Way to Improve Automated ERP Testing: Discovering Five Threats to QA

During the last decade, ERP technology has turned to be the essence of every business. Whether it be the manufacturing industry or retail giants, every industry vertical strives to align well with ERP software for added productivity. However, the only thing where it makes the difference for those who manage to yield better performance with their resource planning operations than struggling with real-time information fetching is the choice of the test automation solution.  

Most of the time, even the most informed IT experts, when involved in business activities, skips to consider the idea of Test automation and aim only at their software needs. However, sticking solely to the software requirements of the business vertical is of no meaning when you are not working on the test automation solution.  

Automated testing not only helps you validate software for your operational requirements but also allows you to extend the coverage of your software. However, planning for automated testing on your ERP software involves certain challenges that must be worked on in advance. This is important to avoid any performance gaps at the later stages of software/application implementation leading to detrimental scenarios causing loss of test effort, money, time, and of course, the overall success of the project.  

When Automated testing ERP software, what kinds of challenges and difficulties does the tester face?

With our years of experience across various testing environments, we bring you a list of the five most common threats that automation testers encounter when working on Automated ERP testing. Let’s dig into the detail and discuss these challenges, and see how these can be tackled for optimum performance with your Quality Assurance objectives. 

Key Challenges of Automated ERP Testing

• Collaboration Issues  

If anything that could bother most testers in an automated or manual testing environment, it is collaboration issues within the team. However, quality communication is even more necessary with automation testing over manual to ensure maximum value is achieved. Automated testing needs testers to work together on planning targets and define the path to objectives based on historical data and conceptual knowledge.   

Also, the automation process should be planned with careful consideration to the scope of the project and delivery timeframe, that too after discussing with developers, technical architects, and manual testing team. Moreover, any risks related to the project should be identified at the early stages keeping the management involved in leading the project in the right direction with quality. 

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• Choice Of Tool  

When you are planning to hire automation testers, the first thing that you need to understand is to find the tools that you need for your software testing goals. It can be an open-source solution like Selenium or any commercial software designed to meet your specific testing needs. Make sure you never get tricked into a service that exaggerates its solutions. Instead, you should do all the research on your part that which latest tools are trending in the market and which choice of tools could work for meeting the quality assurance goals of your software.   

Your assessment process should be defined based on the tool requirements and expertise of the testers you are planning to hire. Though there are no specific criteria to measure the performance of the tools, you can spend some time defining your technical and business expectations, making it easier to communicate with testing teams. This will help you avoid any failure with the automation effort.   

• Locate Professional Services  

The next big challenge you may have to encounter while planning an Automated ERP Testing solution for your ERP software is finding professional and certified web or mobile test automation services. There is an extreme likeliness that you would find yourself working with a team of manual testers while searching for a certified team of automation testers. Automation testing needs experts who have a good grip on automation framework, test scripts, and command on resolving technical issues.   

Automation testing services, you should hire testers who must have a strong knowledge of the application framework, including programming skills and capabilities of automation tool. Remember, testers can even assist developers in writing codes that are less prone to errors and can be used or modified easily. In a nutshell, having access to skilled resources could help you meet your development goals for quality-controlled development.  

• The Testing Approach  

When planning the testing part of an ERP software or application, the quality of test results is never limited to selecting the tool. The very next factor that decides the quality of output is the testing approach. Your testing approach must be aligned to reduce the effort in implementation and reducing the maintenance work involved in planning test scripts or suites. Moreover, the test suites should have a greater lifetime so that they can be worked to generate various test reports and metrics.  

Though agile is the most popularly adopted approach for quality testing services, the adaptability of the test becomes more critical when tests are to be conducted under rapidly changing development cycles. All in all, when +, consider an approach that can help detect issues and validate the test without manual efforts. It may appear to be a challenging process, finding the way to address the right approach is crucial when it comes to Quality Assurance Services.   

Also Read: How are Large-Scale Organizations Executing their ERP Testing Strategy?

• Massive Upfront Investment  

Last but not least, if it is anything that bothers the company investing in the development of ERP solution, it is the high upfront cost. Especially when a company or user is already investing a big chunk of money in ERP, spending on the test automation process may appear daunting. It demands analysis of test automation framework, design reusable functions, builds libraries, and more. As the projects have significant investment in on stakes with account licensing, operational planning, and infrastructure, the reluctance to invest in test automation services becomes natural.   

However, the costs associated with automated ERP testing could be cut using free and open-source tools; the real task begins with learning the process, training on the tools, and maintaining them. On the other hand, the overhead costs related to meetings and collaborations can make any stakeholder doubt their decision. Therefore, the automation testing companies have to struggle to consent from the stakeholders on investing in an automated ERP testing solution. And even after all the agreements are made, there are very high chances of stakeholders withdrawing from the testing phase to execute their ROI goals.  

The Crux  

Like any other technical project, automation testing involves certain threats and challenges that are not only restricted to the aforementioned key points. However, the above-defined issues are the most common to occur within the testing environment, and the inability to counter these challenges may lead to catastrophic quality failures.   

However, the only thing that can help you keep your investment safe and the ERP solution protected with the quality assurance label is making the right decisions by following the ERP testing checklist. Whether choosing an agile test automation service or finding the right automation testing partner, working with an expert automation testing company allows you to make way for opportunities while encouraging paybacks. But all you need to do is, stay informed and plan wisely!