Shun the Experts .... Long live the Experts

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Permalink Reply by Pradeep Soundararajan on February 4, 2008 at 1:36pm

First, before you read further, you must know and note that I am *NOT* a testing expert but I interact a lot with some of them, NOT because I love their association that helps me build my credibility or reputation BUT I enjoy the learning I have from them during every interaction.

Software testing has become a Ba##$d science . Put the testing experts in a room and u see them going for each others throats in a jiffy.

Put politicians together in a room, you might notice the same.
Put a husband and wife in a room, you might notice the same
Put sales experts together in a room you might notice the same.
Put marketing experts in a room you might notice the same.
Put cricketing experts in a room you might notice the same.

OR

Watch programs like NDTV "We the people" where topics and experts vary from a lot of things happening in and around world are discussed and you *will* notice the same.

Why do you think it is a common behavior among experts?


That's nature! I am happy that you seem to be questioning the nature and I'd be happy if you are doing that for learning - more about the nature and yourself.

Experts have all the rights to have differences of opinion(after all "when compromises continue REVOLUTION stops) but i always hope it could be done in a more dignified manner and with humility

At least in Context Driven Community ( to which I associated myself without anyone influencing me to do that ), I have seen people respect each other a lot and have hot discussions. They appreciate each other and agree to disagree, at times. Sometimes one doesn't want to agree to the other at all and that's perfectly okay because as you said, they have a right to do so.

It means within every school or community - there might be a lot of fight and betterment of ideas or learning as a resultant - that's good.

Humility is the toughest thing for someone to learn and practice. At least for me, I admit openly that I don't know how to express my humility although I think I have plenty of them. It might happen so that I might never be able to learn to communicate my humility. I DONT want to be humble to those who are spoiling the craft and that's when my inability to express my humility is of great help.

We always fight, you always fight. You fought your way among several candidates during an interview to get a job. Fighting is our nature. The mightiest, smartest, timely, and the luckiest ( if it exists ) wins. All of us win at some and lose at the other. When we lose, others win. Sometimes, we lose, we win at the same instant.

I am no expert nor have insights into what goes on in their minds but what i have seen is that the same experts who speak about creativity , freedom of expression et.c. behave in the most vile manner when their beliefs are questioned.

If you are not the Prime Minister of India, you might not be pleased when he/she announces a war against a neighboring country. You never know why the person took such a decision or does so during a situation. If you want to know that - the only way I can think of is - for you to become a Prime Minister.

There are some experts who have dedicated their life to better the craft and the rest to make money as testing is offering a huge opportunity to make money.

Betterment of craft means - disproving and taking off those so called experts who are making money and spoiling the craft.

Not that some experts don't bother about money but they wouldn't bother about money sacrificing the betterment of the craft. Money moves everyone and everything that is under "business" clause.

Some have become so confrontationist to any opposing views that their tone changes to a jingoistic one, not remembering at many times that there is a fine line between 'proving your point' and megalomania . There is a literally a a blood bath on every forum,group , blog , conference where these experts interact.

They are just being themselves and you and I need not worry about that as long as they offer insightful ideas helping us become better in the craft ( if we want to become )

People who oppose semantics and terminology's saying they make u narrow minded go on to propagate their own definitions and terminology's.

Here is a definition of testing that I heard: Testing is a process of making a product bug free!

Really?

By finding bugs - you are not making the product bug free. It is only when ALL bugs can be found and ALL bugs can be fixed without introducing ANY new bugs you might be getting close to it. It is a foolish statement lurking among many testers.

Here is another definition of testing: Testing is questioning a product in order to evaluate it -- James Bach

That's insightful and helps most of us do better as it seems to be insightful that we need to question and provide information to the management take informed decisions. That's all. Achievable and insightful, isn't it?

Insightful because testers who have subscribed to this definition have done a lot better testing than the ones with the previous definition and are also open to scrutiny about their work. Tell me a test that you did, which is not a question that you asked to the product or environment you tested!

Terminologies and definitions should help people think and not stop them or spoil their thought process or leads them to infinity or impractical ideas.

hey try to split the community into schools of thought(read the very interesting article by Bret on schools of testing : http://www.pnsqc.org/files/FourSchoolsofSoftwareTesting.pdf ).

Were you ever forced to join one of them?
As long as it doesn't spoil any of your learning or betterment opportunities, do not worry about them.

In this game of one upmanship they manage to confuse the bystanders and force them to align themselves to their school of thought. At many times we see its the commercial interests being propagated camouflaged as knowledge sharing.

You can't be confused about something unless you hear or know it. If you came to know about it, it is BECAUSE you were curious to know that. Your CURIOSITY lead to YOUR confusion and NOT they confused you. You could be clear before you read anything that - I am not going to be biased or worry about anything I read or draw conclusions on it the moment I finish reading an article. I am going to experiment and learn from it.

As a bystander and a student of testing this has become repulsive.

A true student of testing looks at anything relevant or irrelevant as a learning opportunity.

Shouldn't the EXPERTS(respected and self professed) be trying to confluence their ideas?
Do we need to split up into schools of thought?
Do we need to fight over the semantics?

Did anyone, till date, when you approached them ask you: What school of testing are you from? or Were you deprived of anything because you belonged to one school and not the other?

f we look back into history a classical example might come from the schools of thought of the Indian Philosophy, where the schools( Sankhya, Yoga ,Nyaya , Vaisheshika ,Purva Mimamsa, Vedanta) having divergent views still existed besides each other in harmony. They seen as complementary and supplementary to each other and was not an either or not situation. We had the austerism of Mahavira and crass materialism of charvaka having healthy dialogue with each other and co-existing.

I think there exists nothing called a healthy dialogue but there exist people who know to make the conversation healthy and there exists people who understand what other person means by healthy.

What do you mean by co-exist?

We co-exist with aliens ( who might be in Mars ) in the same galaxy. We breathe oxygen and they might be breathing nitrogen. I think I made a correct statement because that's my understanding of "co-exist". You might think I made an incorrect statement because it conflicts with your definition of "co-exist".

The four schools of testing do co-exist and I know of many people who are friends with people of other school of thought.



Long live the EXPERTS.........

Yes, Let those people, who are experts and work for betterment of the craft ( with money as secondary interest ) live long or even if they live short let them contribute as much as possible for the craft.

I have seen Context Driven Testing school or community members spoiling the craft for those who want to make money (sacrificing the betterment of the craft) through the ideas that CDT members think of it as a bad idea and a hinder to the betterment of the craft. I think its good to spoil the craft for such people because I too want to see the craft get better and money is secondary. Secondary means - it exists!

The fight is for the ownership of the craft.

Once again, fight is not a bad thing. We all came to existence fighting against one million sperms!

--
Pradeep Soundararajan - http://testertested.blogspot.com - +91-98451-76817 - pradeep.srajan@gmail.com

"The test doesn't find the bug. A human finds the bug, and the test plays a role in helping the human find it." --

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Permalink Reply by Jayapradeep Jiothis on February 6, 2008 at 5:35pm

Hi Pradeep,

Its a great honour to see ur comments on this subject.In fact we could not sync up after that very brief telephonic conversation i had with you when u were having dinner with Vipul.And let me also also reiterate i do not belong to any school of thought.

Let me make myself clear that this was not an attack or a critique on the eminent experts of any school, but a genuine voice of concern on could we do things better??

Well personally i DO NOT regard fights as intrinsically bad. But its about 'how we do it'. What do the bystanders deduce from it. There has to be rules of engagement. I do totally agree that within schools and communities experts do behave cordially ,but believe me i have seen the very experts(or so called) behave rudely when they come agree a conflicting idea. In my association with many of the experts on the receiving end they have mentioned that they have stopped their participation on many forums because of this rude behaviour from the other end.

I have no problems with the schools of testing , divergent views , but my problem comes when commitment to a cause becomes narrowness of thoughts. I guess u sum it up correctly when u said "The fight is for the ownership of the craft." . There u got it right. Its about ownership , its about proving oneself at the cost of others. But in this race they manage only to polarise the audience. Any idea can be put forth in a way that can convince sections . This is equivalent to the "Information asymmetry" concept in finance. An example of this was that a whole chapter of the book "Tipping Point Leadership" is based on a conclusion stated in the book The Tipping Point that the drop in crime in New York city was caused by a change in policies, actions, and leadership. However, according to the book Freakonomics, it was more likely caused by an increase in abortion rates several years earlier.Another example of this is that when Da Vinci Code was released it lead to at-least some sections of its readers feel what it spoke about was the truth. Remember this is the force behind behind recruitment and rise of terrorists.


You mentioned that ">> i have seen Context Driven Testing school or community members spoiling the craft for those who want to make money (sacrificing the betterment of the craft) through the ideas that CDT members think of it as a bad idea and a hinder to the betterment of the craft." . Now the point an X person thinks as betterment of the craft is relative to his view point and what he ASSUMES to be right. "The mind sees what it wants to see ".We need to be aware that we have seen a Copernicus and Galileo being vilified for their thoughts but they later stood vindicated. At a point of time particle physics ruled the roost till it was dethroned by quantum theories . We have still not had a good enough sample of time to say with certainty which of these thought process would stand vindicated. Its about points of view , one mans 'hindering' of craft is another's "betterment". (Its beautifully exemplified by HSBC your point of view ads (http://www.yourpointofview.com/hsbcads_print.aspx)).

Morever i see some disturbing tendencies in the studies and analysis made by these experts.
1. Survivorship bias : In finance, Survivorship bias is the tendency for failed companies to be excluded from performance studies because they no longer exist. It often causes the results of studies to skew higher because only companies which were successful enough to survive until the end of the period are included.This is being practised by some of these experts to prove their points. The world has bore the brunt because of this practise by loosing money in the markets , i fear this may affect the testing community by us taking assumptions based on some of the data these experts show.

2. Quoting things out of context : I have seen may experts pulling out sentences out of articles/sylabii/presentations/blog posts etc.(the ISTQB syllabus seem to be their favourite hunting point). and quoting them out of context without mentioning what preceded or what succeeded that sentences , and they end manage misquote it.Information assymetry comes into play here as well.

3. Hypocrisy : As i mentioned the same set of people who oppose semantics and terminology's go on to propagate their own definitions and terminology's. The same set of people who speak against certain set of affiliations given a chance go and for commercial interests act the opposite...


Pradeep, in my view there is healthy dialogue possible. That's not a misnomer ...

Yes Politicians do fight , but if it leads to the betterment of the society they would be appreciated , but f its to protect their own interests they would be detested. Remember they may win elections but .....

"Let nobel thoughts come to us from all sides" - M.K.Gandhi



JP

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Permalink Reply by Shrini Kulkarni on February 4, 2008 at 4:42pm

Hi JP ...

Shrini here .. hope you remember me ... Nice to see you here. The thread you started here has deep thoughts ... some good and some perceptions that you seem to have formed as you interact ...

What are you complaining about? Schools of testing categorization?
or
Some expert who (as you have seen) has reacted rudely or without humaility?

>>>> "Put the testing experts in a room and u see them going for each others throats in a jiffy.
I have been hanging around many experts for last 2-3 years. My experience has been different. There are debates, at times about terminologies, semantics - but no blood bath or holding throats or collars - all for learning.

Let us take one by one ...

There has been lot discussed about schools of testing .... You might want to visit Rahul Verma's blog on this topic (7-8 series posts)

Before I react, can you clarify which issue you want to discuss

Shrini

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Permalink Reply by Jayapradeep Jiothis on February 6, 2008 at 4:48pm

Hi Shrini,

Pleasure meeting you again(albeit through this channel).

Shrini, my concern was not about having different schools of thought. but about behaviours of some of the experts. I were to believe what Pradeep said , then its a fight for ownership of the craft.

Do we need to fight for ownership of this nascent craft.

I have detailed some of my concerns in my reply to pradeep (above).

Well as u said it may be perceptions that i built. And im looking for answers thats all.

JP

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Permalink Reply by Shrini Kulkarni on February 6, 2008 at 5:27pm

Hi JP,

>>Shrini, my concern was not about having different schools of thought. but about behaviours of some of the experts. I were to believe what Pradeep said , then its a fight for ownership of the craft.

While Pradeep can clarify whether the fight is for ownership of the craft or not !!!, let me convey my view...

The fight is NOT for the OWNERSHIP. No one can own the craft, No one owns now and No one ever will.
If you analyze these experts carefully (not sure who you are referring to) and their opinions, from a free/unbiased mind, you might notice that the fight is about "core differences" in the beliefs, practices. When people from different backgrounds come together and start working together, such debates and fights are common and objective of such fight to shed light on unknown things, check assumptions, contexts and so on.

Debates and fights do well to our craft as they clear the darkness that we often see. I have witnessed several fights over schools, certifications, practices, techniques, exploratory testing, metrics, tester role - all of these have helped me to understand more. I believe we should encourage such fights and debates (but not at the cost of dis-respecting the individuals, making personal remarks and attacks).

Healthy debates are good for testing - after all, critical viewpoint, analysis, questioning are key testing attributes. Why stay away from them?

I REPEAT the discussions and fights you seem to be referring are not for OWNERSHIP of the craft but for BETTERMENT of craft and they stand as acknowledgement of INHERRENT DIFFERENCES PRACTICE of the testing craft.

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Permalink Reply by Jayapradeep Jiothis on February 6, 2008 at 5:38pm

Shrini ,

Point taken...

>>> I REPEAT the discussions and fights you seem to be referring are not for OWNERSHIP of the craft but for BETTERMENT of craft and they stand as acknowledgement of INHERRENT DIFFERENCES PRACTICE of the testing craft.< This is what we all what... Well if i perceived things differently i should definitely give it a re think.

(BTW the last reply got trimmed for some reason , i have reposted it...

:)
Jp

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Permalink Reply by Michael Bolton on February 6, 2008 at 4:39am

Brian Marick, I believe, belongs to a different school (or community) from mine, but that doesn't stop me from using an expression that he favours:

what i have seen is that the same experts who speak about creativity , freedom of expression et.c. behave in the most vile manner when their beliefs are questioned.

Brian would say, "An example would be helpful now." Can you point us to something that you're referring to?

Shouldn't the EXPERTS (respected and self professed) be trying to confluence their ideas?

There are at least two ways to interpret this question: "Should experts get together to discuss and debate ideas?" or "Should the experts work towards agreeing on everything?" To the first, I would answer, Yes, certainly. To the second, I would answer No, not at all. As you say, revolution could stop. But worse, evolution would stop too. The absence of disagreement would be founded on no new information or energy coming in from the outside--a closed system. The field isn't a closed system, nor should it be.

Do we need to split up into schools of thought?

It's actually convenient to do so, since it reduces confusion. Philosophical divisions allow one to say that certain decisions, processes, tools, ideas are rational from the perspective of a different set of values, rather than irrational

Do we need to fight over the semantics?

If we fail to acknowledge that people might mean different things, even if they use the same words; or that they mean the same things, even though they're using different words, we run the risk of very serious misunderstandings. Arguments often seem to be about conclusions, but they're almost always about premises. Understanding diversity of premises helps us to understand the differences between conclusions that reasonable people might reach.

One of my favourite lines about semantics comes from Wendell Johnson. He said, "To a mouse, cheese is just cheese. That's why mousetraps work."

None of this precludes the idea that people can be respectful and nice to one another while they disagree. Contempt is dangerous contagious.

---Michael B.

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