ISTQB certification: benefits and features
The success of an IT project depends largely on how well the testing and quality assurance system (Quality Assurance, QA) is organized at all stages of its life cycle.
For a QA specialist, one of the most reliable ways to prove your professional skills is the availability of an international ISTQB certificate. Today we will talk about what such certification gives to an employee, an employer and a business, as well as how we at SimbirSoft support the qualification of QA engineers.
ISTQB (International Software Testing Qualifications Board) is an international organization that certifies QA specialists. Today it is the most authoritative certification system.
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As of December 2018, ISTQB has conducted more than 875,000 examinations and has issued over 641,000 certificates that recognize IT companies in 126 countries around the world. Different countries have their own representative offices of this organization, for example, in Russia it is RSTQB.
Despite the territorial "variation", the materials for the preparation, the number of questions and the duration of the exam are the same for everyone. In this case, certification is carried out only in person, in the presence of an examiner from the ISTQB representative office.
ISTQB certificates have three levels :
A QA specialist who successfully passes the exam receives the following features and guarantees:
For an employer, the applicant has an ISTQB certificate ─ a kind of "quality mark" of the knowledge of its owner. Large IT-companies seek to attract to the state
certified staff or arrange exams yourself.
When choosing a contractor for an IT project, customers estimate different parameters, including deadlines and cost of work, availability of relevant cases, etc. If QA specialists of an IT company are certified according to ISTQB standards, all other things being equal, this could be an additional competitive advantage for the company.
ISTQB certificates are quoted worldwide, so an IT company with a staff of certified employees can also participate in international tenders.
In addition to the obvious competitive advantages, there are other positive results of certification:
Some IT professionals refer to ISTQB certification as an unnecessary formality or “achivka”, which does not bring practical benefits. In forums devoted to IT problems, one can often hear the opinion that a certificate does not help to confirm the knowledge of its owner.
However, we at SimbirSoft do not agree with this opinion. Above, we have already examined how certification helps to deepen the knowledge of specialists and make collaboration within the team more effective. In our company, every quality assurance specialist must be certified by ISTQB. At the time of the preparation of the material, 64 employees already received certificates: 50% of QA specialists and 36% ─ SDET.
Independent training + help from a curator and colleagues ─ is an approach that shows good results. Experts at the same time prepare for the exam, supplement their knowledge and systematize them. In addition to comprehensive training, we conduct intensive and quality assurance meetings. Before exams, we will definitely check the degree of mastering materials and the readiness of employees for certification.
The knowledge test is conducted offline, in the main office of our company in Ulyanovsk. On the appointed day, an examiner from RSTQB ─ of the Russian representative office of ISTQB comes to us. He monitors compliance with the rules of certification. SimbirSoft company undertakes to pay for certification.
We have been cooperating with RSTQB for a long time as volunteers, translate and adapt materials for exam preparation, participate in joint conferences and expert meetings. Ekaterina SimbirSoft expert has been a member of the RSTQB board since 2015.
Experts RSTQB and SimbirSoft are preparing for a joint discussion club in the framework of the international IT conference "Strike 2019".
Summing up, we list the advantages that we see in the ISTQB certification:
For our part, we are arranging the exam preparation process so as to help specialists not only to get a diploma, but to really enrich and systematize their knowledge and subsequently apply them in their work.
Our specialists who successfully passed the ISTQB exam
For a QA specialist, one of the most reliable ways to prove your professional skills is the availability of an international ISTQB certificate. Today we will talk about what such certification gives to an employee, an employer and a business, as well as how we at SimbirSoft support the qualification of QA engineers.
What is ISTQB?
ISTQB (International Software Testing Qualifications Board) is an international organization that certifies QA specialists. Today it is the most authoritative certification system.
')
As of December 2018, ISTQB has conducted more than 875,000 examinations and has issued over 641,000 certificates that recognize IT companies in 126 countries around the world. Different countries have their own representative offices of this organization, for example, in Russia it is RSTQB.
Despite the territorial "variation", the materials for the preparation, the number of questions and the duration of the exam are the same for everyone. In this case, certification is carried out only in person, in the presence of an examiner from the ISTQB representative office.
ISTQB certificates have three levels :
Why certificate ISTQB specialist
A QA specialist who successfully passes the exam receives the following features and guarantees:
- Competitiveness in hiring , including in an international company. This is due to the fact that ISTQB certification is popular and trusted in many countries around the world. In addition, the non-commercial nature of ISTQB and the free provision of materials for exam preparation are a guarantee of unbiased certification.
In some companies, the presence of an ISTQB certificate is an advantage for the applicant, as can be seen by familiarizing himself with vacancies on the well-known resource HeadHunter. - Career growth and salary increase . When the knowledge of a specialist is confirmed by an international certificate, then management has more confidence in such an employee. He gets the opportunity to work on more complex projects that are well paid.
- Systematization of knowledge . Preparation for exams will “sort through” separate theoretical and practical knowledge and fill in some gaps. And when preparing for the exam at the expert level (Expert Level), more than half of the tasks are practical. Working on theory and practice helps to deepen professional skills and learn something new.
- Development of skills and expertise . Certificates can only be obtained sequentially: from a basic level to an expert. And at each stage of preparation for the exam will require new knowledge, so the specialist really puts a lot of effort. The certificate of the expert is confirmed by practical skills, for example, completed tasks or speeches at specialized conferences. This can also be an incentive for development in its own field.
For an employer, the applicant has an ISTQB certificate ─ a kind of "quality mark" of the knowledge of its owner. Large IT-companies seek to attract to the state
certified staff or arrange exams yourself.
The benefits of employee certification for IT companies and customers
When choosing a contractor for an IT project, customers estimate different parameters, including deadlines and cost of work, availability of relevant cases, etc. If QA specialists of an IT company are certified according to ISTQB standards, all other things being equal, this could be an additional competitive advantage for the company.
ISTQB certificates are quoted worldwide, so an IT company with a staff of certified employees can also participate in international tenders.
In addition to the obvious competitive advantages, there are other positive results of certification:
- All experts who have been trained and passed the exam, have common terminology. The team members speak the same language, there are no problems due to a misunderstanding of each other.
- Evaluation of the results is impartial, since knowledge is verified by third-party independent experts, for whom Ivanov, Petrov and Sidorov are equal.
- Certification provides an opportunity to assess in which areas the employee understands the best, and what knowledge should be developed.
How do we get certified by ISTQB at SimbirSoft
Some IT professionals refer to ISTQB certification as an unnecessary formality or “achivka”, which does not bring practical benefits. In forums devoted to IT problems, one can often hear the opinion that a certificate does not help to confirm the knowledge of its owner.
However, we at SimbirSoft do not agree with this opinion. Above, we have already examined how certification helps to deepen the knowledge of specialists and make collaboration within the team more effective. In our company, every quality assurance specialist must be certified by ISTQB. At the time of the preparation of the material, 64 employees already received certificates: 50% of QA specialists and 36% ─ SDET.
How we organize exam preparation
- We set the time for passing the exam for the ISTQB certificate individually for each employee. First of all it depends on the experience of the specialist. On average, after six months or a year of work in the company, an examination for a basic level certificate is taken.
- We unite employees into groups that prepare themselves for the exam on the basis of the official ISTQB materials and unofficial training tests that are available on the Internet.
- Each group has a tutor ─ curator from among experienced QA specialists. It helps to find answers to the most difficult questions. Group members tell the curator what issues caused them difficulty, then they choose the time and meet in a brainstorming session to find a solution with the curator.
Independent training + help from a curator and colleagues ─ is an approach that shows good results. Experts at the same time prepare for the exam, supplement their knowledge and systematize them. In addition to comprehensive training, we conduct intensive and quality assurance meetings. Before exams, we will definitely check the degree of mastering materials and the readiness of employees for certification.
The knowledge test is conducted offline, in the main office of our company in Ulyanovsk. On the appointed day, an examiner from RSTQB ─ of the Russian representative office of ISTQB comes to us. He monitors compliance with the rules of certification. SimbirSoft company undertakes to pay for certification.
We have been cooperating with RSTQB for a long time as volunteers, translate and adapt materials for exam preparation, participate in joint conferences and expert meetings. Ekaterina SimbirSoft expert has been a member of the RSTQB board since 2015.
Experts RSTQB and SimbirSoft are preparing for a joint discussion club in the framework of the international IT conference "Strike 2019".
findings
Summing up, we list the advantages that we see in the ISTQB certification:
- Communication within the company and with customers takes place in the same language. This is very important because it allows you to avoid mistakes due to misunderstanding. In turn, we are confident that all our employees equally understand the processes of testing and quality assurance and equally interpret the results of work.
- After our employee honestly (and we don’t have anything else), we can be sure that his professional knowledge is structured, he is ready to work on projects of different levels of complexity.
- Our certified experts know the exact standards of the industry and are guided by them in their work.
- The high professional level of QA specialists helps us to comply with the deadlines for project development.
- We can ensure the quality of even the most complex IT products, as we are confident in the qualifications of our employees.
For our part, we are arranging the exam preparation process so as to help specialists not only to get a diploma, but to really enrich and systematize their knowledge and subsequently apply them in their work.
Our specialists who successfully passed the ISTQB exam
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/456876/
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