One of my favourite software development quotes is from W Edwards Deming, who says “Cease dependence on mass inspection to achieve quality. Improve the process and build quality into the product in the first place.” That means that testing is not a phase to be performed after development is complete. It needs to be done all the time throughout the delivery process by everybody, using techniques such as behaviour-driven development and acceptance test driven development. It also means that quality is not the responsibility of testers - it’s the responsibility of the whole team. Testers are essential to creating high-quality software, but their job is to make the quality of the system transparent, not to be responsible for that quality.
