I'm not meant to be a tester.....

It's not all peaches and cream. Don't get me wrong, I'm paid quite well for what I currently do and like the people that I work with in Baltimore. But it's not really what I would like to do long-term.

For several years, I was a programmer. I liked it because it was constantly evolving. It resulted in late nights or occasional overnights of work, but I liked the rush of having to fix something in a short amount of time. It was even more rewarding that I often exceeded expectations in regards to those critical situations. Often, that resulted in me jumping other, older workers who didn't work as hard as I did. As a result, some didn't like me at work, but I honestly didn't care. It was no fault but their own for getting outworked by a younger worker.

Currently, I'm a tester. This means that I basically run the system through various tests to make sure it's running as it should. I like the job when I am busy, but that usually only occurs about half the time. The other half is spent documenting various processes. While I understand that documentation is needed, it's just not my cup of tea. I like action and a testing job just doesn't provide enough of that action.

So, life lesson learned. I know that I'm not a tester. Between the lack of action and the fact that I only find problems, it's just not for me. If I find the problems, I want to fix them too. Who knows, someone may read my impressions and figure out that one or the other job may be for them. If so, I've spent the last 5 minutes doing something that helps someone else, and that's always a good thing.