Let’s try to explore together the significance of Quality Assurance metrics, understanding their various nuances, how to efficiently implement them but more importantly how to communicate this information to those who need it.
1.Create metrics specific to your project & team context
Align your metrics with the core functionalities and the main goal of the product you are working with. Having this in place helps you to target your effort and to enhance areas of the software that matter to its user satisfaction.
Customized metrics will help the QA teams to direct their focus on what is truly the value of the software and at the same time make sure that the most critical areas for the user are continuously elevated. In the same time metrics will be influenced by team structure, expertise and workflow. A team where most of the colleagues are specialized in automation testing might focus on metrics like code coverage or the percentage of tests automated. On the other hand, a team that is transitioning to automation could have different metrics prioritization, such as time spent to convert manual tests into automation one.
Keep in mind: Customizing QA metrics to your product and team context is about measuring the right aspects of software quality. By laboriously selecting the right metric and continuously refining them you make sure that the QA efforts are correctly coordinated with your products and team’s needs.
2.Incorporate metrics into routine process
To engage in a culture where metrics guide continuous improvement there’s a need to empower teams in using metrics into their routine.
Each team member of the product team needs to be encouraged to engage with QA metrics. This activity could consist of involving developers in building/using relevant code quality metrics or aligning with UI/UX colleagues on user experience metrics. Getting into a routine could be as simple as starting the sprint with metrics overview and then incorporating metric discussions in stand-up meetings. It requires a regular involvement with metrics to keep them in the team’s mind.
It's important of course to maintain a continuous improvement cycle. The team should regularly bring feedback about the effectiveness of certain metrics or the process itself. Having such a routine ensures that defined metrics remain relevant, practical and aligned with the team’s and software solution’s evolving needs.
Keep in mind: All the effort involved in the metrics subject should be linked to a broader team and organizational goals. This alignment helps everyone to understand how this effort contributes to a broader success rate in the company.
3.Drawbacks in the usage of QA metrics
If we use some basic examples, we can agree that a high number of bugs in a new feature should create panic during early development stages. However, the same number of bugs in mature product should become a red flag. The point here is that we need to have a close look over the context behind any metrics. This will help everyone to have an accurate interpretation and response.
Don’t burden the QA reporting with overcomplicated dashboards. If you or your team are spending more time tracking & updating metrics than improving the overall quality the reporting system needs simplification. Reports about quality should help, not obstruct the QA process.
Metrics should help us to identify where improvements are needed. This doesn’t mean that we can understand why issues are occurring. To understand the root causes, use open communication and collaboration withing the team. Don’t fully rely on metrics to reveal what team communication can easily do.
