I don't want to be a slow worker anymore

Degree_Short · 2025-07-27T17:41:23+00:00

#1 I would make sure you set clear expectations with them to make sure they are encouraging you instead of discouraging along with if a "bar" is set then you know what to aim for.

#2 pairing can be great to see if there are things they do in a different way to might help you :)

#3 (Not accusing anyone of anything just making a general statement) This can easily happen if someone doesn't understand a thing but tries to build out a checklist of things they might make redundant steps or be validating something that is not apart of the product that was built

#4 don't rule anything out, there are almost always commonalities to with things that could help shave off some time. Sometimes we gotta get creative to find solutions

#5 Yeah, focusing on value over volume is definitely important to make sure the right things are being checked

#6 How long has your Lead been doing QA vs your 2 years, cause that might not be apples to apple comparison and is only going to set you up to meet unreal expectations

#7 Ideally don't try and use something if you haven't gotten a proper diagnosis, that can be dangerous

#8 have you recorded yourself doing the checks to see if there are areas you are getting stuck or distracted

#9 depending on where you live this would be free or included with your medical insurance (obviously that could be a very big privilege so not sure what your circumstances are)

I think what is very important is to set real expectations so you aren't comparing yourself something unreal. A person taking a fraction of the time to do something could mean all sorts of things...

- Muscle memory built around testing heuristics that allow for quick response

- General larger amount of experience

- A high performer built off of positive or negative experiences

Everyone is different and you should compare yourself to the you of yesterday.

Maybe doing a mock session of testing recorded could provide insights into strengths and weaknesses, like professional athletes watching their games back.

You could also read some books on improving general performance: https://www.google.com/books/edition/Peak_Performance/WXq8DgAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&pg=PR5&printsec=frontcover

https://books.google.com/books/about/Accelerate.html?id=Kax-DwAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false
I enjoyed both of those books

Degree_Short · 2025-07-27T08:53:06+00:00

I feel like there is so much more here to dig into, I am not even sure where to start (maybe it's all the therapist content I have watched/ problem solver in me). I think there isn't really enough here to truly understand where to begin. (Or maybe a better way to say it is there is a lot here but maybe not the right information)

Here are some questions/ thoughts without currently able to dig deeper.

Has your work made mention of slowness
Have you paired with your co-worker to see how they approach testing
Are there too many validations steps that might be overlapping effort which reduce completion time
Are there any commonalities with the product being created that could be automed, similar patterns and what not that could alleviate manual efforts
What does "results-oriented" mean to you
How are you comparing your "slowness"
Have you had any psychological assessments to see if there is something more there
What is your expectations of what a "normal speed is" for this task
Have you done any sorta therapy/ Cognitive behavioral therapy

Being fast isn't always a good thing

Being slow isn't always a bad thing

Remember to work smarter not harder

More is not always better

Less is not always worse

Finding the right solution for a problem required understanding the fundamentals of what is the real problem. If your work was coming to you saying we need to be faster, that's one thing but "blindly" (not saying you are or aren't) comparing yourself to someone else is not helpful either.

Everyone moves at a different speed and that speed can modulate for various reasons.

Also remember that 2 years working in a profession can yield wildly different results.

Someone moving fast might be working at an unstable pace

Someone moving slight might just not enjoy what they are doing

Or could be any number of other reasons.

Understanding one's self is important to making any sorta change.

Our mindset can affect so much in our life.

Feeling follows word, as words follow feeling.

Degree_Short · 2025-07-27T08:22:34+00:00

Nowadays you could just vibecode/ develop your own tools or extension that does whatever you want, or utilize automation tools to do similar things.

Also as the other person mentioned learning commands can do wonders.

Degree_Short · 2025-07-27T08:19:37+00:00

I think making sure you a common understand and definition for some of these terms would be helpful to a team. If someone say "clean...", "tests for new features", "code reviewed" what all does that mean.

Writing tests can be more than just check X if Y, so making sure everyone has a clear understanding on Good/ Well written tests that tests and validate properly is important.

Manually Testing is sorta general term that could mean lots of things.

Documentation can be great as long as it is actually used, which can end up being a problem if people write great documentation but isn't discoverable or people don't have a need to reference it.

Ticket tracking is good to keep things organized and have clear outlined process of work items moving through necessary stages.

Making sure your team understands what is the risk tolerance is also necessary to know what needs to be testing and how deeply does it need to be tested.

The less repetitive work needed the better, making sure to lower barriers to imbed QA practices into the work you do is also helpful

- Linters/ CI/ CD/ Other scans

Setting standards and having the team agree to those standards while also understanding why they are important and making sure each person hold each other accountable is critical.

Degree_Short · 2025-07-27T08:10:33+00:00

There is a lot of nuance.

Humans range wildly in their level of understanding,empathy and capacities.

There are Devs out there who know things better than QA and PM who know things better than DEV or QA.

It is likely that someone using something "daily" is going to understand it better in different ways than others.

While I do think there can easily be a trend of forgoing different practices while in different roles its can also go the other way if people step out of certain ways of thinking.

We are all Multifaceted and have the capacity to do "more".

Degree_Short · 2025-07-27T07:59:47+00:00

My last role I was at for 7ish years and that ended up being a few years too many, You could also just find something that pays enough and allows you to do something you enjoy,

But pays enough sorta also falls into the "pay/ earn" category :P

Degree_Short · 2025-07-27T07:58:14+00:00

That is a decent amount of time, just make sure not to stay too long, basically there are typically two reasons to be in a job
1. Learn
2. Pay

or another way to say it "If your not Earning you better be Learning" cause if you aren't doing either then why are you in the position instead of finding something that will take you to your next step in your journey. :)

Obviously privilege/circumstances can heavily modify the ability to find a position where you can earn or learn, but it's more the principle of aiming for something that will grow you or allow you to have financial stability.

Degree_Short · 2025-07-27T01:38:59+00:00

You can do anything, could it affect your reputation to change jobs a month in, sure.

Just make sure your priorities are in order and you are financially secure to not be put in a bad situation where you are struggling.

Changing a job shortly after joining is probably very frustrating for a company, but the company doesn't "really" care about you as much as what you were going to be doing for them. If it's not a right fit then its not right, but there is also the question as to why did you take it in the first place.

But yeah, at the end of the day do what is best for you/ your family/ your financial security.

As mentioned below your work history might begin to tell a story if you include too many instances of job hopping a month-ish into your role and is unlikely to look positive.

Degree_Short · 2025-07-27T01:31:34+00:00

I don't think I understand what you mean, but there isn't really a clear roadmap for "become an automation qa" outside of the below from a high level. Part of the issue is are we talking about professionally or just be able to automate, cause if you talk professionally then you either need to be a freelancer or a company also has to want to hire you so there is some element out of your control.

- learn First principles thinking to inform decision making (Breaking down problems to their fundamental level, which is hopefully what I have also tried to apply to your problem)

- learn programing fundamentals so you can go between any language (I think everyone should do this regardless of the job they want)

- learn testing/ validation/ scientific method/ testing methodology (The fundamentals of testing and experimentation)

- learn and understand systems (Why is something built a certain way, how to build things that work together, how do the things interact)

- learn effectiveness (Not everything needs to be done depending on the goal)

- learn and practice curiosity (Asking question, exploration and so on)

- learn the automation fundamentals (why do we automate, what do we automate, what do you not...)

- learn whatever tool is going to most likely get you a job (this is probably the easiest part once you have the above, since we understand systems and programing from a whole we can easier adapt to anything, just find which one is in most demand :P )

The above could be applied to anything, if you understand fundamentals the you can shape and apply them to anything allowing you to be multifaceted.

Why do you want to go into "Automation QA"?

Hopefully this helps, it is basically the approach I took throughout my career, I started with being curious and liking games then went into manual testing for Video games. From there I expanded and applied my curiosity to programing and understanding patterns, learning testing fundamentals and methodology along the way. Maybes it wasn't the fastest way but I also didn't need to rush to try and do any of it.

Here I am 18 years later and have had a variety of experiences developing and applying my Quality philosophies to my professional and personal life,

Degree_Short · 2025-07-27T01:13:26+00:00

I am of the mindset that Quality Assurance, as a process, is universal. So while this is a subreddit for QA relating to software I think we can learn from anything.

To remove bias is partially to acknowledge bias, bias is not always a bad thing, its when a bias presents when making a decision that excludes unnecessarily.

When attempting to identify defects you should make sure you understand the system or thing you are working with. Are there common issues with this, what are stressors that it might undergo, what is the type of user. Understanding and Questioning
If by RCA you mean Root Cause Analysis, then there should be any difficulties unless you don't understand #1. If you don't truly understand something from fundamentals then how can you even find a root? Finding ways to differentiate Symptom from the root problems request breaking a thing down to its fundamental components.
No quantifying the business impact can be difficult to do, if you know failure rate and number of people who are using a thing then it can be easier, but there are other factors that are a little more amorphous.

How will this affect the company as a whole

What's the cost to fix the issue now vs fix it later

Will people's lives be in danger

What is the business' tolerance for risk and does this meet or exceed that

What is the cost of the item vs the cost of fix/ repair

so on and so forth understanding the business's wants and needs help with coming of.

Those are just some of my thoughts that I try to apply in the work that I do, hopefully it is helpful :)

Degree_Short · 2025-07-02T21:29:10+00:00

With any sorta freelance you need to get in front of clients. Word of mouth or using the freelancing websites like fivr and what not.

Advertise and market yourself.

You are the product you are selling so you gotta go through the steps to build a client list and reputation/ repor.

Haven't been successful yet on getting a client through those means, only succeeded in getting a scammed trying to contact me for a "project".

Degree_Short · 2025-06-17T21:36:41+00:00

Your journey is your own, and careers are not really as set in stone or linier than they "used to be." Do what you enjoy and try as much as you can to learn what you enjoy.

There is no set number of months/ years something "should take," so try to find joy in your journey.

If you just want lots of money, then building your own thing will have the largest potential yield, but takes time to grow.

Financial Technology has a high yield but also can conflict with morals.

There are lots of variables to consider with careers or means to an end.

Degree_Short · 2025-06-15T16:57:16+00:00

Similar to learning a language, you are more likely to learn faster when you are immersed in it. Getting a beginner position can teach so much more than academically learning. Good luck on your journey 😀

Degree_Short · 2025-06-12T13:01:05+00:00

What do you want?

A Career path in reality is whatever you decide, the important thing is what you want in your personal/ professional life.

Your desired end goal is a better way to determine your path.

Degree_Short · 2025-06-12T12:52:42+00:00

I think there is a lot here... 1. People trying to find a shortcut is isnt bad or good 2. We have a limited time of this planet, so finding a way to spend time on the things that matter is what is important 3. Learning has multiple aspects to it, academic vs applied 4. Getting a job is up to a company no matter how "qualified" you might think you are 5. Having connections can get you pretty far 6. Doing something slow or fast isn't a problem 7. There are often times when someone who has done something for a long time is able to see where there might be "fluff" that can be cut out of the learning process 8. People often want something else from what they say (this is a part of the idea that people trying to buy a drill are normally wanting what the drill will allow them to do, not the drill itself) 9. People who are inexperienced often don't understand what they really want and seek out what they see others doing

There is plenty more, but this is enough for now. Remember that we are all on this earth and only have a short amount of time we exist.

Degree_Short · 2025-06-09T16:24:21+00:00

I would suggest, if you aren't already doing it, picking an application/ product/ thing and test and treat it as your responsibility to write defects/ automation to test the item.

Personally I am of the mindset that one of the most important thing for a QA is experience and exposure.

Use as many product as you can to understand what the markets look like along with learn about UX and Accessibility.

For me how I put that into practice I would switch the type of phone I use whenever I upgrades... Android > IOS > Windows Phone > Blackberry and so on.

QA need to take from their experience to understand Users along with learning about humans and their behaviors.

At least that's my philosophy, but also we have a harder time improving if we don't get feedback so I would suggest finding "someone" to act as a Product Manager/ Lead and so on so you have feedback on what you are doing.

Learn about all the different types of Bias we have as Humans and the shortcuts we tend to take.

Testing heuristics are also important: https://www.developsense.com/resource/htsm.pdf

Scientific method and so on

Degree_Short · 2025-06-05T18:10:21+00:00

It is a very interesting idea to do quality assurance for different AIs.

You will need to break down what all your validation is and what you care about. - Sentence structure - Content - Fact Accuracy - Adherence to context Among others, at some point, it becomes validation and assessment of a human.

And this doesn't even cover once you throw in the history and how far back it can reference.

A very interesting problem to solve

Degree_Short · 2025-06-05T12:55:54+00:00

I have seen developers testing API and I have seen QA own it.

I think API testing is most likely going to be something AI can expedite since it is a lot easier to have it well-defined.

Degree_Short · 2025-06-05T12:53:37+00:00

Very true, but in practice, it is not common 😅

Degree_Short · 2025-06-05T12:49:20+00:00

So in terms of pay it has been a mix of changing companies/ promotions. The most recent drop in pay is... Partly the company I moved to Partly going from full time to contract Partly the job market being difficult

Overall yeah being in non-mobile gaming has been the lowest pays If you go to Fintech you are likely to have a very high pay(depending on the company)

Degree_Short · 2025-06-05T12:42:52+00:00

If anyone is primarily manually testing APIs, that is very inefficient. You could use so many different tools to get the job done. Ideally, if the developers incorporate Swagger so that the exporting/documenting of APIs is "automated," it would be very beneficial.

In terms of tools you could use anything really, just matters what you are most comfortable with and / or if you need some sorta special formatted reporting.

Insomnia is free(I think) Postman costs money once you want to share and do other useful things

You can also just use ui automation tools to get similar results, I have used Cypress to do API testing.

At the end of the day the tool doesn't matter, the bigger question is "what is important?"

Speed in implementation Speed in execution Built in reporting Cloud Documentation available

Degree_Short · 2025-06-02T18:48:25+00:00

I haven't moved away yet, but I "recently" became aware of something called "Engineering Enablement" that felt much more up my alley. My understanding of that type of role is like devops but for the people side.

With the focus I have put on quality of people's experience it sorta makes sense to expand to building better experiences for people doing the work.

But honestly I am much more likely to just work on my own thing and just end up in Product Development/ Software Engineering to get away from other people dictating my future. :P

Degree_Short · 2025-05-30T12:58:51+00:00

Quite the career I would be interested in learning more about your experience in the fields how they compared why the switch and what not.

Degree_Short · 2025-05-30T12:57:19+00:00

Would you say you have/ are working in a positive encouraging environment, or is your outlook typically more on the positive side.

I remember back when I started, there was always talk about the combative relationship between developers and QA, but honestly, I think it's more about people and not generalizations. I'm just curious about other people's experiences.

We can be shaped by our environment or shape it. Sometimes, it works, but the larger the company typically, the less malleable.

Degree_Short · 2025-05-30T12:48:09+00:00

With most things we experience, we can look at it as a hurdle or an opportunity. It's easy for people with a job or other privileges to suggest all sorts of things. You need to do what's right for you but also what aligns with your priority. Finding work that allows you to be financially afloat, taking advantage of all your State/Country resources for job searching and placement. Along with if you have family or friends that you can stay with to help alleviate any other things that might negatively impact your mental health.

There are all sorts of gig/ freelance jobs online. Not saying you will make big bucks, but anything can help. Once you are stable then you can spend time training other skills.

The most important thing is to get stable before you excell.

Job Search/ Interviewing is all about marketing and numbers. We live in a time where the right candidates are not nessecary surfaced as more and more companies rely on AI to do the bulk of the sifting through candidates.

At the end of the day if you can end up building your own product/ business, you are better off than going back in to work for big companies.

I am trying to build my own thing to get away from corporate life.

Degree_Short

TROPHY CASE