14 Mar 2024
This article is part of a series called "Stories of Women in Software Testing All around the World", launched on the 8th of March in a post with snippets from every interview. In the week from the 11th to the 15th, we will launch the complete interviews of all the women.
The interview was done by Brightest with Larissa Rosochansky, Senior IT Global Leader - Portfolio & Demand Management at Mars. For the original interview in Portuguese, please click here.
In 2003, I was working as a business analyst in a pharmaceutical company and was affected by a major layoff. In that company, I was the link between business and development, and I validated that what was ordered was being delivered correctly, including the visual identity. When I was looking for another position, they asked me what I did, I explained, and they told me: that's QA! In 2004, I saw a vacancy for a test analyst in a town in the interior of São Paulo and decided to apply. It was for IBM, in the newly created area of Testing, which was starting to provide testing services for IBM in the United States. At the time, there were 15 people there. I joined, did training that taught me what formal testing was, and fell in love. We grew to over 300 people, and I held every testing position at IBM, from analyst, team leader, test manager, consultant, until I became the head of the testing area, thinking about strategy and selling services, over 14 years. Testing became my second name and my passion, and I met my husband, also a quality professional, at IBM.
Each project has taught me something different. I think the main thing is the mindset of eternal learning. As an analyst and team leader, my most memorable project was a test of a payroll solution involving several Latin American countries, frontend in Lotus Notes, and backend Oracle Forms. When I arrived at the project, I realized that the requirements were not in the best possible shape and that the front end had never talked to the back end... Many months later, we managed to have a quality solution with a satisfied client. And in Spanish! At the time, I only knew the basics. It was an unforgettable learning experience! As head of the testing area, I was very pleased with a solution design I did with my team for a test factory using all the most innovative accelerators, from test optimization with pairwise to defect prevention using AI, which at the time was in its infancy. This work involved a lot of learning, many areas, a lot of convincing and inspiration until people were able to see things from the same perspective as me, which was much more of a vision, an inspiration, of what could be. When we signed the contract, the feeling of accomplishment led everyone to believe was beautiful!
I was the first in many things in my area... the first focal point, the first manager... and I always wanted to bring other women with me. The main challenge I saw was the assumption I often encountered that too many women working together generated a lot of "noise" and intrigue. Also, we were too emotional. In the patriarchal society we live in, we are brought up to see other women as competition, and often the intrigues were because of this, and because of the predominantly male environment, which instigated us. But as we evolved as an area, and we had more women growing into leadership roles, I noticed that sororities began to speak louder, and women helped each other more. As a pioneer, I was often considered more masculine than feminine, and my assertiveness was seen as aggressiveness. It took years for me to be comfortable in my skin and thus be able to have my say without fear of being frowned upon.
Women have a keen sense of empathy and are therefore able to connect much more easily with the user's needs, and we are strong enough to fight for this vision. What's more, the more diverse perspectives a product has, the more comprehensive it will be. There are many stories of products created by predominantly male teams that, when they reached the market, failed badly: voice recognition software that didn't recognize female voices, facial recognition that didn't recognize black skin, and many others. If a company wants its product to be used by everyone, its development/QA team must also be as diverse as its audience.
I've learned a lot from wonderful women who have appeared as leaders in my life. They served as an example that I too could get there and that I should have my voice, without being afraid to use it. Having role models, people we can be inspired by is essential if we want to see ourselves in leadership positions. There is a gap in female leaders everywhere. Here in Brazil, it's also due to the amount of time we take off on maternity leave and the double or triple shifts we often have. Men also receiving paternity leave, so that they can be with their wives at this time, is a good step towards the evolution of female leadership, as well as the understanding that women can add a lot to a company and that our leadership style may be different, but it works in the same way. Support groups for women leaders, exchanges, and career acceleration programs for top-talent women are excellent ways of supporting women. As well as making women aware that we were brought up in a patriarchal environment, but that doesn't define us.
La entrevista fue realizada por Brightest a Maria Clara Choucair, Fundadora y Presidenta de HASTQB & CEO de Choucair Testing S.A..
Trabajé en un proyecto con una empresa americana, de ahí aprendí la disciplina. Y me encantó porque me dio la oportunidad de servir a la sociedad a través de que los activos digitales que yo intervenía con la disciplina de pruebas cumplían sus objetivos, no tenían problemas y veía cómo los usuarios se beneficiaban de ellos de una manera mejor.
Hemos enfrentado muchos desafíos, nosotros somos una compañía de 700 personas hoy, yo empecé sola. Y hay desafíos de construcción de compañía.
Para el futuro nos vienen muchos cambios, y específicamente en el tema de desarrollo, cómo construimos activos digitales. Y para ello tenemos que utilizar todo el tema de inteligencia artificial, y obviamente saber utilizar esto, y nos va a tocar aprender muchas matemáticas y estadísticas, y enfrentarnos a resolver problemas de la vida diaria con temas más formales.
Es por eso por lo que invito a las mujeres, específicamente a que incursionemos o sigamos profundizando en temas de estadísticas, matemáticas y en general STEM, porque definitivamente, además de ser un tema muy divertido para ver cómo resolvemos problemas de la sociedad de manera más precisa, genera muchísimo bienestar para la sociedad.