Testing Pendulum

Yesterday I got my team together and we spent some time talking about testing techniques.  Specifically, since I started reading Exploratory Software Testing by James Whittaker I've thought a lot about how his techniques fit into the way we're doing work here.  Let me illustrate:

I started off by writing "automation" on the board and said something to the effect of, "I spend all my time automating everything... this guarantees full coverage.  It's the right way to test."  I was hoping for some push back, and I got some push back.  There was a consensus that not everything should be automated.

I then said, "I'm a sapient tester... I use my brain to decide which paths to test and which ones to ignore.  I don't need to write things down - it just slows me down." and wrote "Ad-hoc" on the board.  Again, I got push back.  "No, it's important to write test cases to keep testing repeatable."

I drew the pendulum on the board swinging from "Ad-hoc" to "Automation".  You see, to me, the pendulum of testing tends to swing back and forth between ad-hoc and automation.  In some companies it will be a matter of months, others it will only happen every few years where the focus will shift.

I then asked, "Where does exploratory testing fall?"  The first response I got was "Next to ad-hoc".  That's not an uncommon perception.  There are a lot of people out there who perceive exploratory testing as just a fancy way of saying "Ad-hoc with some basic rules or syntax."  Really, exploratory testing is concentrated deviations from a scripted test.

Now, I don't want any of my team members to be spending 100% of their time doing automation - unless of course they are an automation specialist and there are other testers doing more scripted testing.

I also don't want my testers to be ad-hoc, which to me is an excuse for lazy testing.

I want my testers to be wise - to use their individual talents and skills.  I believe that in an organization, testing should float somewhere in the blue zone.  Due to project differences, I can't prescribe the 100% solution to 100% of testing questions.  However, I maintain that best practices are employed by the testers that aim for scripted exploratory testing.

Where is the pendulum swinging in your company?  Was it somewhere else before?  Comment below.