There are still companies out there that dismiss offshore QA as a steep investment — not necessarily in terms of money, but in time. They figure that finding the right QA partner, onboarding them, transferring knowledge, and coordinating schedules will simply take too much time, and that they’re better off hiring in-house or having developers handle the QA workload.
While it’s true that outsourcing your testing services comes with some initial time investment and a certain degree of change management, the benefits — huge time savings, exponential increases in productivity, and a higher-quality product — make it worth while.
Today, software companies need to be operating at peak productivity. It’s the only way to keep up with ambitious release cycles, deliver on customer feature requests, and get ahead of competitors.
Outsourced QA increases your team’s productivity and efficiency in many ways. Here are just a few of the key game-changers:
Always have the right person for the job
Hiring QA engineers in the Silicon Valley is notoriously difficult. They’re always in high demand, and those with specific, niche skill sets are snapped up quickly and well-retained. This makes finding the right engineer for your team challenging, and you may end up spending months in the interview process.
When you outsource with a reputable offshore provider, you’re gaining access to QA specialists, domain experts, and engineers with unique, hard-to-find skill sets. Because they’re seasoned testing experts, there’s no excessive training or vetting required — they’re ready to jump on a project and quickly deliver results.
Ramp up according to your releases
Having a solid outsourced QA team at your fingertips allows you to strategically plan and delegate work to the right resources, especially during crunch time (aka the weeks before and after a release). With added support from expert QA engineers, your developers are more productive, focusing on improving the shiny new features that your customers know and love. The ability to scale your team is invaluable, and it helps you maintain a proper dev to QA ratio.
The ability to scale your team is invaluable. Having a solid outsourced QA team at your fingertips allows you to strategically plan and delegate work to the right resources, especially during crunch time. (Click to tweet)
Adopt the latest tools and technology
QA engineers can bring more to the table than manpower. They can also serve as technology consultants that help you stay abreast of the latest trends in testing tools, and they can help you implement any new solutions that you decide to adopt.
When it comes to implementing automated testing programs, many companies lean on their outsourced QA teams for assistance and advice. They typically staff a handful of automation experts that can answer any questions you might have and troubleshoot any problems with the rollout.
Communicate easily, on your terms
Outsourced QA teams are great to work with because they’re used to collaborating with U.S. clients. They know what a remote relationship requires in terms of technical infrastructure and communication management. They’re up to date on the latest video conferencing and messaging tools, and the necessary security protocols that come along with them. And if you contract with a QA provider based in India, you can use the time difference to your advantage.
Using the Agile process? Your team is probably already up to speed with Agile, so they’ll ask to be included at the start of sprint planning. This early involvement helps them be as productive as possible during the sprint and reduces the amount of bug fixes post-release.
