Stephen Blower Email & Phone Number

Sheffield, United Kingdom

Assisting adults with learning disabilities and the socially excluded with computer literacy skills.

Sheffield, United Kingdom

Responsible for defining a clear QA Strategic Plan involving overarching changes to improve quality and efficiencies within the test team. This Involved evaluating current methodologies in use and implementing changes based on context driven practices.

Sheffield, United Kingdom

Responsible for defining a clear QA Strategic Plan involving overarching changes to improve quality and efficiencies within the test team. This Involved evaluating current methodologies in use and implementing changes based on context driven practices.[Contracting]

Leeds, United Kingdom

Initial responsibilities included reinvigorating a depressed QA team who hadn't been managed directly for over 18 months. Introduction of automation which had been tried unsuccessfully prior to my involvement and over the following 9 months I introduced automation that created the foundations for continual improvements with various automation tools. I also assisted with the migration from Quality Center test case management tool over to Zephyr with Jira integration.[Contracting]

Sheffield, United Kingdom

As the QA Manager I had the sole responsibility for the stability of the whole platform; ensuring new releases kept to schedule. I used Selenium for automated testing alongside manual testing.[Contracting]

Sheffield, United Kingdom

Responsible for coordinating work steams between development and network departments. Responsibilities included, release management signoff, problem management reduction, direct report for QA Manager, project scheduling and reporting to Directors.I have managed small projects to large internal projects including three integration projects, ranging in size from 30k to 250k customer base. I had an integral part with the migration of the PlusNet payment systems; being a massively important part of the business it was crucial that the live roll-out was problem free. With this target in mind I delayed the scheduled roll out date three times due to low test plan pass rates and high unresolved bug numbers.

Sheffield, United Kingdom

Throughout my time within QA I continued to introduce recognised QA concepts and was responsible for encouraging buy-in within the team and the business, which resulted in the delivery of projects with less problems encountered on release and less risk to roll out schedules. These changes proved to be overarching and long standing and continuous improvement was necessary to create a more professionally recognised QA department within the business. I evaluated several automated testing tools and eventually introduced Selenium for automated testing and creating a regression suite and NeoLoad for load testing. Training was also provided for the team.During my time as QA Manager I gradually expanded the team from four to eight who I was responsible for hiring. I also took on an off shore QA team based in India of four QA Engineers; furthermore I garnered businesses by-in to second staff from the CSC department to help in QA during busy times.

Sheffield, United Kingdom

QA testing was mainly conducted in an ad-hoc fashion without any formal processes being in place. I started introducing recognised and proven testing techniques, starting with creating a detailed test plan template and introducing testing techniques such as, regression testing, smoke testing, acceptance testing, unit testing and integration testing.

Sheffield, United Kingdom

Customer telephony support to 200k customer base, from basic email setup to web page and domain management and broadband fault reporting.Call centre agents where given bonuses for achieving monthly targets. I achieved this target within my first month, which included two weeks of training.

Sheffield, United Kingdom

Installation and network setup of PC’s in large call centres and legal departments within Sheffield.

Sheffield, United Kingdom

Promoted in to this role after 10 months to lead a team of 5 QA Testers. Responsible for coordinating work streams, creation of test plans, sign off and submission of games to Sony (PlayStation) and Microsoft (Xbox). No game submitted via my team to Sony or Microsoft for evaluation and approval ever failed over a two year period.

Sheffield, United Kingdom

Computer games tester, requiring regular over time and weekend work. After first month of employment I was always in the “Top 5 Tester’s League Table” for most bugs found.

Sheffield, United Kingdom

Qualified Critical Care Nurse on an extremely busy Intensive Care Unit. I was part of a team that built a computerised patient care plan system and trained nurses. Making the Royal Hallamshire Hospital Intensive Care Unit the first unit in Sheffield to have such a system. I was also responsible for training nurses within the hospital on “Movement and Safe Handling of Patients”, this was undertaken outside of my normal nursing role.