Thursday, May 29, 2008

A Different Kind of QA: Calling all Engineers

This is a repost of a blog post I made on the Xobni blog. You can read the original post here.


It’s common for people to ask why a good engineer like myself would want to work in QA, especially when you have to fight the stigma’s of QA, namely:

1) You are in QA because you are not good enough for development

2) You are in QA as a stepping stone for development

3) You are in QA because you don’t like coding

My response to those statements: pish-posh. While these statements may apply to some people in the field, they certainly don’t apply to the people serious about QA. A good QA Engineer solves quality problems with an algorithmic intensity that rivals traditional programmers. They are a true hacker in the older sense of the word - they are here to find and exploit the problems in the system in any way possible.

Every problem has its boundaries. For most developers, the boundaries for implementing solutions are usually confined to one language, stack, or technology. The boundaries for problem solving in QA are generally much wider, simply because our solutions don’t have to be productized, exposed to the public, and aren’t necessarily even in the same language or stack.

This allows a much wider range of creative freedom when solving problems. Learning new languages and technologies becomes essential for your work. Having a large arsenal of tools to attack a problem becomes a necessary part of the job. This provides you with even more of a reason to learn about the latest and greatest in tech, which is something that appeals to all engineers alike.

At Xobni we approach QA differently than most. The people we look for are not here because they are not good enough for development. They are not here because they don’t like coding. The QA people here are expected to be at the top of their game. They are expected to build and create software that can topple the Jenga-like building blocks of our product. They are expected to be creative people who like to learn, explore, and exploit software.

That being said, Xobni is looking for a QA engineer! Check out the job post, and send resumes to ryan dot gerard at xobni.com if you think you can rock our world.