Career path for Tester (me2)

(...poor me, missed the SEMI-FINAL EURO match last night, định là ngủ sớm rồi dậy sớm coi "bánh đa", bắt độ tùm lum (TNK-Đức) cuối cùng quan trọng nhất lại KHÔNG được hồi hộp theo dõi trận đấu, hơi tiếc. Giờ dậy sớm chỉ để coi kết quả, tình hình *quề dốn* hết 3 kèo (bắt Đức chấp 1 trái), và viết cái entry dưới đây. Vì hôm qua mới đọc đúng cái article mà mình trăn trở bấy lâu, sáng nay có hứng chơi luôn English :)


You are a tester, sr tester or lead of a test group, then what??? what's going on next year? Be a manager ?!? Good, that seem normally in my mind, and some of us, right ? But there are something else we could think of.

An article in "software testing help" I just read yesterday has clarified further as you can see in picture below, there are more choices for us, my testing friend. That's nice to have a look:

Career options for software test professionals

Some of them are strange in meaning to me, such as SCM, IS Auditor, Developer Designer..(?) And a surprise: Business Analyst, a title that I dun think of before in testing career path, but that's sound interesting too.

Ah, this also remind me a thing, yesterday there was one recruiter guy (named Huy) from CSC (a new name of FCG) found me in Y!360 blog and ask me to join their boat. After some chat, I can see that they may require a lead most likely Tool Architect (as describe in this picture), an experience man of automation tool having *organization mind* (this word like tiếng Anh bồi quá :). Actually, this was also my wish of career path after leaving LTRC. Tool Architect is a pretty nice sound, but before that I must be used to a very good automation engineer that I actually did not have. So I refuse the offer tenderly (but more than that, I'm still in love with AgileMobile :). Then what next of mine... a Test Manager might be the choice of mind recently but Business Analyst also interesting title that would rock me too much (because of relating to customer :) )

Que se ra, se ra, what ever will be will be. The future's not ours to see. Que se ra, se ra... That's my favorite song, but please NO, we should not leave us flow in the river of career path, but selecting the best part of yours. That's what I think of and would like to share with you my dear friends.

Another true stories from my friends has proved that statement in a very *strong* way. A night-year experience tester, SonLe, he has worked for PSV, SilkRoad, GCS, TTNK then RnD-LTRC (meet me here) and now is Vinagame, and he has plan to leave testing after such a long years...yes *leaving* in the meaning of quit out testing career path. He's on his way getting another professional in Construction Engineer at week-nights, for now he may got it already. Another guy, who was my favorite staff in RnD-LTRC, Khanh.Tran, he's just leaving LTRC and now working for Vietcombank as "Tín dụng enginner" (not testing any more for sure). Another nice testing girl I have known also in LTRC, a badminton friend, Hanh.Ng, now in Singapore studying Entrepreneurial (quản trị doanh nghiệp)... Finally, a *pretty woman*, who was my first lead (in testing) at Rnd-LTRC, Chaupk, now studying Law at week-nights with sponsor is the money earned from testing work... I believe that there more and more people like them, the one who on the way building a back-up plan for there future. But to me, Software Testing has chose me already (3 years ago) and fortunately, I feel very comfortable with current job. And I have plan to gain more on it.

>>> Here below are categorized in some testing aspect that mentioned in the article.

Specialization has come to stay in testing career - following are some of the key areas where one need to specialize to move ahead in career path in testing apart from good knowledge in software life-cycle testing process.

1) Domain Knowledge - Good knowledge in domain area of the application adds value to the testing professionals. There are ever living domains like BFSI, Telecom, Health care, manufacturing, embedded etc. Numbers of certifications are available for each of these areas where the tester can get them certified.

>>> That's new to me and interesting. But I think it's not really practical in Vietnam, at least for now, P5, defer it.

2) Automation Testing Tools Knowledge - There is great demand for automation and performance testers. A good skill on scripting languages of these tools is basic necessity for succeeding in test automation. Knowledge on creation, validation and enhancement of test automation framework is very much required.

>>> Yea, yeah.. that was one of my choice and love to forward this trend of Specialization. Wish to fix as P3, but defer it for now, re-set to P5.

3) Certifications - QAI, ASQ, ISTQB and several other institutes are offering testing specific certifications. These certifications improve the confidence of the clients on the testing professionals. CQTM, PMP are some managerial certifications, which help the testers to scale up in the professional ladder. Certifications on the testing tools offered by vendors like HP increases the technical competency of the individual.

>>> This has just come up and back to me recently. Actually, I was think of a certification over pass 3 years. Usually after joining several classes, that is short but valuable to me, with Michael Hackett and Hung Q. Nguyen (founder of Logigear.com - ltrc.vn), the question was repeating come up but no solution until it's fallen into the dark. Now it's back to me with ISQTB. P3, fix it in next build please :)

4) Niche areas in Testing - Experts predict that the niche areas like SOA testing, Security testing are gaining momentum in the testing space. Many tools are emerging in these areas. As testing professionals we should be aware of where the industry is heading and update our knowledge in those areas.

>>> This also was in mind once upon a time. It seem not an easy work but should be in queue with a priority, well, P4, defer it for now :). But I'm sure (and trying for sure) that I will be back to this sometime to update the news of it. This is interesting trend of testing, an advance professional level, I think.

(Source: softwaretestinghelp)