7 Reasons Quality Assurance (QA) is Essential in Digital Transformation Projects
Planning to land your Digital Transformation satellite in just 6-7 months? Struggling to find a team of skilled professionals capable to oversee and streamline the implementation process? Finding it challenging to fit testing into your busy business SMEs’ schedules? Facing issues with integration failures and poor system performance? Constantly dealing with a growing RAID log and a fluctuating project RAG status? Been through it all!
Digital Transformation Programs and their typical challenges
Gartner study states that ~91% of businesses are undergoing some level of transformation. Companies undergoing Digital Transformation Projects rethink their strategies, processes, customer experiences, and internal operations to thrive in a rapidly evolving digital landscape. Typical optimization and transformation examples would target a variety of business processes and systems, such as:
- Opportunity and quote management, CRM
- Order management, invoicing, taxes, accounting, asset and resource management, ERP
- Quote, products and pricelists configuration, sales campaigns
- Lead management, marketing campaigns and automation
- Service management & self-service
- e-Commerce and subscription management
- Business Intelligence
- Migrations to Cloud or VMware
- and many more…
The bad news is that according to 2021 McKinsey survey ~70% of all transformation projects fail to achieve their original objectives. The ongoing investment in digital projects that fail at this rate highlights their strategic importance, with costs extending beyond resources wasted to impact the organization’s competitive position.
Every significant transformation comes with its unique set of challenges. With 20+ years of experience and 100+ transformation projects delivered, we would split the majority of these in two major categories:
Our Digital Transformation Projects Experience
Allied Testing has actively participated in over 100 Digital Transformation Programs. Salesforce, Microsoft Dynamics, Eagle CRM, Oracle EBS, SAP ERP, SAP ECC, NetSuite ERP, Workday, Limio, SF CPQ, DocuSign, Adobe Sign, Oracle Eloqua, SF marketing cloud, Magento, Zuora, Power BI, Tableau, Oracle BI, SAP HANA, etc. aren’t just words to us.
Our engagements include standalone and integration testing, overseeing migrations and more. Our hands-on experience and proficiency have been instrumental in facilitating seamless digital transformations for renowned global leaders across diverse sectors and industries.
You can find our case studies at Case Studies – Allied Testing. More available upon demand, so don’t hesitate to contact us!
What an experienced QA team brings to the Digital Transformation table
Before we start, it is essential to recognize and appreciate the crucial contributions other team members make. Therefore, kudos to Project Managers, Solution Architects, Developers, Product Owners, Business Analysts, Business Change, Business Stakeholders, and Business SMEs for all your hard work and support!
Let’s now explore why Quality Assurance emerges as the linchpin for ensuring successful implementation of transformation projects. Please note we refer to Quality Assurance, rather than testing here.
1. Setting the foundation right to cover all bases
Some common misconceptions revolve around the minimal impact of configuration on COTS products, their flawless integrations, and assumption that QA team is only necessary when there’s enough to test. However, primary QA vendor engagement from the project’s inception:
- ensures a thorough grasp of objectives, scope, critical milestones, potential challenges and risks
- promotes improved planning and vendor alignment on phase ownership with clearly defined roles & responsibilities, deliverables as per agreed schedule, entry & exit criteria, handshakes between different parties
- allows assembling the team based on required skillset and its timely ramp-up and ramp-down throughout SDLC
- enables crafting of a comprehensive test plan covering data migration, customizations, integrations, user interfaces, etc.
- prompts test areas prioritization based on criticality, potential impact, and their readiness
- guarantees early QA feedback
2. Tailoring testing for client-specific customizations
Modern systems are rarely one-size-fits-all and out-of-the-box solutions need customized to meet specific business needs, align with AS-IS or TO-BE business processes, system mock-ups. QA team steps in to ensure these custom features undergo thorough analysis and testing.
- Through in-depth process and config analysis, the seasoned QA team proactively identifies and highlights potential configuration or business process issues and discrepancies well in advance, facilitating their resolution ahead of the actual testing start
- By crafting detailed and comprehensive test scenarios covering various use cases, QA’s guarantee that customizations align seamlessly with intended functionality and business processes
Close collaboration between project team members boosts the overall project success.
3. Seamless integration testing
The interconnected nature of modern business systems demands flawless integrations and their testing can be complex.
QA teams:
- establish dedicated testing environments
- perform rigorous API testing
- ensure seamless communication between different components
- establish clear communication channels with integration partners to address integration challenges proactively
The goal is to validate that all integrated systems function cohesively within the new ecosystem.
4. Data integrity – the QA bedrock
At the heart of every transformation project lies the challenge of data integrity. QA teams play a crucial role in meticulously verifying the accurate transfer of data from legacy to the newly built platforms and systems. To mitigate risks associated with data loss or discrepancies QA with their keen eye for detail:
- run rigorous validation checks
- do data mapping exercises
- perform data review and validation on various levels pre- and post-transformation
Although the ultimate data quality sign off rests with business users, the QA team:
- conducts comprehensive data quality checks
- performs various tests using both newly created and migrated data well in advance
It is also important to establish and test rollback procedures where possible to mitigate risks associated with data discrepancies.
5. User-centric approach adoption during UAT
The success of any implementation or systems migration hinges on user satisfaction. Alongside BCM and BAs, QA teams play a crucial role in involving end-users early in the testing process, particularly during User Acceptance Testing (UAT). To ensure the new system seamlessly aligns with user expectations and business requirements, the QA team takes an active role in:
- runningplaybacks
- arranging and performing system demos
- creating and distributing high-level or detailed UAT scenarios
- triaging and reporting issues spotted by UAT participants
- helping with any Q&A during UAT
- tracking execution progress and encouraging off-script checks
- collecting and documenting user’s feedback
Meticulous UAT preparation and support coupled with flawless execution secure end-user buy-in, positive feedback, and readiness for seamless onboarding of the new system.
6. Performance optimization through rigorous testing
Optimizing performance in complex and multi-integrated platforms is a multifaceted challenge. QA teams conduct exhaustive performance testing, ensuring the new platform operates smoothly under various load conditions. QA arsenal parts would include:
- monitoring system responsiveness
- identifying bottlenecks
- optimizing queries
- ensuring optimal performance
A few other things QA team would consider here are: Disaster Recovery, Backup & Archiving, etc.
7. Post-mortem and continuous systems improvement
QA doesn’t end with the new platform rollout or migration, it extends into the post-implementation phase.
- Project-wise, QA would participate in post-implementation reviews to evaluate the project success, identify lessons learned, document best practices, and contribute insights for future projects
- Platform-wise, robust monitoring mechanisms and feedback loops empower project team to gather valuable insights from end-users. The QA team plays a pivotal role in collecting and adding this feedback into various systems and tools. Additionally, the QA team actively engages in investigating production incidents, conducting retests, and implementing necessary hotfixes
This iterative process fuels continuous improvement and optimization, ensuring systems adapt to evolving business needs increasing their satisfaction level.
In essence, QA teams are the silent architects of the overall Digital Transformation Programme success and their efforts set the stage for businesses to unlock the full potential of advanced systems. Therefore, securing the right QA partner on time is your key to success in navigating the dynamic landscape of modern technologies!
Contact Allied Testing now to get a free evaluation of your Digital Transformation Project and hit the ground running!
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