Someone who believed in Moolya right from first communication about Moolya is Dhanasekar (DS as we call him in Moolya). He has done stuff that only passionate and skilled people could have and we are excited to be working with him. I personally have enjoyed the company and work of DS.
While people of his age were worrying about how to be ahead of rate race-iness thing, DS leapt to chase his dream of being a part of a future that could redefine testing in India (and then maybe the world). Moolya is very strong because of people like DS. He has worked on at least 2 big projects a couple of small projects so far.
He played a lead role for testing a legacy system where people had no clue about it and it looked like a maze. DS went through some tough times to get things going in shape for a project. He was able to influence people around him to change for the good and I consider that a rare skill from a tester.
Oh, I must talk about his mind mapping skill. He is fundoo. I was having a call with a potential client who asked us if we could give a mind map of our understanding of their product. DS put a mind map that our potential client is on the way to become a client. His passion seemed to be towards testing Apple, touch devices, smartphones, tablets and applications that run on them. We got a client who wants to be a leader in a specific market for mobile applications. DS played a Lead role in it and did “awesomeness” that our client said two cool things:
“Is it common that you find so many bugs or our product is a little extra buggy?” and “We love working with Dhanasekar, he doesn’t beat around the bush, communicates directly and is focused”
DS did a couple of cool things. He helped people in different business functions adopt mindmaps for reporting and communication. Moolya needed someone to be a technical head for our mobile testing division and thankfully, we didn’t have to look too far. DS is now equipped with a Macbook Pro, iPad and a Windows Phone. He was able to coach testers for testing mobile applications and do it on par with the kind of quality of work we want to maintain. DS introduced Exploratory Testing and Session Based Test Management to our clients and to some of our testers. Here is my interview with him on the occasion that he completes one year with us:
PS: You complete one year at Moolya. How is that feeling for you?
DS: Awesomeness!!!
PS: You have seen Moolya grow and continuing to grow, what do you think is the secret ingredient (ha ha) for Moolya do it?
DS: Passion, Honesty and Self-belief.
PS: What would you call as your personal accomplishments in the last one year at Moolya?
DS: Whatever accomplished could not be called personal other than remaining a bachelor: P. I take pride in building Moolya’s capabilities on mind-maps and mobile testing.
PS: What did you expect when you joined Moolya last year this time? How much of your expectations are met?
DS: I didn’t join with the expectation of getting something at the end of every year. Moolya was started with a mission to provide value to customers and testers, and I think Moolya is providing it consistently.
PS: What were some of the “awesome” moments for you here at Moolya?
DS: It started much before I joined Moolya, the day you told me about starting your own company, office inauguration pooja, our first client, our first MNC client, seeing our mind-maps about product coverage in developers desk at our client location. These are apart from the ones we had in and around JP Nagar garden restaurants 😉
PS: How have you benefited by the people you worked with at Moolya?
DS: Choose a world that supports you. Moolya is definitely such a wonderful place filled with testing brains and hearts :). Though I know all of them even before joining Moolya, working closely with them has provided wonderful opportunities to observe a lot from them. Parimala: How to manage people and the project. Sunil: How to remain calm and get things done even during the chaos. ST: How to mix fun and work 😉 . PS : How to interact, communicate, anticipate and present exactly what a target audience or client would need.
PS: You were promoted as the Commander of Mobile Testing this year. What does that mean to you?
DS: More responsibilities, more challenge and more opportunities. The new generation mobile hardwares are as powerful as desktops and laptops. Apple is embracing iOS and bringing many of its features to Mac OS X. So, this division would play a vital role in Moolya’s future, and help Moolya to reach new heights. The testing style and context here is different from a typical desktop or web application testing. For example, the general expectation in desktop application is to have detailed help file, but in mobile device it should be very minimal, this mean there should be change in mindset. So, my role is to help testers to get the right mindset while testing mobile applications.
PS: How are you going to change the world being in Moolya?
DS: Toughest question 🙂 I escape saying “I rely on Moolya for this” 😉 Honestly, I don’t have an answer for this right now.
PS: I personally think you are the master when it comes to mind mapping for software testers, how did you pick that skill?
It is love at first site 😉 .
The pictorial radical arrangement of mindmap got immediate attention from my brain, it said “wow! I can easily associated such representation of information”. From then I started using mind-maps where ever possible, both in testing and personal life. I would like to reveal a secret ingredient here(ha..ha..), if I run out of ideas while creating mind maps, would start changing the fonts, colors, layout of nodes that helps to take a small break in-between, its perfect blend of art and thinking. The only rule in mindmap is “There are no rules” 🙂 , there is neither right nor wrong way of creating mindmap. Anyone who realize mindmaps are captured for her own reference can easily master the art of mind mapping.
PS: We know you are a great fan of AR Rahman and Apple. How has being a fan of the two great A’s helped you at work?
In AR Rahman and Apple, I see lot of similarities. Intense focus on what they do, giving importance to every minute details, never compromise on quality and consistency in maintaining it.
When I multitask, I felt I was never effective. I even felt it’s my negative looking at many who does multitasking (or pretend 🙂 ). From AR Rahman I learnt that he doesn’t multitask, instead when he focus it’s intense on one task. According to him focusing is a spiritual thing, nothing comes without losing something and you can’t have everything. After that I never felt it’s a negative instead started doing one task at a time with intense focus. Another quality I would love to inherit from Rahman is his humbleness.
Apple always reminds me quality and simplicity. A rare company, which never compromise on quality for anything. Being a tester Apple always reminds a benchmark for quality, being an Apple fan helped me to test the new generation multi touch mobile platforms with ease and passion.
PS: Give us a couple of testing challenges that you can solve now which you could not have an year back?
DS: Mission focused testing, test coverage tracking using mind maps are the skills I developed in past one year, through the opportunities and freedom provided by Moolya.
PS: What is your advice to people coming in to Moolya in future?
DS: Pursue your passion. What matters most is how you look into things.
PS: What’s your advice to Moolya?
Remain Moolya 🙂
PS: What do you plan to accomplish in your 2nd year at Moolya?
Twice the awesomeness!!!
To find out what twice the awesomeness means, stay tuned.
_end of interview_
A small note to you DS (and probably to others): Time isn’t a milestone, your work and its usefulness to the world is.
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