NOT THE END OF TESTING, BUT A SHIFT IN THINKING

In his article, “QA is Dead, Long live QA”, Boris Idler makes a bold yet timely statement: the traditional role of QA no longer fits modern development practices. But that doesn’t mean quality assurance is dead- rather, it’s evolving.

The article highlights a fundamental change that many modern teams are already experiencing: QA is no longer a stage at the end of the development cycle. In today’s fast-paced, Agile and DevOps-driven environments, the focus is no longer on who does the testing, but on how quality is embedded throughout the process.

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‍QUALITY IS EVERYONE’S RESPONSIBILITY

In modern product teams, especially in Agile and DevOps environments, testing can’t be an afterthought. In traditional QA models, development and testing were separate phases - a structure designed around the Waterfall model. But in modern software development, that separation is no longer practical. 

Continuous integration and delivery (CI/CD) practices, along with stronger cross-functional collaboration, have shifted the focus. Instead of handing off testing to a dedicated QA team at the end of a sprint, quality is now seen as a collective responsibility integrated into the entire process. 

That means developers write more tests, teams automate more steps, and everyone - product managers, designers, engineers - shares accountability for what gets released. It’s a shift from “delivering, then testing” to “making quality part of the process”.

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THE QA ROLE ISN’T GONE - IT’S SMARTER

Quality professionals still have a vital role, but it looks different. Their focus is no longer just finding bugs, but helping teams prevent them, by designing better test strategies, identifying risks earlier, and integrating automation into everyday workflow.

QA is shifting from being a final checkpoint to a continuous enabler of quality. They now collaborate closely with developers and product teams throughout the lifecycle. Their goal is to support smarter, faster releases by integrating testing into development workflows and empowering teams with the right tools and practices. Rather than acting as gatekeepers, they help shape a shared understanding of quality, ensuring that issues are addressed before they reach the end of the process.

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AUTOMATION FIRST - BUT NOT AUTOMATION ONLY

At Sprintform, we fully embrace this shift. We prioritize automation because it allows us to move fast and scale without compromising quality. However, we also recognize that not all testing scenarios can - or should - be automated. That’s why we still value thoughtful manual testing - especially in more complex cases where human insight matters.

In short: automation is our default, but never our only answer.

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