statement had totally invalidated the months of testing her team and the business team had done. If they had the expertise, and signed the approval on versions that we still find bugs on, one have to wonder what kind of expertise that they have, and secondly, what kind of approval is it when a test team signed off still have huge bugs.
When i heard this statement, i was literally in flame-mode, like the Human Torch from the Fantastic Four. My manager and a few others in the meeting room saw the flames coming out of my head!
It was quite fun though. And so, i sent back a few more statements, and the verbarl barrages continued.
The point that i brought up finally was:
"If you want to go ahead with the rollout without the test, i wont be part of the approvals. I wont be doing my job properly if i am going to sign off on something that i did not test on. "
I think my manager understood that point.
3 hours after this very interesting meeting, my testing was completed. Yet again, a total waste of time to do all the unnecessary exchanges.
Erik and Andrew thought that this was strike three. Nope. It's still strike two.
I didnt want to attend it, as i already knew my presence (or not) wouldn't change anything, and there was quite a large volume of production work that needs to be looked at in the early morning.
Andrew suddenly IM me and asked me to the conference room and join the meeting. Upon walking into the room, with lots of management folks on both the technology provider group and the business group, i was asked about a certain issue that was preventing me from completing the testing.
Apparently, the issue was fixed by the time the meeting started, so the question put to me was:
Q: "Can you accept the system as-is without tesiing this part?"
A: No.
Somehow a barrage of exchanges appeared (not unexpectedly), and we reached this stage, where:
i said: "how can you confirm if this fix will resolve the issue without testing"
Statement: "We got the expertise. You dont have to test"
As a sidenote, I've put the above statement as my email signature now. 8)
The lady that made the statement had totally invalidated the months of testing her team and the business team had done. If they had the expertise, and signed the approval on versions that we still find bugs on, one have to wonder what kind of expertise that they have, and secondly, what kind of approval is it when a test team signed off still have huge bugs.
When i heard this statement, i was literally in flame-mode, like the Human Torch from the Fantastic Four. My manager and a few others in the meeting room saw the flames coming out of my head!
It was quite fun though. And so, i sent back a few more statements, and the verbarl barrages continued.
The point that i brought up finally was:
"If you want to go ahead with the rollout without the test, i wont be part of the approvals. I wont be doing my job properly if i am going to sign off on something that i did not test on. "
I think my manager understood that point.
3 hours after this very interesting meeting, my testing was completed. Yet again, a total waste of time to do all the unnecessary exchanges.
Erik and Andrew thought that this was strike three. Nope. It's still strike two.
posted by Jonathan at 2:11 AM | Permalink | 
3 Comments:
i think the management is living in denial. how can you roll out a system that does not work.
wait a minute! this sounds very familiar! look at my bank. did you tell them about my bank. let me know i will gladly attend their meetings and give them a full report on customer issues.
next time, ask time to consult me before rolling out the system.
all these chao ang mohs have no brains.
Nothing other than the typical 'hello world' can be said to have no bugs.
I dont think it's a matter of living in denial, or having no brains.
It appears to me, at least, that they have a focus on a specific target, i.e., to roll a system out and tell the whole world that their project is done! Hooray. Applause. You know.. the usual slaps on the backs.
Hi, I've been reading your blog for a while, ever since I found out that you had linked to me.
I love that line about not needing testing 'cos of expertise! Classic! As a programmer/developer, I know that nothing ever works the first time.