Model Office Testing: A New Age Quality Imperative

Transcription

1 1 White Paper submitted for: 13th Annual International Software Testing Conference 2013, QAI Model Office Testing: A New Age Quality Imperative Bharat Jadwani Senior Consultant Kartik Jain Senior Consultant Robin Jain Consultant Deloitte Consulting India Pvt. Ltd. Fairmont Level 2, Hiranandani Business Park Powai Mumbai , Maharashtra

2 2 Abstract Have you ever wondered why some organizations appear to transition to new ways of working after the completion of large IT transformation projects or programs seamlessly, while others struggle and find the experience very disruptive? The answer may well be the Model Office. The Model Office is a great way to gain buy in from those people who will ultimately use the system, as it gets them involved early, adapts the systems based on their feedback, and ultimately gets them to sign-off the systems and processes as fit for purpose. This paper describes how businesses can embrace Model Office Testing in a quick and easy manner Audience:- IT Project Managers, Test Managers, Test Leads, Business Leads and Business resources with testing responsibilities Need of thehour Understanding & Objectives When we think about testing we naturally think of verifying the outcome produced by individual system components. We also think of verifying the combination of these system components to test the end-to-end system. In the process of testing, it is quite common to forget that these deliverables will have a significant impact on ways of working, tools, and processes used within the organization. A Model Office can be used to address this. We have all heard this one time or the other, When testing, for God sake ensure everything is the same as it will be in LIVE. Model Office testing really goes ahead to implement it. Overview A Model Office is a simulated business environment that accurately reflects the business processes and workflows of the to-be production environment. It is basically a mini-business operation, staffed by both experienced business and technical people. In this scenario these resources then mimic the intake of the business processes and their flow through the system to ensure that the systems implementation reflects business requirements. These can also include non-functional requirements. Alternation and improvements can be fed back into development for either current releases or future releases depending on need and severity.

3 3 Model offices are typically used over many releases therefore through the life time of the system rollout. There are often side benefits; such as it enables business and technology to begin to create a common dialogue of understanding and cross transfer of skills, essential to any large application implementation. Model Office Does:- Use pre-established test scripts to test end-to-end business processes in a controlled manner Provide an overview of the system and business processes by walking through representative business scenarios Provide Model Office participants with hands-on experience and exposure to the new system and business processes, allowing participants to establish confidence, validate business performance metrics, and identify gaps in business productivity Model Office Does Not:- Provide an opportunity for Model Office participants to experiment with the system or alter the agreed design Provide comprehensive coverage of all system functionality or business processes. Typically only 20% of transactions that occur 80% of the time should be tested in this phase. The remaining 80% should have been tested in previous testing phases Replace training or provide new users with training Model Office - Expected Benefits Model Office Testing provides a production-like environment for stakeholders to perform complete business processes and validate solution functionality from end to end. By focusing on most commonly used processes and functionality that has been thoroughly tested, Model Office Testing helps increase business confidence and accelerates go-live decisions. Key Benefits:- Increases business confidence by providing hands on access to most commonly used functionality, with constant feedback from Users enabling issues to be caught and addressed thereby, accelerating the go-live decision Helps in identification of potential Risks early in the Project Stage, thereby increasing the Success rate of the Project

4 4 Reduces focus on testing and defect resolution in lower priority areas, reducing scope of testing and the number of defects requiring resolution Allows knowledge to be transferred to business earlier in the development lifecycle, increasing buy-in and supporting change management activities at an early stage as the systems and processes develop, reducing the severity of the learning curve Facilitates a comprehensive evaluation of the Application, its Design and most business change activities without impacting the operational business Allows training of Business/End Users to enrich their experience by working on the development of the Model Office Enables UAT phase to be a Fast tracked stage as key users will have been involved in the design and build exactly the way through the Model Office Approach Model office environments can be easily updated as development progresses, providing strong support for iteration. Model Office Testing fits perfectly with the iterative approach. Additionally, several accelerators can be leveraged to speed Model Office preparations. Figure 1: Model Office Testing Approach

5 5 Model Office Testing is integrated into an overall Test Strategy and Plan, in order to maximize speed and quality benefits. Figure 2: Integration with Overall Test Plan Model Office Testing Vs. Other Testing Phases The table below represents typical Test phases that are implemented in a release. Each Test phase builds upon work performed in the previous Test phase. The percentage of conditions that need to be tested from one phase to another decreases, as users spend more time validating business workflow. Figure 3: Model Office Testing Vs. Other Testing Phases

6 6 Proposed Framework Model Office Testing Framework is a combination of Testing best practices and and a Capability Development Lifecycle which will engage and support people across the IT organization in being more effective and efficient prior to go-live. This framework can be used to deploy Model Office Testing in any IT projects. It will be used to drive quality, business confidence, and end user training based on Model Office Testing principles and best practices. The framework has four stages: Planning, Business Scenario Walkthrough, Partial Business Simulation, and Full Business Simulation. Each phase combines a focus on increasing the business confidence, uncovering protential application issues early in the project stage, and reduces the focus on testing and lower priority areas. The figure below illustrates how Model Office Testing can be employed during the typical Software Development Lifecycle. Figure 4: Model Office - Stages and Timing Business Scenario Walkthrough The main purpose of the Walkthrough sessions is to gain confidence within the Business areas that the newly designed Business processes & organizational structures will be fit for purpose and will achieve the overall requirements of the Organization. Business Scenario Walkthroughs help validate a consistent understanding of the solution between different work threads (policy, IT, configuration, and workflow).

7 7 Figure 5: Why execute Business Scenario Walkthroughs? The objective of the Business Scenario Walkthrough will be achieved through a series of workshops. The inputs to the workshops will be deliverables from the previous (conceptual design) and current (detailed design) phase. The outputs will be a validation that the design is consistent with the principles defined throughout the project Figure 6: Flow Chart for Business Scenario Walkthroughs The following tools can be utilized to perform Business Scenario Walkthroughs of the application solution

8 8 Figure 7: Tools Used for Business Scenario Walkthroughs Best Practices to consider Model Office Testing is a relatively new field and still alien to a lot of people in the testing domain. However, if we follow a structured approach and do things methodically, it can be adopted with ease and without any hassles. The following best practices should be considered during Model Office implementation and operation. Figure 8: Best Practices to Consider

9 9 Case Study - Accelerating Delivery for an Administration System Program Deloitte partnered with a leading Insurance provider to improve testing performance through innovative test strategies. Testing effort dramatically reduced by focusing efforts on most critical functionality, engaging business stakeholders in a controlled environment, and increasing use of automation. Figure 9: Deloitte Case Study

10 10 References Item Model Office Testing Overview Model Office Testing Simulation Model Office Testing Webinars Other Resources Description Deloitte Internal Resources Deloitte Internal Resources Deloitte Internal Resources The Model Office and improving user acceptance Helix risk Assessment Approach Table 1: References Biography of the Authors Bharat Jadwani is a Senior Consultant at Deloitte Consulting and has over 10 years of experience leading the functional requirements and testing teams in onshore offshore delivery model. He has extensive Functional and QA experience working with insurance clients leading technology transformation and modernization efforts. His Quality Assurance and Testing expertise include Test Design and Execution, Test Planning and Strategies, Test automation tools and Frameworks, Performance Testing, and Web Services Testing. His technical abilities include test automation tools such as QuickTest Professional, WinRunner, LoadRunner, SOATest, and Selenium. Bharat has excellent Life and P&C Insurance domain expertise - attained LOMA Level I certification in Life Insurance and Annuities, and Guidewire Functional Certification in PoliceCenter (Policy Admin System). Bharat holds a Bachelor of Science in Computer Engineering from National Institute of Technology, Jamshedpur. Kartik Jain is a Senior Consultant at Deloitte Consulting with over 9 years of strong experience in Functional and Automated Testing of large scale implementations. He has worked and led cross cultural teams in capacity of Test Lead, HP ALM Specialist, and QA Consultant. He has performed Quality Assurance for Clients focusing on FSI, Public Sector and Health Care Sectors and Technical platforms like Siebel, SAP and Customized frameworks. Kartik has good experience in Client facing roles and has been face of Deloitte at Onshore deployments. Kartik holds Bachelor s Degree in Computer Science from Amravati University. Robin Jain is a Consultant at Deloitte Consulting and has over 5 years of experience in both development and testing roles. He has worked across various industry verticals ranging from petrochemicals to semiconductors across the globe. He has a rich experience in analyzing business systems and he has captured the essence of business processes involved across various sectors. His primary area of interest is Quality and he is a certified SIX SIGMA Green belt.robin holds a Bachelor s degree in Computer Science from National Institute of Technology, Allahabad and a Master s degree in Business Administration from IIT Delhi.

11 11 APPENDIX - Abbreviations MOT MO UAT BSW IT Item Description Model Office Testing Model Office User Acceptance Testing Business Scenario Walkthroughs Information Technology