Know a Leader – 14 Questions with Neeraj Tripathi, VP of Global QA at Infor [Interview]

14 Questions with Neeraj Tripathi, VP of global QA at Infor.com as part of our “Know a Leader” interview series. 

Today, we are excited to start a brand new interview series – “Know a Leader”.  We will be interviewing famous personalities from the Software Testing industry. Our guest at this time is Neeraj Tripathi, VP of global QA at Infor.com

I am sure these interviews will be immensely helpful and inspire our readers.

14 Questions With Neeraj Tripathi

Neeraj, it is my utmost pleasure to converse with you today. We appreciate you taking the time to answer our questions. Our readers will be thrilled to learn about you and learn your views, virtually, through this 14 Question series. Let’s begin.

Question #1. Hi Neeraj, could you share more about yourself and your journey so far?

Neeraj: Sure, I have been in the IT industry for 20+ years now and like many others, I have witnessed & was part of a journey from legacy technologies to the world of IOTs . I was fortunate to start my journey building software in different technologies for clients located across the globe & leading large software projects & programs.

In last 10+ years, I have helped many organizations to build, nurture and transform their software quality assurance organizations.

My recent experience includes leading & transforming QA professionals from different LOBs for one of the fortune 10 companies into an enterprise shared services QA organization.

Question #2. How do you think testing has changed in the last decade? What can we expect in the future?

Neeraj: A lot has changed.

10 years ago, many organization didn’t even have formal QA/Test team members to verify and validate software and nowadays we see quality acceptance criteria, left shift quality, regression for incremental releases, focus on defects leakages, etc..

Many institutions now even have courses on software quality/testing & there are certifications for QA professionals.

We also now have a lot of tools available for test cases, defect management, automation, device & browser testing, etc.

Question #3. What can testers do to adapt to these changes?

Neeraj: If you are in a technology business then the only thing that is constant is change and software testing is no different.

It is important for QA Professional/tester to understand how software is being developed and more importantly how it will be consumed by the end user. Keeping up with the changes in software development technologies and tools available for QA is very important.

I encourage testers to attend or read topics from software testing conferences to understand trends and solutions. It is also good to participate and contribute to software testing blogs/communities.

Question #4. Do you think QA teams are still struggling to prove to the management that they do generate positive ROI? If yes, what works in our favor?

Neeraj: I don’t think so but QA being a value added service you should have metrics and data, not only to prove your point, it is also important to set goals for your team members and keep them motivated by demonstrating their contribution as QA professionals in the overall success of the organization.

What really worked for me during initial phases of this journey is to gather details on what problems (time to market, security, quality, customer retention, etc.) are we trying to solve and how QA can help to solve those problems.

Question #5. Do you think all the traditional, waterfall-like processes are obsolete and irrelevant to the current day’s situation? Has Rapid/Agile testing solved or created more problems?

Neeraj: You may be surprised to learn but many organizations are still pretty much waterfalls for their large programs. What is really important for QA team is to have a process and deliverables aligned with the organization’s software development life cycle.

For waterfall, early active engagement of QA is critical and for agile while active engagement is important, having a robust regression for frequent deployment is very critical.

Question #6. Will there be more testing jobs or less in the future?

Neeraj: Software testing is here to stay as long as we keep building software.

It is important for a QA professional to keep up with the technology because skills required for these types of jobs are going to continue to evolve.

Question #7. Testing is a field where we see resumes with inflated experience and skills. When you hire someone, how do you decide if they are right for the job?

Neeraj: Hiring process is critical irrespective of BA, QA, PM, Development, etc. resources. In addition to cultural fit, skills, etc. Hiring managers should be evaluating candidates on responses & problem-solving approach for close to real scenarios for the job they are interviewing for.

Question #8. With your experience, I am sure you have seen it all, done it all and solved it all. But has there been anything that has challenged you and ‘stirred the pot’ more so than the others?

Neeraj: There are many things and sometimes sequences of things that help in building your thought process and motivation, but if I need to pinpoint one thing that really amazed and challenged my thinking is the opportunity the QA team has in recent times due to exposure of your organization’s brand image in social media/digital transformation and scary security breaches.

Question #9. At the other end of the spectrum, what has given you tremendous amounts of professional joy over the years?

Neeraj: Keeping your customers happy and reducing costs on penalties, if any, as well as retaining more customers by delivering a superior quality product is what has given me joy over the years and I equally enjoy helping and educating organizations on quality and how best we can use and transform existing talent to deliver quality software.

Question #10. If there are 3 skills you would advise testers to invest in, what would those be?

Neeraj: There is quite a long list 🙂 but if I need to pick the top three, I would say:

• Customer Experience – Understanding your end user/customers is very critical for QA/test team members. When I say customer experience, I want to specify that it is different than user experience, customer experience is to understand how your customer is consuming or using the information provided by your software
• Automation Skills – Speed to market is critical and it is important for QA/tester to keep finding ways to increase test coverage and reduce testing cycle time by automating test scripts, eliminating redundant processes, automate data creation, continuous integration, etc.
• Analytical Mind – While this is important for all resources in IT, having an analytical mind is one of the key qualities to be a good QA/tester. An analytical mind helps you to observe data, think & challenge logic, resolve problems, etc.

Question #11. I am sure you get this a lot. What keeps you motivated?

Neeraj: I find it exciting to implement new process & ideas in SDLC, especially in QA and see them through to its realization.

I find the most satisfaction in building COEs, empowering QA resources & transforming QA organizations to prove their value.  Great companies & leaders I worked for have allowed me to work at my best.

Question #12. What are the trusted sources for testers to improve themselves professionally?  Your favorite personalities, books, blogs etc?

Neeraj: I like StickyMinds.com, James Bach’s Blog and reading other available testing resources. Attending testing conferences is another great source for learning about industry trends and networking. 

Question #13. If you have to summarize your mantra for success in the IT QA field in one line, what would it be?

Neeraj: Keep up with industry trends and be persistent about solving problems.

Question #14. On a lighter note, I have to ask this – Is work-life balance a myth or does it exist? What are your tips?

Neeraj: It may vary from person to person & how they perceive work-life balance. If you enjoy what you do at work then that will certainly help in achieving a work-life balance.

Thanks again Neeraj for answering all these questions. I am sure your insights will motivate our readers! 

To check out Neeraj’s profile on LinkedIn, you can click here.

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