Testing as a Career!!!

Hi All,


I am Deepak, I am Software Engineer. I am in testing field for about 7yrs. I wanted to share some thoughts about testing and taking this as a career.

As I graduate when you pass out from the college, we normally aspire to become a software engineer. If anybody asks you what are your plans, the first answer from us would be I would join a software company and earn good money, have an onsite oppurtunity bla! bla!... Hang on!! What do you mean by that? Software engg is a very confusing word. Let me come back to this topic a little later.


Some of the studious students are very fortunate. They get campus selected; get FAT offers from Big SHOPS (Infy, Yahoo, Google etc...) We envy such students....we should have also got good marks....

It all happens after we get the pinch on our hand...till then we are in a happy scenario. As an Engineer, we set our goals to complete engg and come out of it...But is that what engineers are meant for?

Think about it!!! Engineers are said to Junior Scientist. Are we sure that we can call ourseleves the same... Yes offcourse!!!! You can call....Guys pls pat yourselves...its true that we have worked to our potential to complete all the semesters with so many subjects which hardly we care about it now...Thanks to our education system.


Let me come back to the Software Engg term!!!

Our aspirations would be entering S/W industry. But are we really sure what is that industry about? What excatly we want to become in this industry? What are the oppurtunities available? It’s a huge industry with huge set of options available.


For an instance, for a person who is good at Embedded and C- Programming, he should look for oppurtunities in embedded field. For a person who is strong in Oracle he should look in database management technologies and so on and so forth. Hang on!!! Is it really possible for us to judge ourselves nowadays what to choose? The most common scenario today is, He/She clears an interview in some ABC company and take the oppurtunity given from that company. That’s not wrong at all...Oppurtunities come our way and we pick it up.


But can we do a small re-thinking, to know what are the options available in the market? Where would I best fit in to the market? What are my skills sets....? Do I need to sharpen that further? Do I need to attend the formal training to sharpen my skill sets, or can I do it myself.

These are some of the very important Questions we should ask ourselves....Trust me you will have a better go later...



Since I have a testing backround. I am writing about testing as a career. The Oppurtunities for the same. Skill sets requirement.


The main intention of writing this blog is to help someone who is really in need of guidance, if he or she is looking to persue a career in Software testing.



What is testing? => test the product to see whether it complies the requirement or not.

Why was testing not so popular 10-15 yrs before?

10-15 yrs before testing was very much present. But it was done in an informal way.

However, today the scenario is completely different. Testing has become a very important aspect of any industry.

Even, I was searching for this answer from a long time. I would like to share some of my understanding here:

Today scenario the end user is very much quality savvy. The moment they see the product is of bad quality, he/she would look for a change. The main reason are, finacial indepencence, different options available in the market, competative costing of the product.


I would take an example of Nokia, Once said to be the mobile leading manufactures are struggling today because of the Android market. Android phones have become much cheaper and have better quality. The more competitive is the market, the more quality is demanded. If not the Big shops would loose the marked as there are lots of players. Consumerism is one of the revolutions what we have seen in last 5-10 yrs. Hence, testing has become an integral and a very important Function any industry.


Moving on, what are the skills sets required for taking testing as a career?

The very important skill set required is, you need to be very good in Analytical thinking. Think rational! Quick leaner and offcource programming will be an additional knowledge required.


Most of the testers would have ended up taking testing, because they were offered so, or they were bad at programming etc....But today it’s not the case. Testing has become a strong career path. Most of the companies spend lot of money on this fucntion. It’s no more s supporting fucntion in any industry. It’s the most important and a very essential fucntion in any industry.

Especially the Safety critical systems to name some, Medical equipments, Aviation etc. even small mistake can cause a disaster.


QUALITY is measured by testing!!!!!


If you have the right skill sets….You can do wonders in this field.



Deepak