Outsourcing UAT –more than just a viable business model!

Percy Dara Hilloo

The process of software or application development is long, time consuming, highly intensive and engaging in nature. In the cycle of software development, the Testing stage is the final frontier of the process and probably one of the most vital stages wherein developers are able to assess the viability of the end product and take measures to enhance its performance or refine its blemish.

However, the Testing stage has more often been neglected in software development cycle. It has been observed that the budget and time period allocated for testing products is meagre and most organisations don’t realise its significance. As more and more businesses are going online and organisations are realising that malfunctioning of their portals during critical business hours can lead to loss of revenue, customer dissatisfaction and earn them a bad brand reputation. It is a known fact that the costs associated with fixing a defect after release of the product are far greater than the costs of fixinga defect during the system's development lifecycle (A paper by Jones in 1996 pointed).

User acceptance testing is business requirement testing particularly to check how the software functions when it is used by the end users. Earlier, software applications were developed to meet a particular business need that was supposed to be used by a defined set of people. These people could have done the UAT, checked whether the software is delivering the specified requirements. With the spread of internet, audiences have become more open and it is not possible to get the software checked by all users. Particularly with the popularity of e-commerce and online banking, applications need to be robust, without glitches, and which satisfies the end consumers. With such high competition, an application which is slow, with bugs may lead to loss of revenue.

Why is User Acceptance Testing being outsourced?

User Acceptance testing is a critical last mile aspect in software development life cycle and often clients don’t feel comfortable to outsource it. It is final acceptance, sign-off before launching a product in the market. It also gives the client an opportunity to interact with real, business users and take a call whether the product is meeting all specifications. Yet, they may be conservative in outsourcing the UAT of applications.

Today third party IT vendors that have expertise in areas of software testing perform the role of a value-added partner for clients who outsource Testing of their product. A scientific, formal and structured approach to UAT, can definitely bring in better quality outputs.

Though the common benefits of outsourcing are applicable here also in terms of

1. Time Saving:Testing is often the last thing before launching a product in the market – developer organisations will always be hard pressed on time – outsourcing may help them to work 24X7 and thus help to launch it faster in the market.

2. Enhances Accuracy and specialisation in evaluating performance: The client doesn’t have to build a specialised testing team or doesn’t have to take out developers from projects and involve them in testing process. Also, a professional tester will understand the user’s requirements, domain/business knowledge and test it appropriately rather than a developer who has developed the product based on his/her understanding (and may able to validate only the technical requirement)

3. Testing across geographies: In some cases testing can be speed up by taking advantage of the time zone differences. Testing at night what has been developed or debugged during the day yields convenience and pace.

4. Standardisation and Customisation of Testing Process: Most IT vendors have a well-documented process in place that can be customised based on theneed of the product. This helps in analyzing the requirements or reviewing the test cases in an organised manner

5. Reduce testing costs: Apart from the low-cost country benefit, costly IT and business resources can be freed from repetitive and time-consuming test activities thus resulting in cost savings by outsourcing smartly.

Though outsourcing UAT may seem to be one of the best options to reduce errors and launch a stable product in the market, there are lot of challenges in terms of selecting the right outsourcing partner –

The client may already have an IT outsourcing partner who is building the application. Should UAT be outsourced to them risking an obvious conflict of interest? Or a tussle with the existing IT outsourcing vendor?

One of the biggest disadvantages of outsourcing is the risk of losing sensitive data and the loss of confidentiality. There has to be defined frameworks and share of work for the outsourcing testing vendor and the internal team who will validate the findings. Also the outsourcing vendor may work with many organisations and vendors might not give 100% time and attention to a single company. This may result in delays and inaccuracies in the work output

In short, if an enterprise has picked a good partner, and together they have successfully completed a few projects in the past then outsourced testing can be an excellent option. However it must be noted that to make a success of it, there must be continuous monitoring and assessment of the software along with stable and transparent relationships with outsourcing vendors and well-laid metrics-driven processes to monitor the project progress.

Upon completion of each project enterprises should perform a final acceptance test on all returned software – but they must be open about this process and give constructive feedback. In addition, by assessing own performance along with that of the outsourced vendor, particularly with regard to bottlenecks, enterprises will be able to reduce more bottle necks and release a much improved, robust and secure platform in the market.

(Percy Dara Hilloo is Head – Testing Practice at Blue Star Infotech. The views expressed here are of his own and Cybermedia does not necessarily subscribe to them)