International Comparative Studies on the Software Testing Profession

TL;DR

This study explores the motivations and perceptions of software professionals regarding testing careers across four countries, highlighting common motivators and de-motivators influencing career choices.

Contribution

It provides cross-cultural insights into software testers' motivation factors and identifies key challenges affecting their career decisions.

Findings

Few professionals are eager to pursue testing careers.

Learning opportunities motivate testers across countries.

Tester treatment and job complexity are major de-motivators.

Abstract

This work attempts to fill a gap by exploring the human dimension in particular, by trying to understand the motivation of software professionals for taking up and sustaining their careers as software testers. Towards that goal, four surveys were conducted in four countries - India, Canada, Cuba, and China - to try to understand how professional software engineers perceive and value work-related factors that could influence their motivation to start or move into software testing careers. From our sample of 220 software professionals, we observed that very few were keen to take up testing careers. Some aspects of software testing, such as the potential for learning opportunities and the importance of the job, appear to be common motivators across the four countries, whereas the treatment of testers as second-class citizens and the complexity of the job appeared to be the most prominent de-motivators.