Automated testing is one key to the solution. One thing we know for sure: No agile team will succeed doing only manual testing. We need robust automation in order to deliver business value in a time frame that makes it valuable.

For example, a skilled exploratory tester may discover issues in the system that couldn’t be detected by automated functional tests. Someone with deep testing experience might ask important questions that didn’t occur to team members without testing experience. Testing knowledge is one component of any team’s ability to deliver value.

The developers have the courage to make changes and refactor the code because they have the safety net of an automated regression suite.

Automating tests is hard, but it is much easier when you have the whole team working together. Any testing issue is easier to address when you have people with multiple skill sets and multiple perspectives attacking it.

Testers who have been working in a traditional setting might have a hard time adjusting to their new roles and activities.

For testers, it means testing “just enough” with the lightest-weight tools and techniques we can find that will do the job. Tools can be as simple as a spreadsheet or a checklist. We need to automate regression tests, but we should push them down to the lowest level possible in order to encourage fast feedback. Even simple smoke tests might be enou

Agile testers see each story or theme from the customer’s point of view but also understand technical aspects and limitations related to implementing features.

Even if the customer is internal, it can feel more like two separate companies than two teams working on a common goal of producing business value. Agile development depends on close involvement from customers or, at the very least, their proxies. Agile teams have invited customers to collaborate, work in the same locations if possible, and be inti

The principles we think are important for an agile tester