10 Must Have Skills For a Top Automation Tester

In the accelerated agile way of working, each firm demands a highly-skilled automation expert. Slowly, automation testing is replacement manual testing (though it can't be carried out completely). 

Using automation, you can expand your business to a greater audience saving both time and effort.

For example an automation tester, it is quite essential to get certain skills that help in analyzing the application better. 

Let's understand in the article, the automation testing abilities needed to become an efficient and successful automation tester in the software testing market.

How does test automation advantage the software testing market?

·         Replacing manual testing procedures with automation testing has assisted in the rapid adoption of agile methodology across software development industries

·         Automated testing benefits big scale projects that undergo regular changes by speeding up the testing process and making deliveries within the stipulated timeline.

·         Manual testing in agile requires a lot of human intervention and the total testing effort gets monotonous, automation testing helps resolve this problem by automating the repetitive jobs.

·         Usually, for repetitive tasks, test scripts need to be created once and these may be reused whenever the identical situation has to be executed.

·         With each feature improvement, the scripts can be updated as per the requirement and then can be redeemed.

·         Automated testing expedites the overall testing process. Automation testing can reduce the time to run repetitive evaluations from days to hours saving money and time.

·         Automation testing raises the depth and scope of tests that improve the software quality and also raises the evaluation coverage of the program modules.

·         The automated test scripts can be reused multiple times for any regular shift in the computer software.

·         Automation testing helps the DevOps staff to ship the applications to the marketplace at the earliest.

What are the skills necessary for an automation tester?

Let us look at the top must-have skills for an automation tester:

I. Focus on analytical thinking:

For an automation tester, an urge for analytics and logical application of theories is important. Once the business team provides the company requirement document, the automation testing staff should focus on understanding every element of the feature quite well from an automation perspective.

ii. Knowing of programming languages:

The automation tester needs to be proficient in these programming languages. The thought process of this automation tester needs to be to identify and cover all the probable modules which demand automation.

iii. Good operational testing abilities:

To excel as a automation tester, the tester must have solid knowledge and expertise of operational testing done manually.

It will be beneficial if the tester in addition to the application knowledge also comprehends the domain very well. For e.g., if a banking program requires payments domain knowledge to design automated test scripts of any given functionality, then it will be an added advantage when the tester along with good scripting skills also is well versed using domain-specific knowledge.

iv. Experience in creation of test scripts:

In the market, there is a vast range of automation frameworks, out of which some will expect the tester to have enough programming knowledge in regards to writing automated test scripts whereas for some tools the exam scripts are written in plain English language and don't demand an comprehension of backend coding and logic.

V. Possess good knowledge on Automated testing tools:

The automation testers should be well-equipped with considerable knowledge about the automatic testing tools present in the market that finally help to maximize the overall testing procedure.

There's a vast selection of automation in testing tools available on the marketplace which provide extremely superior benefits to a venture. To excel in the automation testing field, the tester must have great understanding and vulnerability of the automation test tools.

vi. Clear Comprehension of business requirements:

An automation tester needs to have a very clear comprehension of the company requirements.

Let's know this with an illustration that all people must have encountered. If you are unwell and you pay a visit to a physician, the doctor while examining you, also wants to understand your medical history whether you've suffered from any type of disease or ailment previously. Depending upon the general past and present medical condition he can subsequently suggest certain medicines for recovery.

vii. Well versed with agile, DevOps and constant delivery:

Automation testing demand in the marketplace is rising with new-age nimble and DevOps methodology replacing the waterfall model.

As agile methodology entails frequent changes, it is essential to have an automation testing process in place for exactly the same. Automation testers can automate the test scripts for a module to have the ability to react to regular customer induced demand changes.

viii. Keep good communication and interaction with stakeholders:

Having good communication skills and collaboration is crucial for automation testers. This is most important before and during the testing period as automation testers have to interact with programmers, business analysts, attribute engineers (owning excellent domain-specific understanding ) along with the other stakeholders.

Also, once the automatic test scripts were created, the automation testers will need to provide a walkthrough to the developers, business and the other stakeholders.

ix. Curious to find out new technologies and tendencies:

Being an automation tester you should be willing and curious to learn new technologies in the area of automation.

Taking into consideration the history of automation tools being extensively utilized in the organizations, earlier firms preferred using QTP (Quick Test Professional) tools for automation testing for a on-line application whereas now Selenium WebDriver is in huge demand.

X. Able to evaluate and mitigate the risk:

Though test automation looks like a strategic measure in the agile world, there is always a risk connected with the test automation process.

If there are changes in the interfaces, after the automation test scripts were prepared, it can cause a problem during the test execution a process as irrelevant test results will be generated because of these interfaces changes. Similar issues might happen in case of changes in business logic. This incurs additional cost to encourage the modifications, and it can involve modification of test data and impact other test cases as well.