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In his blog post Your user acceptance testing is fixed – Is that a problem? – Shrini has quite correctly detailed the challenges of getting UAT done from the business and various ways how a UAT is compromised.

Forms of fixing UAT
Between Business and IT, UAT can be fixed in number of ways – some of these are reasonably business driven models given the constraints.
1. UAT will be performed by the members from IT team where business only reviews the results of the test. If the results are OK then UAT is ought to have been completed
2. UAT will be performed by a third party, such as someone from support staff. Business will review the results and accept the proposed changes if results are OK
3. Business will provide a prescribed set of test scripts that can either be used by anyone IT staff or support staff. Results will be verified by the Business.
4. UAT will be done like a demo to the users where IT staff will execute some pre-approved test scenarios related to proposed changes.
5. IT team will train the business in new features proposed to be introduced. Business users after training, test (use) the proposed software and accept the software

Why fixing user acceptance testing is bad thing?

Why bother to UAT after all? For IT, more often than not, it is a formality to be completed before they push the code to production.

In my opinion, it is the spirit and purpose of UAT that gets compromised. Typically, in spite of all best efforts, the depth and frequency of interactions between IT and business throughout the project remains low. When business users do not participate with full spirit in UAT, lots of things go unnoticed into production. This might results users (non participating ones especially) getting surprised when they see the product.

I certainly agree with his comments and his displeasure when UAT is compromised.

At one of the companies that I’ve worked for, we had taken the Agile approach where regular demos were conducted for business where they got the exact idea of what was being developed and does it meet their expectations. This made our life quite easier as towards the end when it was time for UAT, they had virtually tested the complete application except for the bits that were part of final iteration.

BUT in saying that Agile approach is not always possible and we sometimes do have to take the traditional ‘waterfall’ method where business gets to see the application right at the end. And when it’s time for UAT then they either don’t understand what UAT is or testing is their last priority due to other BAU (business as usual) committments. And that is when we have to come up with a compromise where we have to help them with testing by providing some high-level scripts or some training on the application.

I am not happy to say but it is quite common and in fact nowadays it is being taken for granted that business will get some support from test team to get the UAT done.