Social sciences define agency as the capacity of individuals to act independently and make their own free choices. It’s core to exploratory testing, and we need to push further the limits of tester agency. Agency is how we move both exploratory testing the verb and exploratory testing the noun as company defaults. Testers are not information providers, but decision-makers. Testers aren’t providing information on risks of automation focus, but enablers of useful automation. Turning up your agency is turning up your value.
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Maaret Pyhäjärvi is an exploratory tester extraordinaire with a day-job at Vaisala as Principal Test Engineer. She is a tester, (polyglot) programmer, speaker, author, conference designer and a community facilitator. She is Most Influential Agile Testing Professional Person 2016 and Top-100 Most Influential in ICT in Finland 2019.