High Level Test Driven Development – Shift Left

Agile development methods are increasingly used in large projects, with many development teams. Because acceptance testing can require a large chain of features to be completed, testing is often carried out late in such projects. In this experience report, we describe a large project where 11 development teams delivered a system in 12 three week iterations. We also describe how the focus of test activities was shifted towards the earlier phases of development, what we call “shift left”. This involved shifting the focus both within the iterations, and in how the overall testing work was organized. We describe the results of this change, and provide recommendations for how to organize test work in future large-scale development projects.