Quality-First Approach

At Sieroka Consulting, we believe that quality should be built into every stage of the software development lifecycle, not just tested at the end. Our quality assurance expertise helps organizations implement practices that improve product quality, reduce defects, and enhance the overall user experience.

Our Quality Assurance Experience

We have introduced new practices to improve quality and allow QA teams to focus their testing on use cases, including:

• Developer Cross-Testing: Implementing processes for development team members to test each other's code for cross-training and catching defects prior to releasing code to the QA team.
• Test Case Matrices: Having development team members provide matrices of recommended test cases and highlighting tests that the development team had already completed.
• Use Case-Focused Testing: Shifting QA focus from feature-based testing to use case-based testing to ensure the software meets user needs.
• Automated Testing: Implementing automated testing at multiple levels to catch issues early and ensure consistent quality.

Quality Assurance Methodologies

Our approach to quality assurance encompasses various methodologies and practices:

• Shift-Left Testing: Moving testing activities earlier in the development lifecycle to catch issues sooner
• Test-Driven Development (TDD): Writing tests before code to ensure requirements are met
• Behavior-Driven Development (BDD): Focusing on the behavior of the application from the user's perspective
• Continuous Testing: Integrating testing into the CI/CD pipeline for immediate feedback
• Exploratory Testing: Using structured exploratory techniques to uncover unexpected issues
• Risk-Based Testing: Prioritizing testing efforts based on risk assessment

Testing Types and Techniques

We have experience with a wide range of testing types and techniques:

• Functional Testing: Ensuring the software functions as expected
• Performance Testing: Evaluating system performance under various conditions
• Security Testing: Identifying vulnerabilities and security risks
• Usability Testing: Assessing the user experience and ease of use
• Accessibility Testing: Ensuring the software is usable by people with disabilities
• Compatibility Testing: Verifying the software works across different environments
• Regression Testing: Ensuring new changes don't break existing functionality
• Integration Testing: Testing how components work together

Quality Assurance Tools

We have experience with various QA tools and frameworks:

• Test Management: Jira, TestRail, qTest
• Automated Testing: Selenium, Cypress, Appium, JUnit, TestNG, Mocha
• Performance Testing: JMeter, Gatling, LoadRunner
• API Testing: Postman, SoapUI, REST Assured
• Security Testing: OWASP ZAP, Burp Suite, SonarQube
• Continuous Integration: Jenkins, CircleCI, GitHub Actions
• BDD Frameworks: Cucumber, SpecFlow, Behave

Our Quality Assurance Services

We offer a comprehensive range of quality assurance services:

• QA Process Assessment: Evaluating your current QA processes and identifying opportunities for improvement
• QA Strategy Development: Creating a comprehensive QA strategy aligned with your business goals
• Test Planning and Design: Developing test plans and test cases based on requirements and use cases
• Automated Testing Implementation: Setting up automated testing frameworks and writing automated tests
• Performance Testing: Identifying performance bottlenecks and recommending improvements
• Security Testing: Identifying security vulnerabilities and recommending mitigations
• QA Team Training: Educating your QA team on best practices and new techniques
• Developer Testing Training: Teaching developers effective testing techniques

Case Study: QA Process Transformation

A software company was struggling with a high number of production defects and inefficient QA processes:

Challenge: Transform a reactive, manual QA process into a proactive, efficient quality assurance approach that catches issues earlier and reduces production defects.

Approach:

• Assessed the current QA process and identified gaps
• Implemented developer cross-testing to catch issues before QA
• Created test case matrices to guide testing efforts
• Implemented automated unit and integration tests
• Shifted to use case-based testing
• Integrated testing into the CI/CD pipeline
• Established clear quality gates for each stage of development

Results:

• Reduced production defects by 65%
• Decreased QA cycle time by 40%
• Improved developer understanding of quality practices
• Enhanced collaboration between development and QA teams
• Increased test coverage from 45% to 85%