Tech Talks With Sandra John

Since we are quickly progressing towards a truly digital world that is surrounded by websites, software, and apps, driving innovation needs extensive focus on quality matters.  

Besides, the ever-expanding tech landscape has made people more informed than ever making them long for better experiences. And when we talk about the future, this experience is not restricted to performance or security anymore. Rather, it needs to work on everything from functionality to personalization of the user experience.  

Therefore, it has become more important than ever to harness the full potential of manual testing solutions and automation testing to complement the tech goals. Effective testing could not only help developers but can help align the products with the perspective of the real-time users.  

Since the only way to yield power products that can transform the world and meet expectations is to develop the right understanding of the user landscape, we at BugRaptors constantly work on improving our software testing solutions.  

As the exchange of information and knowledge sharing is one of the most effective ways to yield success, this time, our in-house expert, Sahil Verma interviewed Sandra John, Performance Engineering Lead @ ZS, enabling & working with teams for Performance Testing of Big Data Analytics platforms. 

With an experience of almost 10 years, Sandra has proficiency in API Automation framework & Performance Testing framework as she has dedicatedly worked on integrating them into the existing CICD pipeline using Kubernetes with Helm Charts. Beginning her career journey as a software engineer trainee, she had a very interesting journey exploring several roles and responsibilities including QA Engineer, QA Lead, Lead Consultant, and now Software Performance Engineering Lead. 

With all those insights into the career and expertise owned by Sandra, let us quickly jump on the interview to learn about his role and everything related to her growth, her personal beliefs, and her vision for the future.  

Sahil: Who are some people that inspire you? 

Sandra: There are many people who inspire me on a day-to-day basis.  

My parents are the first individuals that come to mind, which is a clichéd response. I've watched them overcome adversity and move on. Never let the past consume you. One of the most essential lessons my father ever gave me was to always ask questions. My mother, who consistently shows her mettle, is the most resilient person I have yet to encounter. 

I have the good fortune to have a great husband who gave up his lucrative cruise ship career to be by my side and support my aspirations. 

Moreover, to have amazing friends. I am in front of two excellent instances. One of my friends has been incredibly resilient in the face of a number of trying circumstances, and I've watched her rise above them all and keep going on in life. Another friend of mine, an HR professional, quit her stable position in IT to pursue her passion in the fitness sector, and she is now living her life on her own terms. 

Anyone that has the guts to just be themselves and not put on a persona or simply follow what society says to do inspires me. 

Sahil: Do you have any regrets about your career path? 

Sandra: None, at least till now. At one time, I did see myself becoming a professional chef but thank God I chose to be a QA.  

When I started off, I did not get much challenging work. But when I worked in Cuelogic, Thoughtworks & ZS Associates, the range of my work varied a lot. I have worked on manual testing, created automation frameworks in UI, API, IoT and now I work in as a Performance Engineering Lead.  

In my 10 years career, each year has been unique & challenging in its own way, so thankfully no regrets yet.  

Sahil: What is your personal motto? 

Sandra: “If you're the smartest person in the room, you are in the wrong room.” This is the question I keep asking myself. If one assumes they are the smartest, the possibility of learning or adapting becomes limited. And if you start limiting yourself, that’s it, no room for progress then. I believe that is where the concept of “comfort zone” also kicks in. You need to be a bit realistic & harsh with yourself on occasions, to stop yourself from becoming obsolete.  

Most of my major career decisions, discipline change, new learnings or initiative decisions have been fueled by the answer of that question.  

Sahil: How to keep up with the change in the testing world? 

Sandra: Curiosity  

Technology & Strategies are ever-changing, and the fuel behind those changes is evolving. To understand every change, you need to be curious. 

As a part of the Testing world, we are gatekeeper in many rights. Earlier the focus used to be just a bug free application. But today, just delivering a bug free application will not make you a cut above the rest. You need to do automation testing, accessibility testing, security checks, performance & reliability evaluations, user experience validations.  

Earlier, these were just terms in a college textbook, but today if you look around there are checklists & processes in place that ensure that each one of them are followed. And with changing times, this vocabulary will keep evolving. That is where your curiosity as a QA or Tester needs to kick in. Understanding target audiences, their preferences, new ways of reaching them like Virtual Reality, Smart Living solutions, Accessibility solutions.  

The more we are curious, the more test cases we develop, the more suggestions we provide and be a driving force of responsible & stable software.  

Sahil: When is the best time to start performance testing? 

Sandra: Performance Testing can be done at every phase in the SDLC. However, the best time to start Performance Testing is after a round of smoke testing is completed.  

I suggest, once smoke test is done, creating load test scripts will be easier & more reliable. Multiple iterations can be executed and their results can be saved & analyzed for performance improvements. 

Also, Performance Testing does not just mean response time validation, but much more capacity validations, resource utilization, and cost optimizations. These can be done at different levels at different times whenever the data to do this analysis are present. Performance test execution results can make these decisions clear & more data-driven.  

Sahil: What’s the most important trait someone would need to work in the QA industry? 

Sandra: Attention to detail. QA & Testing should not be done as a superficial activity to tick a checkbox. It needs to be result & data-driven.  

Anything you test software, hardware, API, utilities etc., all need a unique strategy that can be developed by having in-depth knowledge about what you are working on. That’s where your “attention to detail” skill will help you. Just copy pasting test strategy documents that have been used for ages and running the same test cases over and over again will not give you a different result.  

Strategies have to be customized as per the problem to be solved. And to solve a problem you need to know every detail about it, only then can you come up with something efficient & logical solution.  

Sahil: Where can people go to find out more about you online? 

Sandra: You can find my LinkedIn profile here - https://www.linkedin.com/in/sandra-john-0428396b/ 

And have started contributing blogs to medium.com - https://medium.com/@sandra.john_79147 

 
At BugRaptors, we constantly work to improve the digital landscape with access to industry expertise and knowledge that can aid testers, developers, and QA enthusiasts.     

Just in case you have any questions related to Quality Assurance or software testing services, feel free to reach our team through info@bugraptors.com