Testing Is a Social Activity — Not a Solo Act
What I learned as the first (and only) tester in a startup
Skilled testing is not a solo act, nor a factory line. It’s a social, cognitive process. Quality emerges when testers and teams question deeply, share tacit knowledge, and explore uncertainty together.
I didn’t read this idea in a book.
I lived it.
I was hired as the first test engineer.
No prior QA.
No scripts.
No legacy tools.
No test artifacts.
Just a team of engineers who had never worked with a tester before.
Honestly, I was excited. Not because it was smooth, but because it was uncertain. And testing thrives in uncertainty.
There was no structured onboarding.
Just one 1-hour product walkthrough.
But here’s what mattered: the team was curious and collaborative.
They didn’t see me as a bottleneck. They saw me as someone who could help them understand the product better. And I saw them the same way.
I didn’t wait for clarity. I went looking for it.
I started asking questions.
I explored the product.
I observed how features were shipped.
And I noticed something else.
Almost every release needed a hotfix.
Not because developers were careless.
But because no one was really testing.
They were mostly checking. Verifying that features met basic requirements. Edge cases, interaction risks, and behavior under strain were rarely explored.
So I tried something different.
I didn’t bring in a process.
I didn’t write a test plan.
I didn’t pitch automation tools.
Instead, I made testing visible.
I shared what I found in Slack, in meetings, and in 1:1s.
I involved myself early, even when there was no formal invitation.
I asked about goals, not just features.
I mapped customer complaints to real problems.
I prioritized based on risk, not a checklist.
Not every question was welcomed.
Some findings were inconvenient.
Some discussions were uncomfortable.
But something important changed.
What actually changed wasn’t the number of bugs found.
It was when conversations happened.
Risks surfaced before code was “done.”
Assumptions were challenged while they were still cheap.
Surprises moved left.
When the next feature release went out, it went out with fewer surprises.
Known risks were consciously accepted, not discovered in production.
Not because I’m a magician.
But because we talked, questioned, and learned together.
Some issues were fixed.
Some were negotiated.
Some were deferred.
But they were seen. Understood. Discussed.
That’s what good testing does.
The common belief is that testing is something a tester does after development.
What I learned is that testing fails the moment it becomes isolated.
What I learned
This wasn’t about being “the only QA.”
It was about what happens when testing becomes social.
Testing is not a service.
It’s not a script.
It’s not a gate.
It’s a conversation.
A skilled tester doesn’t wait for instructions.
They ask better questions.
They notice things others miss.
They think like a user and speak like a teammate.
Testing is a team sport.
And the real work doesn’t happen when testers follow scripts, but when they work in sync with others, learning and thinking together.
Final thought
If you’re the only tester, don’t try to do everything.
Trying to do everything alone is how testers become invisible — and eventually irrelevant.
This doesn’t guarantee agreement.
It guarantees awareness.
Bring people into the act of testing.
Ask questions.
Share discoveries.
Make invisible risks visible.
You don’t need to be a gatekeeper.
Just be a skilled investigator in a room full of builders.
If you found this helpful, stay connected with Life of QA for more real-world testing experiences, tips, and lessons from the journey!