This is something i have been asking myself for quite sometime. What is career path for experienced tester ? Every year so many people are getting graduated and looking for jobs.
Still, in India its more like getting job is priority rather than thinking about questions like development or testing. Here i see a pattern, if you are good ( percentage 75 % or more ) after finishing college, first priority is development, if you didn't get job in first year , you look for testing jobs. Still no job, ok lets do some testing course. Finally, join somewhere.
Testing, as a career is still not popular , and sometimes i am surprised, when they compare testing job with "Data operator jobs". Anyway, that's another topic altogether.
Well, in my case i started career in JAVA, got SCJP, very popular in 2000, joined some company as software engineer and worked there looking for codes. It was more like when you are in development you know everything about your module, but if i ask some basic question about full system, you don't have an answer. Exceptions are always there, but this is general pattern i see.if you ask the same question to tester, he can tell you from different ways , explain perfectly what you are looking for. So my views, my personal view is "Testers" has more knowledge about the system as a whole rather than a "Developer". Slowly i got chance and i moved to testing.
Now, it is a beautiful journey, testing new things, new protocols , new devices, but now what? after almost 12 + years i have mentored many people, saw them moving to development. Many people moving from dev to testing ( surprisingly numbers of people moving to testing is more than the number of people moving from testing to dev, as i know) .
Now, every year intern join, within a year or two they can do almost the same things which you will do. So, how do you differentiate yourself? What options do you have when you move up the ladder ?
Well, we have many options !!!
1) Become a manager and manage people. : In India becoming manager is one option which is true as you become senior.
2) Contribute more towards open source projects.
3) Mentor new people.
4) Start a website and write about your experience.
5) Learn more things, new things . Learning never stops and technology evolves very fast.
Still, in India its more like getting job is priority rather than thinking about questions like development or testing. Here i see a pattern, if you are good ( percentage 75 % or more ) after finishing college, first priority is development, if you didn't get job in first year , you look for testing jobs. Still no job, ok lets do some testing course. Finally, join somewhere.
Testing, as a career is still not popular , and sometimes i am surprised, when they compare testing job with "Data operator jobs". Anyway, that's another topic altogether.
Well, in my case i started career in JAVA, got SCJP, very popular in 2000, joined some company as software engineer and worked there looking for codes. It was more like when you are in development you know everything about your module, but if i ask some basic question about full system, you don't have an answer. Exceptions are always there, but this is general pattern i see.if you ask the same question to tester, he can tell you from different ways , explain perfectly what you are looking for. So my views, my personal view is "Testers" has more knowledge about the system as a whole rather than a "Developer". Slowly i got chance and i moved to testing.
Now, it is a beautiful journey, testing new things, new protocols , new devices, but now what? after almost 12 + years i have mentored many people, saw them moving to development. Many people moving from dev to testing ( surprisingly numbers of people moving to testing is more than the number of people moving from testing to dev, as i know) .
Now, every year intern join, within a year or two they can do almost the same things which you will do. So, how do you differentiate yourself? What options do you have when you move up the ladder ?
Well, we have many options !!!
1) Become a manager and manage people. : In India becoming manager is one option which is true as you become senior.
2) Contribute more towards open source projects.
3) Mentor new people.
4) Start a website and write about your experience.
5) Learn more things, new things . Learning never stops and technology evolves very fast.
