5 Key Benefits of Outsourcing Quality Assurance
Many businesses nowadays rely on software development to create the tools essential for their success.
Software development is carried out in 3 main phases, starting with an analysis/planning phase, followed by the actual coding phase, and then completed by a phase of quality assurance/testing.
A lot of businesses have in-house teams that handle the entire software development process. The in-house team thus not only performs the coding, but also handles the quality assurance (QA).
But, having an in-house team handle every aspect of software development might not be the most effective strategy. Quality assurance is a unique process that requires specialized and qualified staff to carry it out.
So, if you have an in-house team handling both software development and QA, you may be undermining the quality of your software. It’s usually better to treat software development and QA as two distinct functions, carried out by different specialists.
Previously, QA was not as important as it is now. Nowadays, you really can’t do without effective QA when creating a software product, or you’ll run into major bugs and costly malfunctions further down the road.
Why Outsource Quality Assurance?
While it makes sense for companies that rely on software for their core business to maintain an in-house team of developers, the QA part is a different matter.
If you are not prepared to hire and train specialized QA staff, an attractive option is to develop your software in-house, and then outsource the QA.
By outsourcing your QA to highly qualified specialists, you can be sure to get the most rigorous testing for your software, which will help to guarantee the highest quality possible.
Also, if you have never tried outsourcing before, outsourcing QA is a great first step to take, since you don’t need to outsource your entire software development.
The following are the main advantages offered by outsourcing QA:
1. Access to specialized QA technology
Since QA is becoming more important for successful software development, an increasing number of automated tools are being developed to support the QA testing process.
But, while it may not be possible for your company to acquire all of the latest QA technology for in-house testing, you can be sure that a QA outsourcing provider will have access to this technology. An external QA team will therefore always have the latest QA technology and techniques on hand.
So, when you outsource QA, you benefit from the latest QA technology without having to buy it yourself.
2. Increased objectivity
If you want an unbiased review of your software, it is always better to give the QA part to a different team than the one who did the coding.
It’s well known that when the same developers write the code, and then check the software product for bugs, they tend to overlook many errors. This is why a lot of bugs are only detected once end users start using the software.
If you get a team that was not involved in the development of the software to do the QA on it, they will test it more rigorously and detect faults that the developers don’t see.
3. A great way to test outsourcing
While outsourcing of software development has become a common practice due to the many benefits it offers, many companies are still cautious to try it, due to the risks involved.
Your company might have plans to outsource parts of the whole software development process in the future, but you aren’t sure how to start. In that case, outsourcing QA is a good way to ‘test the waters,’ and determine how well the communication process works between internal and external teams.
Outsourcing QA is also a good way of testing how skilled the offshore engineers are and how well they will perform with the tasks you give them. If they deliver a quality job, you may decide to expand the outsourcing process in future.
4. The ability to perform QA on beta versions
If you hire an external QA team right from the start of your software project, they can help to improve the actual development process by doing QA testing on beta versions.
Many companies view QA as something that’s necessary at the end of the development process. But QA can be extremely helpful already during the early development phases. Many software projects are performed in phases that each aim to generate a partially complete product. And each of these intermediate products can easily undergo QA testing.
When bugs are detected early, it makes it much easier to make changes before subsequent phases of development are under way, which can save a lot of time and money.
Therefore, to save costs in the long run, you can benefit greatly from hiring the services of an external QA team right from the beginning of a software project.
5. Keep your code confidential
When you outsource your QA, you do not need to release the code of the software to the QA team.
The task of the QA team is simply to test the software rigorously, check for bugs, develop testing scripts, and ensure all aspects of the software are working perfectly. They can do all this without ever taking a look at the actual code.
So, you can be assured that there won’t be any theft of intellectual property.
Conclusion
As can be seen from the discussion above, there is a lot to gain from outsourcing quality assurance. Outsourcing QA can help to ensure that your company’s software is as good as possible, which will save you a lot of costs in the long run.
Outsourcing QA can also help companies that are new to IT outsourcing to get used to the outsourcing process.
Finally, outsourcing QA will give your company access to the services of talented testers and automated technology without having to get them in-house. This will free up your in-house team to focus on other tasks, while leaving QA for the external team.