Hello! My name is Bader (Bads) and I am a QA engineer at freee Healthcare Services. It's the 14th day of the freee QA Advent Calendar 2024.
I am truly grateful for the opportunity to share my thoughts through this blog. It's an exciting moment for me to introduce Zephyr Scale, a powerful tool that has greatly enhanced the way we approach test management. In this article, I’ll explore how Zephyr Scale can streamline your testing process and the many advantages it offers for managing test cases, improving collaboration, and boosting overall efficiency.
Self Introduction
After three months of unemployment following my departure from my previous job, I found Likha-IT, now supported by Freee. I was hired and assigned to the Lapu-Lapu team as the main Software QA Engineer for their healthcare service. Several months into the role, I’m still excited about the opportunity to contribute my expertise and help unlock the full potential of this service, especially given the common perception that Japanese corporate culture often overlooks mental health and overall healthcare
What is Test Management, a Test Management Tool, and Why is it Important?
When discussing project management or software development, the concept of the Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) is always central. One of its key phases is testing, but the real challenge lies in effectively integrating testing into this process. This is where test management becomes crucial.
Test management involves the careful oversight and tracking of application testing to ensure that efforts are focused on high-risk or critical areas of the software. Through test management, a test manager or team leader can efficiently organize, monitor, assess, and control the testing process while managing resources. Integrating test management tools into this process is essential, as they eliminate the need for outdated, manual methods like spreadsheets and documentation to track test data and generate reports.
Transitioning from an old test management system to an atlassian product and its benefits: Zephyr Scale
One month into my role, after getting familiar with the onboarding process, I was introduced to a new test management tool. Although I wasn't too familiar with it, I quickly learned to adapt to it, knowing that every tool has its quirks. But in the same month, Free-Likha-QA made the decision to transition to Zephyr Scale which was something I am familiar with on my previous work. This move aimed to address some of the challenges the QA team was facing, particularly in the areas of test creation/import, repository and execution. I had the opportunity to demo some of zephyr scale feature and seamless integration.
Based on my experience and the survey conducted by the Freee QA team, here are the pros and cons of using other test management tools alongside Jira as the core project management platform:
- Bulk test case upload made easy with little to no mapping required
Zephyr Bulk CSV Upload - Seamless Jira Issue Linking to test case or test cycle/run level
Test Case: Happy/Bug Linking - Search function and repository management is great since it’s already an atlassian product optimized for Jira
Test Case/Cycle Repository search - Dedicated reports tab and Jira dashboard integration that is good in estimation and resource management
Zephyr Scale built in reports tab 
Zephyr Scale and Jira dashboard integration
Bigger Picture: Why Zephyr Scale is the more sensible choice for Jira users
It’s been a few months since the team made the official transition to Zephyr Scale, and we’ve already seen significant improvements in efficiency, particularly in test planning. The ability to import test cases faster and with better mapping has made a noticeable difference. But why is Zephyr Scale the more sensible choice? The answer is simple: it’s a more stable, cloud-based test management tool compared to its competitors. Having experienced frequent server downtimes with other legacy test management tools (not cloud) it’s clear that Zephyr Scale offers a more reliable and consistent solution for our needs. What sets Zephyr Scale apart from other test management tools as per is its ability to link test entities without directly relying on Jira issue types. This flexibility allows you to tailor Zephyr Scale to your team's specific needs. For instance, you can add custom fields and statuses at the project level without requiring assistance from a Jira administrator. Additionally, you can associate test cases with different environments, giving you greater control over your testing process. Beyond Jira, Zephyr Scale integrates with a wide range of tools and frameworks such as the capacity to create BDD or Gherkin test cases that can be used for Cucumber, REST API to integrate with automation such as selenium and CI/CD server tool integration such as Jenkins.
Conclusion: Freee and Likha’s cloud-native approach obviously concludes to the usage of Zephyr Scale instead of legacy solutions
Freee and Likha-IT have always been in cloud-native approach and Zephyr Scale is the perfect solution for its organization with multiple teams that have complex data requirements. Its robust cross-project integration, strong traceability, and scalable structure make it especially valuable in larger environments. At the same time, it’s a great choice for smaller organizations looking to expand, offering the flexibility and room to grow as their needs evolve. True to its purpose, I'll also keep an eye to better test management approach and tools in the future that we can use to better our processes.
Tomorrow, Sunny-san, a QA engineer in the team-qa_finance_transfer, will be publishing an article titled "チーム内でのrunn利用について" Stay tuned!
よい品質を〜
