A Business Case for Structured Software Testing

Author: Roosevelt Quick PMP, Manager, Sogeti USA

October 2011

Companies are increasingly challenged with having to bring new products to the market faster, cheaper and with stricter quality requirements than ever before. For many businesses, information technology has become a key enabler that allows them to exploit opportunities to bring new products to the market faster and cheaper while at the same time meeting strict customer and regulatory requirements for conformance. However, with the accelerated pace to introduce products to market, there is an increased risk of deploying a product of insufficient quality. From a software perspective, a company that releases software of poor quality risks, among other things, the loss of revenue, brand/reputational capital, and its own operational productivity. Furthermore, there’s the drain of high litigation costs and compensation claims. According to a study conducted by the National Institute of Standards and Technology regarding the impact of software failures, software errors cost the American economy $59.5 billion annually. (National Institute of Standards and Technology, 2002)

  • Unstructured testing, typically referred to as ad hoc testing, is performed without planning and documentation. As a result, it is difficult, if not impossible, to predict test effort or to measure test results.
  • Structured testing defines a plan for what is to be tested, by whom, when, and in what order. Since it is not practical to test everything, structured testing employs quality criteria to determine risk and prioritization of testing activities.

With respect to mitigating the risk of poor software quality, testing represents one of the most important actions an organization can take to control these risks. A well-founded, structured testing process can provide an organization with insight into the quality of the software and the risks associated with insufficient quality. Based on this insight, organizations can make informed decisions about whether to take software into operation. With proper testing, organizations can make better decisions and effectively manage risk. (Sogeti Netherlands)

An organization that executes an unstructured test approach decreases the likelihood of being able to predict the test effort, to measure test results effectively and to identify and prioritize risks to test activities. Some of the findings that resulted from various studies of structured and unstructured testing are:

  • Time pressures owing to:
  1. Absence of a good test plan and budgeting method
  2. Absence of an approach in which it is stated which test activities are to be carried out in which phase, and by whom
  3. Absence of solid agreements on terms and procedures for delivery and reworking of the applications
  • No insight in or ability to supply advice on the quality of the system due to:
  1. Absence of a risk strategy
  2. Absence of a test strategy
  3. Test design techniques not being used, therefore both quality and quantity of the test cases are inadequate
  • Inefficiency and ineffectiveness owing to:
  1. Lack of coordination between the various test parties, so that objects are potentially tested more than once, or even worse, not tested at all for both test and system development products
  2. Lack of agreements in the area of configuration and change management for both test and system development products
  3. The incorrect non-use of the testing tools
  4. Lack of prioritization, so less important parts are often tested before more risk-related parts (Koomen, Aalst, Broekman, & Vroon, 2006)

On the other hand, a structured testing approach is characterized by the following advantages and the absence of the disadvantages noted above:

  • It delivers insight into and advice on any risks in respect to the quality of the tested system
  • It finds defects at an early stage
  • It prevents defects
  • It reduces the time that testing is on the critical path of the total development, so the total lead time of the development is shortened
  • The test products (e.g., test cases) are reusable
  • The test process is comprehensible and manageable.

Organizations with inadequate control of their software testing process will often find their projects derailed due to overruns in budget and time and software defects discovered during the operation of the developed information systems. A well-implemented, structured test management approach enables an organization to maximize its project portfolio investment by providing insight into information for project scope, time, and budget, while simultaneously minimizing the risk of poor software quality.

References

Koomen, T., Aalst, L. v., Broekman, B., & Vroon, M. (2006). TMap Next for Result-driven Testing. Nederland B.V.: UTN Publishers.

Sogeti Netherlands. (2010, May). Business Driven Test Management. Retrieved May 22, 2010, from Sogeti Netherlands web site: http://eng.tmap.net/Home/TMap/The_4_essentials/Business_Driven_Test_Management.jsp

Roosevelt Quick is a manager at Sogeti USA.  He can be reached at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

 

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