qa is digital transformation
Automation Agile
5 mins read
March 9, 2023

Why automated testing is the best path to digital transformation

Nowadays, many organisations realise that they're facing a potentially painful and expensive problem: their current testing processes need to be high-notch automated. In this article, you'll learn the true value of avoiding automated testing in your strategy

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Robert Weingartz

Whether due to cost or a lack of urgency, many companies start automating tests using scripting languages such as Python or Selenium WebDriver instead of using full-fledged automated testing platforms like QTP/UFT, Ranorex etc. While these things may be good enough for small projects or prototyping purposes, they don’t scale well beyond a certain size or complexity level and can quickly become unmanageable when you try scaling them up (which is why so many organizations end up stuck with manual testing).

Digital transformation is not only a great way to improve software quality, but it also has other benefits of automation testing in software testing:

  1. Automated testing saves time and money;
  2. Automated testing improves software quality;
  3. Automated testing improves collaboration among testers, developers and business stakeholders.

Here are some other insights from the annual World Quality Report 2022-23 about the important factors of test automation towards adopting digital transformation in business.

automated testing

ā€œWe find the priority for most organizations is meeting business needs rather than justifying the technical ROI of automation and that the conversations in organizations have changed from how much a test tool costs to how much value it brings to the business.ā€

direct quotation, the annual World Quality Report 2022-23

Businesses are still ā€œstarvingā€ for solutions that can simultaneously help meet business and IT requirements:

The urge to create environments and deploy codes faster, in addition to getting and processing big data volumes, brings significant value to using automation solutions similar to automation test tools aqua.

So let’s see what automated QA testing advantages are.

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Test automation offers high ROI

Test automation saves time and money. Test automation improves product quality. Test automation reduces the costs of manual testing.

Test automation facilitates DevOps and continuous testing

Automated testing is a key component of DevOps or the development and operation of the software in concert. Test automation enables continuous testing, which reduces the time between code commits and tests and between test failures and fixes. This helps to keep your application stable at all times.

Test automation enhances software quality and development speed

Youā€™re probably familiar with the concept of software testing: itā€™s the process by which developers verify that their code works as expected. It’s an essential step in creating high-quality software, but there’s a problem: it’s time-consuming and tedious to do manually.

ā€œAutomation takes risk out of the test environment because itā€™s dependable and repeatable.ā€

David Taylor, Director, Quality Business Acceptance and Support, Humana Clinica

Software test automation benefits your development here as well. By automating some or all of your tests, you can make them run faster and more frequently than if they were being run by humans. Test automation can help you improve quality by ensuring that new features are tested before they get released, reducing QA costs and allowing teams to focus on more valuable work (like developing new features).

Test automation increases reliability, productivity and accuracy

Test automation can help you find defects faster, reduce the time needed to test new features and keep your application stable. Itā€™s not a silver bullet, but itā€™s an important part of a comprehensive testing strategy.

Test automation improves collaboration

Automation testing can also help improve communication between testers, developers and business stakeholders by providing a shared language for discussing issues with an applicationā€™s design or functionality. When everyone uses the same terminology (for example: ā€œtest caseā€ instead of ā€œtest scriptā€), it makes it easier for everyone involved in building an application to understand each other’s points of view on what needs improving.

Conclusion

Automated testing is a must-have if you want to succeed in the modern digital landscape.

To kill your hesitation about whether you need automated software, here is a list of some automation initiatives to undertake:

  • Work earlier with quality automation experts.
  • Automation starts as the requirements are being created; build an automation-first approach to the requirements and stories.
  • Get automation requirements agreed on before you start to automate.
  • Focus on what delivers the best benefits to customers and the business rather than justifying ROI.
  • Review your tooling and frameworks regularly.
  • Plan a roadmap for at least the next three years.
  • One tool doesnā€™t do everything. Pick the best tools for the job. Donā€™t try and make one tool do everything.
  • Invest in people. Stop chasing after unicorns and work with the people you have ā€“ they know your business.

Automated testing is an important part of digital transformation. It’s a powerful tool for improving software quality, increasing productivity and efficiency, and making your business more competitive.

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FAQ
What is meant by automated testing?

Automated testing is the process of using software tools to execute tests and verify if the application behaves as expected by the end-user and/or defined in the requirements. It saves time and reduces human error compared to manual testing.

What are examples of automated testing?

Here are some examples of practical automated testing:

  • Test automation frameworks: Selenium and Appium automate testing for web and mobile apps, respectively, allowing testers to write scripts that simulate user interactions.
  • CI/CD pipelines: Automated workflows that integrate and test code changes as they’re made and deploy to production if tests pass. Automated tests help catch errors early and ensure changes don’t break existing functionality.
How automated testing is done?

Automated testing is done in several steps:

  • Identify test cases to be automated
  • Choose appropriate tool or framework
  • Write test scripts or code
  • Integrate tests into build and deployment processes
  • Execute tests and report results
  • Maintain and update tests as needed
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