Where are the German testers?

On the bottom of James Bach’s recommendations of people there is a small paragraph:

That One German Guy

Germany has no excuse. There are TONS of smart people there. How is it only one intellectual software tester has emerged from the ISTQB-addled masses to demand my respect with his work? My theory is that Germany has a more command-and-control culture, which perhaps disparages independent thought of the kind required to achieve excellence in testing. This pains me, because I am descended from Germans and I would love to visit and teach there.

Anyway, the one German guy who shines in my community is Markus Gaertner. I’ll do a write-up on him, shortly.

Yeah, it’s about me. From time to time I am asked by James and other people in our community where the German testers actually are. Here are some folks I am in touch with, that have raised my attention, and I think will need some attention from the wider community. There is not only one guy testing in Germany, seriously.

Meike Mertsch

Meike Mertsch is not only my colleague, but upon joining James’ tutorial at the Swiss Testing Day last year, James got in contact with me over skype along with these lines:

I have met Meike. Now I know two testers in Germany.

Meike is more a developer-tester, but I think she has some potential. I work with her partially as a colleague, partially as a mentor.

Alexander Simic

For quite some time I have been in touch with Alexander. He is working with James as a testing coach, and besides Meike and myself was the third participants at last year’s GATE peer workshop. Alexander is working in Freiburg, eager to meet other like-minded folks.

Maik Nogens

Maik and I started this thing called GATE a while ago. Last year, he couldn’t make the date, though. That does not mean that we are not in touch with each other. In fact, he’s right now co-organizing the Software Testing user group in Hamburg.

Tobias Geyer

Oh, yeah, Tobias is the guy that made me aware of the Software Testing user group in Hamburg at the Agile Testing Days 2010. Since then some things have changed, but I think highly about Tobias, and I think he started a great community in Hamburg there. It’s a bit of a pity that Hamburg seems to be the only user community in Germany I am aware of.

Ursula Beiersdorf

Ursula Beiersdorf right now co-organizes local testing events in Hamburg, Germany together with Maik. I think she is doing a great job in networking and getting testers together.

Stephan Kämper

In 2009 I sat in the same tutorial at a conference as Stephan Kämper. Over the years, I came to value our exchanges on testing, and the greater community.

Andreas Simon

Andreas Simon is the guy that went to the very first Belgium Testing Days on his own budget to attend the Testing Dojos that I facilitated there. We had quite some fun together. Over the past two years, we came to co-organize the local Software Craftsmanship user group in Münster-Osnabrück-Bielefeld, he also organizes Coding Dojos and Code’n’Cake meet-ups in Münster as well.

I think there are more. For example there was this guy, Ender Ekinci, who dived deeply into the problems with Parkcalc, and found a way to produce even higher parking costs.

There also is Moritz Schoenberg who I don’t know in person (yet). I became aware of him since he won the uTest award for the tester of the year in a row. I hope to get in touch with him at the next official GATE workshop.

Oh, and of course there is Christian Baumann who attended the first GATE workshop in Hamburg in 2011. He’s been on my radar before that. That usually means I had the impression he is worthwhile to follow.

A final disclaimer: I think I might have forgotten some more people I work with in user groups, and other communities. If you miss your name on this list, drop me a line, and I will check whether to do a follow-up with your name included as well.

Last, but not least, this should be a starting point for you, German testers, to get in touch with us. I think we can excel beyond the state of our craft that we are currently working in. But we need to network better for this to happen.