HIT Teams Hampered By Inadequate Tools And Skill Sets For Automated Testing
By Christine Kern, contributing writer
Inability to complete continuous software deployments results in crucial gaps in service.
The healthcare industry saw a 5 percent increase in the need for automatic software testing of consumer and B2B programs in 2016, according to provider of enterprise test management solutions Zephyr. In How the World Tests, its annual report, Zephyr found tools and skill sets in automated testing are stalling IT teams from mastering continuous software deployments, meaning businesses and consumers don’t get care, service, or responses they need in critical time periods.
“This report is a benchmark for IT teams in companies of all sizes,” said Zephyr CEO Scott Johnson. “Testing teams in a breadth of industries face the same issues in deploying tools and providing internal training fast enough to meet the needs of continuous software deployment. Based on our report, investments in these two areas in 2017 will enable critical automated testing to perfect the agile workflow and deploy software faster to meet consumer demand for updates in innovative technology.”
Zephyr conducts its annual survey of more than 10,000 customers in 100 countries to determine where the testing industry is headed, as well as better understand the latest trends in all things testing. The study findings are on par with those from a December 2016 Appvance survey which found 54 percent of enterprises are struggling to speed up continuous software development because of their inability to automate quality assurance processes.
“How the World Tests allows the entire testing community to examine our progress over the last year,” said Hamesh Chawla, vice president of engineering at Zephyr. “IT teams want to speed up deployment of new software to meet demand. Companies should increase employee education investments in order to fine-tune the most efficient automated tests that work for any software they develop.”
Agile testing is one of the largest challenges for IT teams, the report found. While 70 percent of respondents from smaller companies follow agile, just 30 percent deploy automated testing. The study identified problems including a lack of automated testing, a constant change of requirements, and an inadequate amount of time. And while the majority of enterprises understand the importance of automated testing, 45 percent say they lack the necessary skills to engage in it continuously.
“Agile is all about getting the product faster to market and being able to learn as you go with requirements changing in this learning process,” said Chawla. “Testing, if done manually in this process, will be cumbersome and not efficient, which is why unless there is automation built in, the agile will not succeed. [The report] validates the thought process that automation and DevOps are two key enablers for a lean development model, which is the Zen of agile, and every organization needs to think of seriously investing in these domains.”
Chawla also suggested software testers and businesses consider test-driven development and put time and energy into building and using the right frameworks for automation and TDD.