e-Talk Radio: Pettichord, Bret, 8 February 2001

There is something off with the connection. I will put my comment - thank you for talking about the difference between developers and testers and then adding in the user component, which is who I am. I have noticed that there is this, sometimes haughty attitude, between our IT department when we ask for help when they have dropped a new program on us overnight. You know, and not really notify the people that there has been an adjustment or a, you know, a new program or a new addendum to the program that we are running.

Carol: Right.

Caller: And there seems to be sometimes with some of the people in IT this attitude that "don't you know what you are doing." We normally do, but there is this lack, I call it a haughty type of attitude. And that sounds like what is being discussed between the developer and the tester. There is kind of a lack of communication and each individual has a certain area of expertise, and communication seems to be the key that is lacking or an understanding of each other is what's lacking. Am I being correct?

Carol: Yes.

Caller: And I will hang up because I can barely hear, and I will be able to hear your answer over the radio better.

Carol: Okay.

Caller: Thank you all for your program, it is very interesting.

Carol: Thank you. I appreciate you calling in. Bret, do you want to comment on that?

Bret: Sure. I think that is true that there is in general a certain, what you call the haughtiness, that people who become technology experts, which includes both the developers and the IT people, that they acquire. I think that is how things are kind of set up and that when you start this kind of hazing process or something of becoming an expert and you kind of have to go through that to get there. Not all get that way and some are able to hold on to their compassion for the user. But a lot of them do, because they get told repeatedly well you did this wrong and you did that wrong, and you should install it. I think a lot of that just comes from the hobbyist roots of the software industry, especially of the PCs and what not. I think it is kind of time for us to let go of that. It has been with us. It is something that it can get involved between the testers and the developers sometimes.

I actually wanted to make a comment about something that you said earlier, you said that your company tries to manage by facts, and that is exactly what I think testers do. The testers are the people who document the facts that the managers can then use to manage by. And that, I think, is a big approach that the testers' minds have. You know, lets not talk about how it should work. Lets talk about what is actually happening. What has been observed. What is it actually doing for us. And there is an approach of the developers of that should not be happening. You must be doing something wrong. We refuse to talk about what should or shouldn't be happening. We refuse to take that as an insult to us or anything, and just say this is what I saw. This is what I put in. This is what I got out. This is what is happening for me now today. We do a really big service to everybody by focusing on the