It’s easy to say that time flies by, but let me give you an example. I’m the editor at StickyMinds.com, and it’s hard to me keep up with all we’ve published lately. I’d like to talk about our recent coverage—and how you might get involved, too.
I met Jeremy Carey-Dressler at a peer workshop where we discussed the Gervais Principle, a somewhat cynical look at workplace politics. Several emails and a few phone calls later, Jeremy wrote Methods for Changing a Workplace Culture. It takes a hard, honest look at what it takes to make change happen, with or without a leadership title.
Jeremy blogs at About98PercentDone along with his manager, Isaac Howard, who has an experienced perspective on test management. Isaac also had an article on StickyMinds in October, about how to develop a team of testers.
At the end of the month we published Jon Hagar’s dystopian view of software testing, which turned the scary, futuristic worldview of robots replacing humans on its head, pointing out that the immediate next steps might actually be enabling and empowering.
So that’s what we’ve been up to at StickyMinds lately. But there is a downside.
Every Monday morning I wake up have the same problem: I need to find a new article on software testing for next week, about eight hundred to twelve hundred words, based on real, first-person experience.
It’s not always easy, because people tend to be scared of writing, reluctant to spend the time, or afraid they are unworthy of writing for StickyMinds.
Allow me to reassure you of a few things. First, if you have stories to share about testing, you are worthy of writing for StickyMinds. We cover a broad variety of experiences in test and quality, from agile to exploratory to more standard school, analytical, and preventive approaches.
SQE, the company that runs StickyMinds and some other publications, is also one of the last major houses to separate development editing (my job, helping you develop the ideas) with copy editing, which takes the idea and improves the writing without changing the content. Stories aren’t cut and pasted onto the site; quite the opposite, in fact. Starting with a title and single paragraph, the editorial staff guides authors toward telling stories that are theirs very well.
That bad news for me could be good for you. If you have an experience worth sharing and are willing to do the work, the odds of getting published are surprisingly high. If you’d like to join Jon, Jeremy, and Isaac and have your name up in lights on StickyMinds, the first step is to email me with a title and a paragraph or two describing what you’d like to write about.
And if you don’t want to write, that’s fine. Enjoy StickyMinds. We’ll be here each and every week. You can count on it.
