Megan Sizemore shares her passion for software testing and how adopting a tester’s mindset benefits entire product teams. She explains that through collaboration with engineers at APAX Software, both parties learn valuable perspectives—testers understand feature architecture while developers gain insight into quality assurance thinking.
Everyone is responsible for quality.
Quality forms the foundation at APAX. Designers, project managers, and engineers all influence whether products are usable, functional, and cohesive. “Thinking like a tester gives you another lens for spotting gaps before they become costly (and often embarrassing) problems.”
What is testing, anyway?
Sizemore references Satisfice, Inc’s definition: testing involves “evaluating a product by learning about it through exploration and experimentation.” Testing isn’t mechanical checkbox-marking; it’s “a thoughtful, deliberate, and exploratory process.”
Why a tester’s mindset matters
Adopting skepticism and curiosity helps teams anticipate problems, prevent confirmation bias, and deliver quality work in fast-paced environments.
Some ways you can think like a tester
1. Always assume there’s a bug
Skepticism drives deeper investigation, helping uncover edge cases real users discover.
2. Consider the bigger picture
Features exist within larger ecosystems; thinking holistically prevents regressions and reveals design inconsistencies.
3. Ask good questions
Requirements contain gaps. Questioning reveals hidden assumptions and business logic issues while building understanding of the “why.”
4. Empathize with the users
Users aren’t robots. Effective testing asks whether features are intuitive, helpful, usable, and solve actual problems.
5. Don’t put yourself in a box
Testing’s exploratory nature encourages critical, creative thinking—but only when decisions have clear rationales.
All this to say…
Quality responsibility applies across teams. This mindset becomes increasingly important as organizations rely on AI assistance, requiring healthy skepticism toward outputs rather than blind trust.