How Test Leaders Can Get More Support from Leadership  ​

Test teams can find themselves struggling to prove their team’s worth to leadership . It’s easy for many to see test as a necessary insurance—to be done as cheaply as possible—versus a true business differentiator. However, test is far from something to check off the list before shipping products. In today’s landscape of increasing product complexity, it is essential for test teams to deliver high-quality products at a faster pace and lower cost. Strategic investments in testing technology play a crucial role.

Many test teams recognize that embracing new technologies is the key to achieving real ROI, but they often face a common challenge—they don’t hold the purse strings. As disruptive technological advances continue to reshape industries and product complexity keeps rising, innovation and investment become the only viable options. In our latest test leader peer research, we learned that 54 percent of test organizations that plan to increase their budget perform above expectations in terms of product quality and reliability, compared to just 32 percent of the rest. Similarly, when it comes to the speed of testing, 44 percent of those teams increasing their budget outperform expectations, whereas less than a third (31 percent) of others achieve the same level of success.

Leadership buy-in is paramount in securing the necessary resources to drive testing excellence.

To secure the much-needed investment, test leaders have an opportunity to not only be expert engineers in their field, but also business leaders within their organization. By communicating an intentional, proactive test strategy that aligns to the overall goals of the organization, test leaders can showcase their work as a value-add—and secure the investment they need. By adopting the approaches below, you can navigate the path towards gaining leadership support, securing vital resources, and driving meaningful impact with test.

Speak the Language of Leadership

You’d be pressed to find a better person to solve a technical challenge than a test engineer. However, when it comes to getting support across the entire business, it’s crucial for test leaders to think beyond the technical. They must create a compelling business case that can overcome any resistance. Instead of solely focusing on the technology itself, the emphasis should be on simplifying and addressing “the problem.”

What does that look like?

To effectively speak the language of leadership, your team’s goals must align with the overall corporate vision. During project discovery, pay close attention to problem statements rather than getting lost in the technical details.

To align with management and gain their support, it’s essential to follow three key steps:

1.      Clearly define the problem you’re trying to solve—Articulate the challenges and pain points the organization faces that highlight the specific problem your proposal aims to solve.

2.      Help leadership feel the impact of this problem and understand how it affects the entire organization—Connect the issue at hand to their strategic objectives and demonstrate how addressing it through a new test process, resourcing, or investment will contribute to overall business success.

3.      Establish measurable metrics that will be used to track progress—By defining KPIs that directly align to the identified problem, you can demonstrate how the initiative will lead to tangible improvements and drive positive outcomes for the organization.

Oftentimes, this approach highlights the need for a shift in mindset. Graham Green, chief solution manager for NI’s portfolio business unit, explains, “Thinking of test as a value-adding differentiator, rather than a cost center, sets apart the best-in-class companies. Educating leaders about the value of test in terms of quality, time to market, cost savings, returns, and customer satisfaction is important in allowing test to play a wider role. This leads to having a more intentional or proactive strategy, and that will unlock huge value across the organization.”

Embrace Collaboration Across Departments

Upleveling the value of test cannot be achieved in isolation. Test leaders must seek education and support from other departments within the organization. Consider the following as you share transformation initiatives outside your team:

• Identify the stakeholders involved in the decision-making process and tailor your communications to address their specific concerns and priorities.
• Listen, adopt their insights, and address different priorities across teams to build a collaborative and supportive environment.
• Clearly communicate the roles and responsibilities that will be impacted by the proposed changes, ensuring that the potential positive impacts are emphasized.

By providing a clear vision of how the proposed investment in test will positively impact their team and the organization, you can garner support and engagement from the rest of the organization

Deliver Your Transformation Pitch

Securing leadership support for test is about articulating the value of test from a business perspective. When it’s time to share your plan with leadership, keep the following points in mind:

• Highlight how your plan will improve aspects of quality, time to market, cost savings, and/or customer satisfaction.
• Design a scalable structure and implementation strategy so leaders can see how your plan can be executed across locations and teams.
• Include the insights you learned from other leaders and experts, both inside and outside your organization.
• Provide a clear vision of the desired end state to show what success looks like.
• Know what your audience cares about, and always connect your goals within test to the greater organization to share how these efforts will impact company-wide initiatives.

While many engineers are happiest working on the bench, it is critical for test leaders to also view themselves as business leaders within their organization. They are tasked with the critical job of educating company leadership about the business value of test and securing the necessary investment to drive testing excellence. 

When it comes to gaining buy-in from leadership on the resources needed to execute your test strategy, don’t be afraid to start small. Our research shows that it doesn’t take massive investment to move the needle. While 73 percent of leading test organizations are securing increased investment in test, a staggering 89 percent of them are only investing marginal increments to see gains.

By focusing on the business problem versus technical specifics, collaborating across departments to garner support, and communicating the total business benefit to leadership, test leaders can secure better support for investments. These tactics are critical to ensuring the continued growth and success of test teams. This is particularly important as products are becoming more complex with the integration of technologies like AI. The need to save on costs and reduce time to market will only grow in the competitive business environment. Working to change your organization’s mindset around the function of test to invest time and resources into test now will enable companies to stay ahead of their competition in the future.

To see what best-in-class test teams are doing differently, read our 2023 Test Leader Peer Report. Our research unearths how a focus on test can ignite progress and identify critical gaps holding back your efficiency.