Client Overview

Sage is the market leader in Financial Services Software, a position which has been built on an enviable record of successful delivery of their suite of products. Sage want to maintain this market position and as a result they value and embrace continuous improvement. Sage Small Business Division requested proposals for the provision of an independent testing review from a number of testing organizations.

Business Needs and Objectives

Sage’s objective was to identify if they were testing in the most effective and efficient way and if not, to make recommendations on what improvements could be made. Sage wanted to understand what steps needed to be taken to:

  • maintain and improve the quality of their products with each release
  • reduce the time taken to deliver functionality, which would in turn reduce its unit cost, allowing for increased scope in each release or for releases to be delivered to the market sooner

The Qualitest Solution

Qualitest proposed a Health Check to review the current testing capability in the context of the whole Software Delivery Lifecycle (SDLC) from start to finish. Qualitest  stressed the importance of looking beyond testing to assess both the inputs to and outputs from testing throughout the SDLC.

This included:

  • Analysis, Design and Architecture
  • Development and Unit Testing (Agile and traditional lifecycles)
  • Testing
    • Test strategy & process
      • Test planning and estimation
      • Risk analysis and traceability of requirements and design
      • Quality Gates and Entry/Exit Controls
      • Test analysis and test design
      • Test execution and reporting
      • Defect management
      • Test prioritization and optimization of testing resources
      • Skill levels and training requirements
      • Testing Tools
      • Non-functional testing
  • Product Documentation
  • Version Control and Configuration Management
  • Project, Development and Testing organization

About the Qualitest Health Check

Qualitest’s Health Check solution combines best in class industry practice and standards with their  long experience of delivering projects on time and to budget. Using the lessons learned from these projects, the Health Check is able to provide pragmatic and objective feedback and recommendations to answer questions such as:

  • Is there anything else that you could be doing to improve your testing?
  • Is your testing approach appropriate for your current lifecycle model?
  • How can we help assure and demonstrate Return on Investment?
  • Does your testing focus on the right places at the right times?
  • How do you know what the remaining risks are before making informed acceptance decisions and going
    live?
  • Are there any potential legal or compliance issues that are not currently being addressed by your test
    process?

The Qualitest Health Check is a transformation tool, used within the predicament consultancy space. It has been designed to enable an objective measurement of the current testing function, and identify suitable change points within the areas of:

  • Financial returns and business benefits
  • People, Organization and Roles & Responsibilities
  • Process and Procedures
  • Information for Decision Making
  • Learning Environment
  • Governance and Assurance of Testing within the Development Lifecycle
  • Tools and Technology to support testing.

Each recommendation for change is tailored to provide the most appropriate enhancement within the context of the client. As part of the Health Check Qualitest’s experienced professional team gather data, review documentation, conduct extensive interviews, benchmark existing processes against good practice, including:

  • S.M.a.R.T. – our own Test Methodology
  • International standards such as those provided by ISO and IEEE
  • Recognized industry best practice from some of the world’s top testers
  • The Test Maturity Model