In many teams, QA is often treated as a separate role, which is the last step before the code enters into production. However, in this rapidly growing period, particularly in startups, only one or a few persons cannot keep up with the speed of development, the changing requirements, and the daily deployments. When quality is the responsibility of just a few, it becomes a huge blocker. It is time to change the way we think about QA. The future of QA should be collaborative.
Old Work Pattern: QA for testing
For many years, the organizations worked in a standard pattern that looked like this: The developers write code, and the QA tests it. When the QA finds the bugs in the code, the developers fix it which is again retested and validated by QA. After all these processes are over, the code is moved to the production phase.
This concept made sense when software releases happened only a few times a year. However, that style doesn’t match how modern teams work. In current times:
- Code deployment usually happens weekly or even daily.
- Team sizes are smaller.
- Roles of the team members are intertwined.
- Speeding up with the pace is crucial.
In this scenario, waiting for QA causes everything to slow down.
Reality in Startups
In startups, the situation is even more critical. It’s possible that there isn’t even a QA person, and testing is simply a shared burden. Developers write and deploy the code for features, and manual testing occurs shortly before the release.
Another scenario is where there is only one QA who is skilled in automation. This person only knows how to run the tests, manage the test setups, and understand the CI pipeline. And if that person is not present that day, the whole team is paralyzed.
What Happens When QA Is Centralized
- The automated tests are never run until the last minute.
- Teams do not trust the suite because no one knows what is in the suite.
- On some occasions, bugs are caught late – or not at all.
- Developers do not feel ownership of quality.
What happens as a result of it? Teams begin skipping steps. They assume everything is “probably fine.”
Quality is a collective responsibility
When each member of the team is capable of and is expected to care about quality, everything will change.
- Regular testing will allow the developers to identify and fix flaky tests.
- Project managers can assess the test coverage and identify gaps in critical areas.
- Designers will be able to implement visual testing tools to detect bugs early.
- QA provides guidance and help but does not have to take on the entire load of responsibility.
In this system, QA transitions from monitoring to facilitation by making testing accessible rather than conducting all the testing.
First Step Is To Give Access
If executing tests demands setting up an environment, opening a terminal, debugging failed CI processes, or requesting help, it won’t take place. People tend to avoid complexity.
Making testing collaborative starts with removing the major obstacles. Imagine if anyone in your team could:
- Run the tests from a browser
- Understand the results without digging through the logs
- Re-run only the failed tests instantly
- Add test coverage without doing any complex setup or installation
In this way, quality becomes everyone’s job and not just the QA.
This Isn’t About Replacing QA
This approach does not reduce the importance of quality assurance. It improves the effectiveness of quality assurance.
When QA doesn’t have to spend the entire day triggering tests, managing environments, or explaining results, they can focus on strategy. This in turn will:
- Enhance the test coverage
- Develop stable and reliable test suites
- Educating the team on quality principles
- Identifying patterns before they become issues
Future of Collaborative QA
Startups don’t have time to maintain fragile processes. They need systems that grow with the team.
Collaborative QA benefits include:
- Distributed ownership
- Reduction of obstacles
- Faster feedback processes
- Builds confidence in the team
Perhaps most importantly, it assures that quality does not rely on a single individual or team and fails when that person/team is unavailable.
Conclusion
The future of QA does not involve adding more tools or checklists. The goal is to make testing so simple, accessible, and dependable that everyone will take part. When teams stop thinking of QA as an individual thing and instead view it in a shared mindset, they produce better quality software even faster. Test automation is only useful if used. Hence, let us make it something everyone can use.