Do Testers and Developers have the same mindset?
Many people in the IT Industry still struggle to find value in testing. Some think they do not need to invest much money on testing, simply because a Developer can test what they build. Little do they know that Testers and Developers have different mindsets and, therefore, they see the same application differently.
I am a Junior Test Analyst and in my short experience, I was able to notice that the difference between Testers and Developers is substantial. They do different jobs and are very good in them, separately.
I was retesting a functionality this week for an application and, as Testers do, I was trying to break what had just been fixed. At the end of my test, I have found many issues with it, going from “the page doesn’t load and keeps looping constantly” to “a complete crash”.
I have logged an issue in our current sprint board and started testing something else. Later on, the Developer reached out to me saying they weren’t able to replicate the issue, asking me to retest the task. I was a little worried (as a Junior Tester!) and tested it again. The result: I found the same issues I had found before.
The Developer and I sat together in order to replicate the steps I have added to the ticket I logged, and we were able to replicate the issues. Today, in our daily stand-up, we discussed the issue with the team. The Developer who checked the issue with me earlier told the other one in the team: “Bruno was testing it differently than we normally do”. And that is my point, right there! Testers have a “destructive” mindset when doing their job, whereas Developers have a “constructive” mindset when building a functionality.
The method I was using to test the application was totally different than the one used by those Developers. And that is what makes testing (and Testers) essential in every technology team and in their processes.
Because no, Developers and Testers do not have the same mindset.
