"I try to get all the yellows to greens, and the reds to yellow."
In essence, this is a very typical dashboard-driven management method. All projects, regardless of value, risk or any other REAL quantitative measurement are distilled down to one of three primary colors. It was a that very moment that I learned a valuable lesson:
No matter what you do, you need to be able to articulate it in a way anyone can understand.
Like "Greens", "Yellows" and "Reds". This got me thinking (look out!) and I kept coming to the same question.'
WHY???
We are all professionals. We know our stuff. Yet our delivery somehow relies upon breaking down sometimes very large and very complex projects into 3 colors, ostensibly for easier consumption by management. So, how does this affect testing you say? We're getting to that ;)
This method (usually without set criteria that defines a color to begin with) causes management to adopt a tactical, reactionary mind set, as opposed to a strategic one. A unfortunate result of this is that project managers and other folks responsible for delivery begin focusing on working on issues to get that color to change ASAP instead of the delivery, with Quality.
As you manage a testing effort, always consider the audience you are catering to. If your audience is other testers or developer-types, drop the stoplight pretense and go straight to the issue at hand. Odds are those folks will appreciate you quickly getting to the issue instead of belaboring it. If you are relating to non-technical users or management types, adopting the stoplight approach can work well, provided you ensure one critically important thing:
Always establish the set criteria for the status, and stick to it!
-William
