Think Twice Before Labelling Yourself As An Automation Engineer
Automation scripts are only part of the job
Break down traditional QA silos and empower developers to own quality checks.
The job market has long paraded automation as being a golden egg, and any company that operated without it felt they were missing out.
It’s not difficult to see why automation as a service can be extremely useful, it’ll click the same button an ungodly number of times if you wanted it to, and it’ll do so till your heart’s content.
But be wary of automation, and job adverts hiring for skilled “Test Automation Engineers”.
A Consideration For New QA Engineers
Automation is exciting, and as QA engineers new to the world of testing, we’re immediately drawn to it like a moth to a light. When I started my career as a tester, I had absolutely no idea what I was doing. Luckily for me tho, the team I joined already had a number of testers.
I started out by doing things manually, reading requirements, navigating through the product click-by-click, participating in all the scrum ceremonies whilst building my knowledge of the product along the way.
Eventually, there came a point where I was the sole contributor to an automation suite that had existed before I joined, built by a member of the team.
I was excited! I was learning to code, figuring out how to debug tests, getting acquainted with Jenkins, generating reports, and I eventually had them running on a giant monitor for the entire team to watch, I was definitely drawn in.
Consider getting hands on to build your own foundational understanding for testing. Learn the theory behind testing techniques, and figure out the best time to apply one technique over the other. Express your creativity through exploratory testing, and use automation to support your testing efforts.
Reality Check On Automation
Fast-forward a few years as I moved through a couple of different companies, the reality is that not every project I worked with utilised automation.
I’ve worked with projects that had automation, and projects that had none, and both approaches worked perfectly well for the team and I.
Jobs that advertise for “Test Automation Engineers” are mislabelling what it means to be a tester, this creates confusion for new testers as well as the wider team.
The reality is that people hired as “Test Automation Engineers” don’t spend 100% of their time writing automation scripts. The scope of their work may indicate their employer is expecting some form of automation skillset, but daily activities will include tasks outside of automation.
Automation is a tool, it’s not a title. It’s a tool to help developers and testers reduce the hands on effort for some of the laborious tasks.
Concluding
Automation is that shiny tool that so many teams have become obsessed with over the years, and we want to use it for everything. The keyword in that sentence is “tool”, automation is just a tool.
Envision automation as a limited resource, and apply it when it’s needed. The requirement for automation often comes from a management team who believe it’s required (the golden-egg), but figure out if you really need automation. Weigh in on the benefits and remember to consider the disadvantages of automation along your testing journey, and think twice before labelling yourself as an “Automation Engineer”.
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