Why I’m no longer Speaking at Software Testing Conferences?
Presentations are not effective for helping implement real test automation.
Between 2010–2013, I spoke at several international software testing conferences. STARWEST 2013, regarded as the most premium conference in software testing, was the last conference I spoke at. In this article, I share my thoughts on conferences and why I no longer pursue or decline invitations to speak at.
Presentations are not effective
Conferences are a legacy way to get new ideas
Organizing a Conference is a business
Speaking at conferences is a business too
What do I do to spread my voice?
1. Presentations are not effective
I heard “Amazon’s boss dislikes PowerPoint presentations” before. My daughter, who started her first full-time job at Amazon this week, confirmed that is indeed the culture.
Jeff Bezos Banned PowerPoint in Amazon Meetings
For serious presentations, it will be useful to replace PowerPoint slides with paper handouts showing words, numbers, data graphics, and images together. Handouts allow viewers to contextualize, compare, narrate, and recast evidence. In contrast, data-thin, forgetful displays tend to make audiences ignorant and passive.
At TIST 2011 conference, I noticed one attendee who sat in the same spot (first row) for all four of my sessions (including two in the previous year). After the talk, I chatted with him.
I asked: “You seem very interested, is your company conducting test automation?”
He answered: “No. I like your presentations and practices, such as Maintainable Test Design and Functional Test Refactoring.”
I continued, “Will you introduce these (practices) to your work?”
He paused for a few seconds, then said: “Probably not, I would like to, but I don’t have the confidence to do that”.
Our conversation ended there as someone interrupted us with another question.
On the way back, I kept thinking of his words on the plane. He was right. Putting myself in his shoes, few have the courage to stand up to offer my approach and solutions (even based on free and open-source Selenium), such as:
Even if a speaker did well, how much audience can learn within 45 minutes? Test Automation and Continuous Testing are highly practical and light on theory. Believing is one thing, but it takes a lot of practice and guidance (I didn’t offer coaching services then).
From a different perspective, he is the most devoted audience I can hope from my presentations. Still, talking is not enough, at least in the context of Test Automation and Continuous Testing. So I decided not to pursue speaking at the software testing conferences.
2. Conferences are a legacy way to get new ideas
Back in the pre-Internet days, Expos/Conferences are essential for people from all parts of the country/world to see new innovations and exchange ideas. When I was young, my parents often told me about the great stuff they saw at World Expo’85 in Japan. Brisbane, my city, thrived after World Expo’88. But now, the World Expo attracts much less interest. (Do you know which city will host the next World Expo?)
I took my family to World Expo 2010 in Shanghai, and the results were disappointing (mainly due to my high expectations). The organisation of the Expo was great, it is obvious that the Shanghai government spent a huge budget and manpower, just the content (from all participating countries) was not exciting. There were rarely new technology/products that wowed us.
With the advancement of communication and resource discovery based on the Internet/Web, such as Google Search, Email, and Video Conference, People nowadays don’t have to travel to another city/country to meet someone or discover new ideas in their interested areas. During the current Covid pandemic, the fact that many people can work from home is solid proof.
Of course, nothing can really replace face-to-face communication, however, everyone will agree that technology has greatly transformed the way we communicate and work.
3. Organizing a Conference is a business
“Conference is a business” shall be obvious, however, unless you are involved with organizing one conference, you would not know. I did because I was a part of the committee for two Charity Conferences (my contribution was developing a conference registration app).
For most conference organizers, the №1 priority is to make profits (or at least not a net loss). There were cost items such as renting venues, speaker fees, …, etc. The funding mainly comes from entry fees (paid by attendants) and sponsors. The contribution of sponsors is important, which decides the content of a conference would be biased.
The sponsors typically are commercial tool vendors for a software testing conference, such as HP (now Micro Focus), SmartBear and Tricentis. However, it has been proven the approach (such as record-n-playback into a proprietary syntax) of these tools is wrong. Free and open-source automation framework such as Selenium WebDriver and Appium is the correct way forward.
So just imagine that a motivated engineer wrote a speaking proposal on how their company successfully moved away from Micro Focus to Selenium WebDriver. If Micro Focus is the highest-tier sponsor of this conference, the chance that this speaking proposal will be accepted is very slim.
Generally speaking, traditional conferences are under more financial pressure. There are more alternatives, such as online webinars and local meetups. All these factors might affect the quality of the content.
One conference (I spoke at twice) I liked was TIST. It was the largest one in China, but not well known internationally. TIST has sponsors, but the majority of its funding was provided by the Tianjin government. Compared to some of the conferences I attended, I sensed a much less commercial atmosphere.
I am not against commercialisation, however, no one can deny that.
4. Speaking at conferences is a business too
The day before most conferences’ first day, there was usually a social event for speakers (and sponsor representatives). I found that many speakers know each other well. I gradually learned that giving talks at conferences/events sounds like a business for some people.
(I heard a few talks by those ‘professional speakers’, very abstract stuff, lacking real substance)
Those ‘professional speakers’ formed a network to benefit each other for
earning ‘fame’
selling their books
selling their training
promoting their consulting business
The objectives are fine, to a degree. Test Automation and Continuous Testing are both practical, taking myself as an example, I need to be hands-on working on test scripts most of my time. I certainly wouldn’t be able to travel every a few days to ‘talk’ about test automation (the copy-n-paste style).
What do I do to spread my voice?
Firstly, I am a professional engineer and test automation/CT coach, not a professional speaker. I run a business with a list of software apps (besides my testing tools), such as WhenWise, ClinicWise, SiteWise and TestWisely. All these software apps have the daily-production-deployment capability, which my CT process enables. Keeping all automated regression tests GREEN (like the one below) is my top priority.
Thanks to my CT process, I managed to do that well. So, I still have time to share my experience.
While I no longer present at software conferences, here are some activities I have been doing since 2011:
Authoring books
I believe reading books is still the best way to learn things constructively. As you may know, compared to speaking at conferences, writing books takes much more effort and less yield nowadays.
For beginners, “Practical Web Test Automation with Selenium WebDriver” is the book to start, then one of Selenium Recipes books. After getting comfortable with maintaining about 20 tests, try to implement “Practical Continuous Testing — make Agile/DevOps real”.
(all my books are on Leanpub, which offers a 60-day 100% Happiness Guarantee)
Keep developing/refining my test automation and CT tools
TestWise, a next-gen functional testing IDE and BuildWise, an award-winning CT server. I use them every working day. Both TestWise and BuildWise offered a free mode, with a minor inconvenience, you can use them free forever.Writing blog articles
You are reading it right now, freely available on Medium. Since 2021, I have published over 140 articles, many of which were featured in software testing newsletters. (Why I am writing these articles?)Workshop-style training
I recently offered online training or one-to-one coaching (via Zoom) for engineers who want dedicated guidance. You can start with 30-minutes of Test Automation Coaching for AUD$1.