This week my company resumed "beta testing" for an in-house software product that will be used for our timesheets. For some reason, they don't feel any of the existing software for timekeeping is sufficient so they created their own custom tool. Since I'm the guy who says yes to a lot of things, I volunteered to be a beta tester for this tool.
The first round of testing occurred at the end of last year. It was an inauspicious beginning when the demo in the kick-off meeting kept crashing. Then we had all kinds of problems with logging into the test site with a URL that shared all but two letters with the production URL. My testing was limited because I was using IE even though they told us the site is "best used" with Chrome. Why wasn't I using Chrome? My old work laptop will not let me open Chrome. I have uninstalled and reinstalled it multiple times, but when I launch it I just get a blank window. I was so happy when they called off testing prematurely. The tool was clearly not ready for prime-time and needs more time in the oven.
I had forgotten about this obligation until I was reminded about it this week when a fresh round of testing kicked off. I was dragging my feet on it and ignored the emails all week. Finally, the office manager reached out directly to me to do some testing.
I still can't use Chrome on my old work laptop. I can't log in to my new work laptop due to a username/password issue and the help desk number rang and rang and sent me to voicemail. I was able to launch Chrome on my MacBook Air only to discover that I don't have the timesheet icon that allows me to enter time. Dead in the water and that's where I was left at the end of the week.
I need to get better at saying no.
The first round of testing occurred at the end of last year. It was an inauspicious beginning when the demo in the kick-off meeting kept crashing. Then we had all kinds of problems with logging into the test site with a URL that shared all but two letters with the production URL. My testing was limited because I was using IE even though they told us the site is "best used" with Chrome. Why wasn't I using Chrome? My old work laptop will not let me open Chrome. I have uninstalled and reinstalled it multiple times, but when I launch it I just get a blank window. I was so happy when they called off testing prematurely. The tool was clearly not ready for prime-time and needs more time in the oven.
I had forgotten about this obligation until I was reminded about it this week when a fresh round of testing kicked off. I was dragging my feet on it and ignored the emails all week. Finally, the office manager reached out directly to me to do some testing.
I still can't use Chrome on my old work laptop. I can't log in to my new work laptop due to a username/password issue and the help desk number rang and rang and sent me to voicemail. I was able to launch Chrome on my MacBook Air only to discover that I don't have the timesheet icon that allows me to enter time. Dead in the water and that's where I was left at the end of the week.
I need to get better at saying no.
But in this case, did you say yes to this beta test because you genuinely wanted to do it or you just did not want to decline?