Improving Defect Management With the Help of Agile Methodologies

Development teams often face a problem with answering one of the most common questions ‘how to manage defects in an agile environment?’. In response, they begin with Scrum as a solution to develop their software and during the implementation stage, they experience issues in how to deal with defects they find during the process.

It isn’t possible that defects will not cross their way during a software development project.

Teams with a realistic approach do not hesitate in finding this true and focus on how these defects were caused, how long does it take to identify them and the most important factor is how and when these defects will be resolved.

Research has explained that fixing a defect identified in the production stage is much more expensive than resolving it when found in earlier stages of the software development lifecycle (SDLC). Thus, teams use defect management tools to identify, track and resolve defects as early as possible to keep the cost low.

Agile Approaches to Improve Defect Handling

In an agile environment, teams aim at fixing defects as early as possible with different techniques like Test-Driven Development (TDD), Behavior Driven Development (BDD), Continuous Integration (CI), etc. These approaches also help in tracking the phases where they find a defect and where it was resolved. 

Prioritizing Defects

Development teams often try to find out why they experience a certain amount of defects in their applications. They use defect management tools to steer their path in the right direction. Apparently, something happened in the process that caused a lot of defects. New agile testers try to figure out what went wrong in the earlier stages of the SDLC.

If there are too many defects appearing during a sprint, it is important to take corrective actions to improve software quality. If testers place defects on the ‘Product Backlog’, discuss it and prioritize them like ‘User Stories’, the problem can be solved at the right time. Teams do not usually challenge product owners to use product backlog, due to which they affect the sprint.

Visualizing Defects

When development teams create too much technical code and design, they may reach a point where they need more time in a sprint to work on the code instead of the defects. At this point, drastic actions need to be taken so that they are on track. Visualizing defects for the code they are creating can be a good idea so that they can see what problems need to be handled. 

Conclusion

It is important to ensure that development teams are not accumulating code without reviewing it for defects. They should visualize and build a roadmap on how to prioritize and remove the defects without delaying it. For high priority defects, these defects should not affect their sprint goals and when they do, it is important to involve the product owner. So, teams use defect management tools to identify, prioritize and resolve defects that appear in the software development process.

Further Reading

How to Reduce Production Defects