Professional History

I am an established, highly competent software tester with over 16 years of testing and leading experience. I have experience in both Waterfall and Agile development environments. I am currently employed by Travelport as a Senior Test Engineer working on Locomote, a corporate travel management platform.

My testing extends beyond the workplace through my test community involvement. I am a co-founder of the Australian Testing Days test conference and a former organiser of Test Engineering Alliance Melbourne (TEAM) meetup. I have had articles published by Women Testers, Testing Trapeze and Test magazines. I provide pre-publication article reviews for Women Testers and Testing Trapeze. My current community focus is the EPIC Testability Academy™. Working with EPIC Assist, this not for profit initiative, aims to introduce people with autism to fundamental testing skills and find them employment.

I have testing experience across multiple domains with a deep understanding of finance. I have held Test Lead and Test Manager roles, handling teams of up to eight direct reports and achieving excellent results. I have experience working with, and leading, co-located and globally distributed teams. I have led successful process and policy definition programs with roll outs in Melbourne and Bangkok.

I have:

• significant waterfall to agile transformation experience
• designed and implemented meaningful metrics programs
• led an automation testing redesign program with implementation across a local and international office.
• designed, in a waterfall environment, an automation test suite that was completed and running prior to software release (this was a first for the company)
• repeatedly demonstrated the ability to work effectively with, internal and external, stakeholders across the software development life cycle (SDLC)
• stakeholder management expertise that includes working on client sites, reviewing client test programs and leading workshops
• excellent coaching and mentoring skills

Work History

Current Role

Travelport, Senior Test Engineer -Locomote, January 2, 2017 to Present

• Specialist tester in scrum team
• Testing Guild Guild Master
• Quality advocate leading the introduction of better test practices across team

I work with both my scrum team and other teams and people in Travelport to introduce better testing practices. These practices include delivering value to stakeholders through improved visibility into testing and information flows out of testing.

Achievements to date

• testing throughout the lifecycle of a story
• testability as a feature of story development
• pair testing
• testing reviews
• introduction of pre-release (UAT) testing
• processes introduction to enhance information flows during story delivery
• gamification to assist targeted improvements
• improved test reporting
• set up and implementation of Testing Guild

Previous Roles

SS&C HiPortfolio and Anova, Principal QA, December 2013 to December 2016

• Leader and influencer in waterfall to agile transformation
• QA Guild Lead across Melbourne and Bangkok offices
• Perform excellent testing using Context Driven Testing and Rapid Software Testing
• Exploratory testing evangelist
• Agile coach to 2 teams with a strong focus on performing testing throughout life of a project
• Collaborating with Developers to develop effective CI scripts
• Crafting regression tests in Gherkin.
• Software tool analysis, acquisition recommendations to senior stakeholders
• Collaborated with agile teams to develop Done list and manage on-going maintenance of Done
• Testing improvement program lead
• Designed and implemented brown bag session program
• Designed and implemented team bonding sessions based on critical thinking, problem solving and collaboration
• Designed and introduced checklists to guide completion of critical tasks
• Introduced kudos cards to generate achievement recognition, contribute to team morale
• Introduced mind maps as a problem solving and testing tool.

DST Global Solutions, QA Technical Lead, August 2011 to December 2013

• Analysed and redefined existing quality pathways.
• Implemented end to end process mapping and checklists.
• Worked with stakeholders to enable roll out quality pathways along with an ongoing maintenance program.
• Produced test plans with cases clearly linked to requirements. Executed test plans, capturing proof of outcomes. Recorded and managed defects. Provided regular and timely updates to Project Managers.
• Coached and mentored team members to improve test knowledge, test skills and solve problems.
• Created and implemented a standardised approach to applicant interviewing that supported consistency in applicant comparison.
• Created and rolled out peer review process to the Testing Team

Employer	Role	From	To
CapGemini	Senior Test Consultant	April 2011	August 2011
DST Global Solutions	QA Technical Lead	April 2010	March 2011
	QA Test Lead	March 2009	April 2010
	Test Manager	April 2008	March 2009
	Initial Estimates Coordinator	September 2006	April 2008
	Test Consultancy Team Lead	February 2003	September 2006
	Client Support Desk Team Lead	April 2000	February 2003
	Business Analyst	January 1998	April 2000
Victoria Legal Aid	Business Analyst/Tester/ Trainer/User Support	April 1996	December 1997
Commonwealth Bank of Australia	Business and Personal Lender	February 1993	April 1996
	Teller and Back Office Support	May 1998	February 1993
Victorian Education Department	Primary School Teacher	January 1987	December 1987

 

Skills Catalogue

Context driven testing	Coaching and mentoring
Exploratory testing	Team and individual motivation
Compliance checking	Stakeholder engagement and management
Identifying and implementing process improvements	Personal improvement and management
Critical thinking	Strategic/Lateral thinking
Problem analysis/solving	People focused leadership
Time management	Agile development
Strong communication skills

Academic Qualifications

1998     Taxation Law (Post Graduate RMIT City Campus)

1998     Accounting Theory (Post Graduate RMIT City Campus)

1997     Bachelor of Business Economics and Finance – RMIT City Campus

1986     Diploma of Teaching (Primary) – Victoria University

Professional Qualifications and Courses

2016     Rapid Software Testing (Michael Bolton – Developsense)

2016     Rapid Software Testing for Managers (Michael Bolton – Developsense)

2016     Critical Thinking (Michael Bolton – Developsense)

2016     Exploratory Testing (Michael Bolton – Developsense)

2011     Open Door Coaching – Mentoring and Coaching (Natalie Ashdown – Open Door Coaching)

2004     ISEB/ISTQB Foundation Certificate in Software Testing (Planit)

1999     Function Point Analysis (Total Metrics)

1999     Applied Function Point Analysis (Total Metrics)

Professional Memberships and Associations

• Association for Software Testers (current full member)

Presentations and Workshops

May 2016	Exploratory Testing workshop – Australian Testing Days 2016
August 2015	Transforming from Waterfall to Agile – AHPRA Test Team and IT Management
August 2015	Understanding the context and emotions – Lightning talk – TEAM meetup
September 2015	Testing in Agile workshop – TEAM meetup
December 2015	The importance of checklists in testing – TEAM meetup

Published Articles

May 2016	Transforming a Test Manager into a Test Leader -Test Magazine
April 2016	Guest editorial – Women Testers
April 2016	Management and trust – So simple, so complex, so important – Testing Trapeze
January 2016	Testers FAQ on certifications – Testing Circus
January 2016	It’s on my list – One piece of the quality jigsaw – Women Testers
October 2015	Stress and work – Strategies that keep you moving forwards – Women Testers