Judith Rosenwick
Lead QA Consultant
QA Consultancy Services
An expert-led service from VML to help clients improve the quality of their products, services and processes whilst driving efficiency
The Market (and Client) Challenge
In a world of ever-more demanding consumers and growing competitive pressures being placed on businesses, the need for strong QA has never been more critical.
Amidst a drive to increase and meet demand, with the constant need to deliver flawless experiences to maintain customer loyalty whilst focusing on heightening efficiency, organisations are having to work harder to ensure quality both internally and externally in an omnichannel world.
With so many different forces at play, it's no surprise our clients frequently come to us seeking guidance on how to solve quality challenges. Common questions we hear include:
Introducing QA Consultancy Services by VML
VML QA Consultancy Services provide expert guidance and support to clients looking to improve the quality of their products, services and processes, while driving efficiency.
These services go beyond just testing and focus on building a culture of quality across software delivery and throughout the organisation. We tailor our services to meet each client’s needs, from project specific support to helping achieve broader organisational quality goals.
Through VML’s QA services, clients benefit in 4 key areas:
- Reduced development costs – proactive early detection and resolution of defects significantly reduces costly rework and delays.
- Faster Time-to-Market & Shorter Time-to-Value – streamlined testing processes and automation accelerate release cycles, enabling you to get your products to market faster.
- Enhanced User Experience – thorough and effective testing ensures a seamless and enjoyable user experience, leading to increased customer satisfaction and retention. This in turn influences conversion rate and revenue.
- Improved Brand Reputation – delivering high-quality, performant, and accessible products builds trust, loyalty and credibility, enhancing your brand image and market standing.
“VML Enterprise Solutions was the perfect partner in our journey of agile technology transformation and software testing to attain the next level of maturity. The team brought in a wealth of experience and a pragmatic approach, and provided recommendations that were clear, actionable, and tailored to our specific needs and challenges... As a result, we’ve seen a marked improvement in the efficiency and effectiveness of our testing approach, which translates to a higher quality software product reaching our users.”
Benefits of using QA Consultancy Services
- Reduce defects escaping to production and improve software quality
- Improve efficiency of QA, for faster time-to-market and reduced cost
- Implement QA strategies to support future technology and delivery roadmaps
- Embed expert QA Engineers and Managers to support delivery
- Embrace and leverage test automation
- Upskill and enable client teams
- Improve site performance and customer experience
- Build a successful QA function or Centre of Excellence
- Enable measurement and monitoring of QA processes via tooling
- Support managing quality in a multi-vendor environment
- Drive adoption of a quality mindset across teams and organisations
QA Consultancy Services is made up of 3 service lines:
Why VML?
We have a team of over 150 QA Specialists and have been a dedicated QA function since 1991. We are also ISTQB Platinum Partners and a MACH Alliance Member. As practitioners, we offer a strong skillset and experience base:
- QA Capabilities – Test Management and Leadership, Manual and Automation QA, Performance Engineering
- Domains – retail ecommerce (fashion, travel, luxury, nutrition, health, motor, etc.), B2B, loyalty, AI, Native Apps, CMS, PIM, OMS, and more
- Test Types - functional, integration, end to end, compatibility, accessibility, performance, and more
- Toolsets and frameworks – we are tool agnostic, having experience with Xray, Zephyr, BrowserStack, Applitools, Cypress, Playwright, Selenium, Postman, and many more
- Enterprise technologies and composable solutions
- Proven track record of helping clients with QA strategy, process, team enablement, and execution through first-class consultancy, going beyond testing to help clients drive improvement and meet quality goals
Recent Client Programmes
A well-known furniture retailer was aiming to centralise their stock management and introduce new fulfilment channels, but they faced the challenge of coordinating complex testing across numerous vendors and internal teams. The lack of centralised test management posed a risk to QA efficiency, quality and visibility, and also to timely delivery.
To address this challenge, VML provided a year-long engagement, delivering project critical test management services. These included test strategy & approach using Atlassian tools for centralised test management and documentation; process optimisation; collaboration & reporting through Jira; initiated automation; and provided on-site support.
The results were significant and included streamlined testing, enhanced defect management, data-driven insights, and reduced regression time which accelerated delivery cycles.
A cutting-edge AI company faced the challenge of some project teams not having dedicated QA practices or processes. Their projects needed to provide solutions with confidence in quality for clients, but they didn’t have a function to lean on to augment the team and critically appraise the WoW.
This is where VML stepped in to help. A dedicated Test Lead as well as QA resources were embedded within the AI company, and their focus included: test strategy & process implementation to embed QA best practices; leveraging their QA expertise; and advocating for Quality and Agile practices.
The results have been impressive: over 400 valid bugs were identified within the first year (including a defect escape rate post-release of <1%), alongside an automated Regression Suite that provided ongoing and early confidence in the stability of the software, and improved Requirements & Documentation.
