What Is Work Breakdown Structure?

What Is Work Breakdown Structure?

The list of activities can be called as the WBS list (Work Breakdown Structure – hierarchical decomposition of work to be done by members of the testing team). Work breakdown is often less formal than the list of typical tasks; on the other hand, it can look like a hierarchal list for activities in which each task is assigned a “descriptor” or an identifier. The descriptor allows you to keep track of the task throughout the development lifecycle and provides the ability to link work or cost measurements with different tasks. Thanks to this, it is possible to take sets of measurements that characterize the actual expenses over the project period. Of course, using more formalities and more reports means a huge overhead in terms of time and cost, so you need to find a reasonable compromise between the level of detail in planning and the organization of the project. Typically, a compromise in such cases is achieved through the use of project management tools, such as, for example, Microsoft Project, while planning and monitoring labor costs for test execution. If you prefer a particular tool, you should make sure that its input and output are compatible with the tools that other groups use.

What benefits can one get from localization testing services? Frankly speaking, they help to adapt software apps to cultural peculiarities of other countries – those where these products are meant to be sold.

E.g., for rapid testing it is necessary to generate a precise task list which should contain all the major tasks, especially those that require preparation time, for example, the acquisition of necessary equipment, the recruitment of qualified personnel or training of the staff and the design of tests. Ignoring the preparation stage for a major task before testing can lead to negative consequences.

For instance, there is no reason to believe that each tester will devote 40 or more hours per week to the assigned pre-designated mission, throughout the life of the project. In this case, there will be no time for meetings, preparation and exchange of information. Moreover, it is necessary to find time to debug tests, solve medical problems and even personal problems.

‘Project evaluation’ is the position in the list that requires additional explanations. Before involving more people in the work to reduce the time required to solve a particular problem, it is recommended to determine what task can be divided into subtasks. For example, only one person can drive a car, therefore the task of driving a car does not allow for subdivision into subtasks. The process of selecting test runners does not allow division into parts, so the labor costs for the preparation of a larger number of testers increase linearly with the number of testers involved.