What do you want from me

So, this post is a response to something that I read in a blog that was shared in work.

https://thelifeofoneman.com/startup-tester-survival-guide

It got under my skin a little and it's taken me a while to fully comprehend why. Let's be clear, I've never worked as a tester in a startup, though I have frequently worked in teams where I've been the only tester.

To begin with I thought that I disagreed with the whole sentiment of the post. I've reread it, and found that I don't have a fundamental problem with the core of the post but that there is a bit at the end which has stuck with me:

Remember: The role of the tester is not to find issues, it is to ensure that the product quality remains at a high standard and never accept that something cannot be improved for the next iteration.

So, I spent a long time believing this, that it was my job to 'ensure that the product quality remains at a high standard.' I found this, personally, in the roles I've had, to be very poisonous. Unless you have the power to stop the release train and get the things fixed that you wanted fixing, trying to 'ensure quality' is going to be a thankless task.

So you shouldn't care about quality at all? You can care about quality, but if you do not have the power to decide what's going into live you can't ensure it, you can only try to inform on what the current state is.

So, you think the role of a Tester is to just find issues? No. I think that the role of a tester is fluid and different depending on the rest of the team. The times when I'm happiest and I think the most productive, is when I'm doing the following

1. Challenging assumptions
2. Investigating the software
3. Providing information on how the software work based on investigations I've performed

But not every job is like this. Not every role is like this. Most importantly not every team will allow you to always do this in the ways you want to. Everywhere is different. I think, the thing that has stuck with me was how final the statement sounded:

Remember: The role of the tester is not to find issues, it is to ensure that the product quality remains at a high standard and never accept that something cannot be improved for the next iteration.

For some people this isn't what your role is. In fact, in most of the roles I have had, this hasn't been my purpose. It's frequently been a product owner who is decided what quality level the software is at, I'm simply informing them to the best of my abilities.

I suppose what worried me, is that if I'd have read this 5 years ago I'd have thought I was failing at my job because the quality wasn't improving no matter how hard I tried and I'd have dug in harder and become more frustrated and unhappier with what I was doing. So, what I would say is, this might be your role, but it might not be.