  Software testing is critical to prevent software failures. Therefore,
research has been carried out in testing but that is largely limited to the
process and technology dimensions and has not sufficiently addressed the human
dimension. Even though there are reports about inadequacies of testing
professionals and their skills, only a few studies have tackled the problem.
Therefore, we decided to explore the human dimension. We started with the basic
problem that plagues the testing profession, the shortage of talent, by asking
why do students and professionals are reluctant to consider testing careers,
what can be done about that, and is the problem specific to locales or spread
across the globe? This paper focusses on these questions. The study was carried
out in one college in Canada and its findings are compared with a college in
India. Studies in more colleges is required to develop acceptable national
views. It also may help to study this phenomenon in more countries and develop
global perspectives on the issue. However, the study certainly offers useful
insights and helps educators and industry leaders to come up with an action
plan to change the outlook towards testers in industry and in computer science
and software engineering programs, and put the software testing profession
under a new light. That could increase the number of software engineers
deciding on testing as a career of their choice, could increase the quality of
software testing, and improve the overall productivity, and turnaround time of
software development activity.
