Present Your Test Plan

Prepare Your Presentation

Now it’s time to prepare your presentation.

Start by laying the groundwork. Before creating your visual material, define the Goals of the presentation:

• What message do you want to get across?

• What is the most important information to share?

Keep in mind that the primary Goal is to validate the test book.

Your presentation will be mainly oral—the people around the table are there to listen to you.

So make sure you use an appropriate presentation support.

A presentation support is exactly that a support. It should not overshadow you. The content you display must be succinct but clear enough to be understood. Avoid too much text; use key phrases that you will expand on orally.

If you include screenshots or images, make sure they are readable.

As for content, you can structure your presentation like a funnel: start with broad topics and narrow down progressively.

Here is an example plan you can follow:

1. Requirements coverage.

2. Scenarios that will be executed.

3. Test methods to be applied.

4. Data sets to be used.

5. Reminder of risks and recommendations.

6. Appendix: Link to the test book.

Prepare Your Presentation

You will present your test book to your colleagues, who have been teased by your recent work and are excited to discover the conclusion of your strategy and the Scope of your test book.

Your Goal is to inform them, reassure them, and share what your team plans to test during the campaign—while also delivering your key messages.

At this stage of project preparation, you already know most of your subject.

Your main effort will now be on delivery and public speaking—an exercise in its own right.

Here are some tips to help you feel more confident and impactful:

• Get ready:

  • Practice the structure of your presentation: How will you begin? What essential points must you cover for each section?

  • Anticipate questions. They may relate to the environment, a type of test, an expected result, etc.

  • Write your key ideas on a sheet of paper. You may be interrupted or swept along by your own explanation—having notes frees your mind and helps you stay focused.

• Be clear and concise:

  • Get straight to the point. Avoid getting lost in details.

  • Avoid technical terms and acronyms. Even if your audience is mostly the project team (Product Owner, testers, possibly developers), non-technical stakeholders may also attend—and you risk losing them.

  • Keep your audience engaged. Look up from your support and insert pauses between sections. For example, ask: “Does anyone have questions or comments before we move on?”

• Use visual aids:

  • Illustrate your points—a good visual is worth a thousand words.

  • Make sure your support follows the same sequence as your oral presentation.

Here’s an experience from one of my projects:

We were used to presenting our work among testers and the Product Owner. But for a highly anticipated project, the business owner joined to monitor progress and check deadlines.

As I reached the most technical part, I said:

• “To test the APIs, we included test cases with POST and GET calls to insert and retrieve data in the DB.”

The business owner froze—they didn’t understand a thing.

With hindsight, I would rephrase it simply as:

• “To test the new services, we prepared test cases to save form data to the database, and others to retrieve it.

Present Your Test Book

The big day has arrived time to present your test book.

Here are the steps you can follow:

Step 1: Get to Know Your Audience

Start by identifying who is attending the meeting: Are all project stakeholders present?

This will help you tailor your presentation. You can choose to emphasize certain topics or move quickly through others depending on who is present.

Step 2: Start with Your Introduction

Begin with a brief introduction explaining the purpose of the presentation:

The purpose is to validate that the test book allows you to confirm features and requirements, and that by the end of execution, the Scope will be fully covered.

Step 3: Present Your Plan

Then walk through your plan, following the structure of your test book (requirements coverage, executed scenarios, etc.).

Final Step: Conclude with Your Summary

Finally, conclude with a summary and recommendations. Wrap up the key points of your presentation and offer suggestions for improving the testing process or the product.

To close this chapter, my final advice is: be yourself. Use a communication style that fits your company’s standards but feels natural to you.

Over to You!

Context

You’ve reached your Goal. Your preparation phase is nearly complete! The last step is presenting your test book.

You are preparing this presentation following your team’s usual plan:

• Requirements coverage.

• Scenarios to be executed.

• Test methods to be applied.

• Data sets to be used.

• Risk reminders and recommendations.

• Appendices: Link to the test book.

Instructions

Prepare the elements of the plan for your test book presentation.

Summary

• The purpose of presenting the test book is to reassure stakeholders and confirm the Scope that will be tested.

• Your audience will be multidisciplinary: adapt your speech accordingly and avoid technical jargon and acronyms.

• Design your presentation to support your delivery. You are the focus—not your slides. If your support is clean and contains short, clear information, it will be a valuable ally.

• The content should reflect what is in the test book. Start with requirements, then drill down to scenarios, test methods, data sets, etc.

• Stay true to yourself, be comfortable in the way you speak and present, while respecting company standards—and you will reach your Goal.

Congratulations—you are now able to design a test strategy! All that’s left is to put what you’ve learned into practice and add your personal touch to your projects.

Thank you for taking this Course. I invite you to complete the final quiz.