QA Squads: a new offering from test IO, amplified by EPAM

Customers come to test IO for many different reasons. Sometimes, an internal product or QA team needs a force multiplier for real-world testing – to extend the existing QA team’s processes and activities beyond their internal team. Other times, it’s crisis mode – perhaps QA leadership has left the company, or there is a critical product release upcoming that the client knows they need eyes on from the outside. Some just think crowdtesting is cool, and that they need it to stay at the cutting edge of software testing trends. The rest often lie somewhere in between, where processes may be broken, coverage is limited – and they are counting on test IO to come in with QA expertise, and act. 

Some quotes from real customers on why they contacted test IO: 

• “Our VP of QA left the company. With the holidays a few months out we’re not going to be able to hire and ramp new QA leadership by then – we need coverage now” 
• “We know we need one, but we don’t have anyone in a dedicated QA function at this time” 
• “QA is a shared responsibility amongst product managers, who test on their own devices before release” 
• “We only have one QA person, who is mostly focused on automation. We know we need to do some manual testing, but we’re resource-constrained”   

As you can see, resource constraints are all too common across QA organizations. test IO has been helping teams alleviate these pains via our platform since 2011 and now we’re extending our capabilities past software testing to real QA staffing for your team.

Following our acquisition by EPAM Systems in April of 2019 we now have access to thousands of tenured QA Testers, Test Leads and Project Coordinators around the world that are available today for test IO clients to help alleviate internal resource constraints. Combined with the power of the test IO platform – and the thousands of testers within – it’s a powerhouse in quality assurance. 

These engagements begin with a QA Assessment of the current state of QA at your organization. This allows us to develop an understanding of the workload ahead and the QA squad that will be needed to accomplish the task at hand. For while we may be able to alleviate something like building features for crowdtests or resolve pain around bug triage with a part-time Test Lead – a major replatforming (and subsequent go-live) may require multiple full-time Test Leads, dedicated QA Testers for non-crowd suitable tests and Project Coordinators to get the job done. This is why our QA Assessment is so critical to determining the right team for the project. Every project has its nuances and we want to deliver the right size solution for the project at hand.

Once the QA Squad has been staffed for your project, as based on the test requirements and geographical desires for your project, we will work to integrate our team with yours. This can manifest as a weekly check in’s, daily standups, or even working onsite at your location – once again, all based on the project requirements.  

EPAM is a product engineering company at heart, that has been working with startups and the Fortune 500 alike, since 1993. QA Squads are just one of the ways that test IO’s service offerings will continue to broaden with time – including test automation, performance, security, accessibility, and general engineering services. We look forward to sharing these developments with you as they come forward. In the meantime, please do not hesitate to reach out if you think a QA Squad is right for you.