John McConda, principal consultant at Mozer Consulting, discusses his workshop designed to aid testers who work in a regulated environment to implement agile and automated testing. He talks about how those who work in businesses that are regulated by federal agencies, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, and other compliance requirements can still work within those rigid specifications to introduce agile and automated processes.

Mike Sowers, senior consultant and VP of Training with Coveros, discusses the value of attending the STAREAST conference: networking, couch sessions, and being able to discuss common challenges with colleagues. He details conversations about trying to improve personal core competencies along with our teams and organizations, integrating agile and moving into DevOps, and how testing operates in a continuous context. Mike also talks about upcoming conferences and staying ahead of the technology curve through training and learning opportunities.

In this interview, Jason Wick, senior manager at MakeMusic, discusses his STAREAST presentation about eight ways you could be making your one-on-one meetings completely useless. He discusses in depth what he feels is the number one way to ruin these meetings: holding back on feedback. He also offers advice on how you can educate your team leader to avoid the pitfalls that lead to ineffective one-on-ones.

In this interview, Adam Satterfield, director of testing and quality at Anthem, discusses the core components that testers need to understand in order to create a test strategy in an agile environment. He also talks about the need to build better communication skills through active listening. And Adam offers advice on sharing the things you have learned through blogging, writing for sites like the TechWell community sites, or becoming a presenter at a conference, as well as the benefits you can gain from that.