Quality Coaching

Quality coaching is very different from consulting and offers unique benefits for teams. Bastian Baumgartner explains how quality coaching can help to integrate quality into processes and shares his experiences with methods such as 3 Amigos, Discovery Workshops and the concept of Communities of Practice. How can a mindset change in companies help to develop a more sustainable understanding of quality? Bastian shows how quality coaching supports this process. He also outlines the challenges and potential of integrating AI into the testing process and gives tips on how teams can prepare for this.

“The nice thing about agility is that everyone has a certain amount of creative freedom. I’ve never seen anyone anywhere do Scrum or Scrum-of-Scrums or LeSS or SAFe by the book. It is always adapted” - Bastian Baumgartner

Bastian Baumgartner is a tester and test manager with extensive experience in national and international projects. He optimizes software quality through adapted planning, methodology and strategy and has further developed processes in test management. He is also involved in the design and training of TestMasters and fulfills this role in complex agile projects.

Highlights of this Episode:

• Quality Coaching aims to teach not only testers, but the entire team the basics and methodologies for better quality
• The quality coaching approach is very practical and aims to anchor knowledge directly in the team instead of just offering superficial advice
• 3 Amigos is a method in which developers, testers and product owners discuss complex user stories before refinement
• Communities of practice promote knowledge sharing and self-organization in teams
• AI and end-to-end testing are areas that will become even more important in the future and offer new challenges and opportunities for testers and quality coaches

Quality Coaching: Insights and methods

Today I’m talking to Bastian Baumgartner about quality coaching. We shed light on the difference to traditional consulting, discuss methodologies and Bastian shares insights into how this concept helps teams and companies to achieve sustainable quality in their processes.

The philosophy behind Quality Coaching

Quality coaching goes beyond simply imparting knowledge. It aims to empower teams and give them the tools to continuously improve their processes. Bastian describes it as an approach that enables teams to develop and live quality awareness from within. This individual approach differs fundamentally from the often schematic approach of traditional consultants.

Methodologies in quality coaching

Bastian shares some specific quality coaching methodologies. These include ‘Testing for Non-Testers’, ‘3 Amigos’ meetings to improve communication between different disciplines and ‘Riskstorming’, which helps to identify risks at an early stage and initiate appropriate countermeasures. These techniques not only enable teams to solve their current problems, but also to work proactively on the quality assurance of their projects.

The impact of quality coaching

One of the main objectives of quality coaching is to bring about sustainable change within teams and organizations. This is done by strengthening quality awareness and promoting a continuous improvement process. Bastian emphasizes the value of such an approach for agile transformations and how it helps to establish quality standards across all levels.

Challenges in quality coaching

Not everything in quality coaching is smooth sailing. Bastian talks about challenges such as mindset change within teams, integrating testing into agile processes and dealing with resentment towards new ways of working. Despite these obstacles, quality coaching remains a powerful tool for promoting quality and efficiency in software development.