In the final blog of this series we will talk about the testing and training elements of implementing audit/inspection software.
Part 3: Configuration & Customization
Project Team Training
Training your project team (the people who are making decisions about how audit/inspection software will be used within your business) should be done throughout the project. By considering training early, you can ensure your team is aware of the software’s capabilities and be better positioned to make decisions later in the project. This training should be considered generic and is intended only to provide exposure and general understanding.
End-User Training
End User Training is training to perform only the tasks and functions they will do personally. This is the most focused of the training and usually the shortest. It may need to be delivered in a repeatable format so users can absorb it over time.
Train the Trainer
Trainer-training is intended to create power users who will be responsible to train other individual users. This training is very focused on particular job functions and the steps required for performing specific tasks.
Testing Needs Training
The key to testing is to provide the right level of training to the right users at the right time to ensure they can adequately test. While it may seem obvious, many organizations forget that in order for testing to be thorough and effective, users need to understand how the audit/inspection software works and what it is intended to do.
Unit Testing
Unit testing is the process to test individual features or functions in an isolated manner. For example, in an audit/inspection project this might be to test the creation of a new checklist to confirm that the necessary data can be captured. This is normally performed by the project team as they are configuring and customizing the solution. In order to perform this type of testing, the tester must understand the requirements of the individual features.
Project Team Testing
Project Team Testing is the process to test a group of features or functions that work together. For example, how a supervisor reviews/approves an audit along with the related approvals and communications. This is normally performed by the project team members who have understanding of the overall business requirements of the solution. In order to perform this type of testing, the tester must understand the requirements of the individual features as well as the capability of the software.
End user testing
End user testing is the process to test all aspects of the solution by a set of end users. End users must be trained to perform their normal tasks and should then execute them in the system in a test environment to ensure they can be completed.
End user testing is most often performed at the end of the project as a final test before going live with the software but the users doing the testing must be engaged throughout the project to ensure requirements are captured and are not overlooked.
Going Live
Going Live is often a date and as such as the date approaches so does the urgency to “turn things on”. While it is important to set a date it is also important to ensure you aren’t going live simply to meet a date. If your training and testing are complete and signed off on, then you roll out your software to a broad audience. To do so beforehand, simply to meet a date will create as many issues as it solves.
Plan for Success
It is inevitably there will be a few speed bumps in implementing audit/inspection software. A well planned implementation can ensure these bumps are minor. Don’t forget to look to your audit/inspection software vender. They will have best practices and experience that are invaluable to your implementation.
