Employee Spotlights: Walking in the Shoes of Bianca Iancu for a Day
Our team is our strongest suit! It’s about time you get to know it through a new series of posts on our blog: employee spotlights! The first one to go is one of our QA Engineers, Bianca Iancu!
Bianca joined us right after finishing her Computer Science degree and has immediately become a solid asset to our team. Software testing requires a lot of spontaneity and creativity, so it is not very hard to believe her when she says she would have become a movie director if the QA path had not come her way.
Outside of work, she keeps the same positive attitude: from spending time with her friends to going for a walk and discovering some new music, she keeps things simple with her many hobbies. Boredom is not an option! Get to know Bianca better below!
When I got hired at BetterQA, I was a fresh Computer Science graduate with zero experience in the Quality Assurance area. I was unsure about which path to follow next, so I thought it would be a good idea to give it a shot. And it was a good idea, indeed.
What I liked the most from the beginning was that people believed in me. I never felt like a junior, incapable of making decisions, but like an employee whose opinion mattered. Even if I was just at the beginning of my career. I also think that taking everyone’s views into account is the way a small company will grow.
During my year here, I discovered that being a Quality Assurance Engineer is a job that fits my personality. And I did this with the help of a supportive, hardworking, and perfectionist team. So what is keeping me here, is the desire of being a better QA Engineer, who is providing more value to a product. And I feel that BetterQA is the perfect place for this.
Before working at BetterQA, what was the most unusual or interesting job you've ever had?
One of my most memorable work stories dates back to 2019 when I lived in Colorado, USA, for four months, during my Work & Travel experience. I worked as a front-desk agent at one of the oldest hotels in town. We were a small team with many responsibilities, and the management had many issues that we couldn’t resolve directly, only creating workarounds for them. I had to deal with angry groups of people, financial matters, and stressful decisions.
People were fired and hired, it seemed like nobody was doing enough for the hotel, but the real issue was not related to the employers directly. It was a hard time, but with the help of kind and motivated people, we managed to deal with everything, have some fun, and collect unforgettable memories.
What do you find the most challenging, and what do you like most about BQA?
The most challenging task is to meet high standards and expectations. One of the most valuable things I have learned at BetterQA is that Quality Assurance doesn’t only mean finding bugs, reporting them, and automating the tasks, but much more.
Quality Assurance means understanding the general application and looking from different angles at it, both from the user’s point of view and from a technical one. Sometimes I feel like a little Sherlock Holmes trying to understand the background and all the parts of a problem. My learning process came with a sort of perfectionism, which is already a routine.
Another thing that I love about being part of this company is that I feel that I contribute to our growth as a team. The management is open to suggestions and gives us a lot of trust, understanding our needs as QA’s and our needs as people.
What advice do you have for prospective BetterQA candidates?
Be open. Admit your mistakes. Always learn from everyone around you. Be curious. Be brave. Be yourself.
Applying and interviewing for jobs is not easy, but the most important thing is being eager to grow. And of course, the other thing that matters is the chemistry you have with your future team, so don’t forget to consider that.
What would you do (for a career) if you weren't doing this?
If I weren’t doing this, I would definitely love to work in the cinema industry. Being a movie director is my inner dream job, and it came very hard to decide which career path to choose, but oh well, I think everything comes at the perfect time.
How do you spend your time outside of the office?
I am a spontaneous person, so I don’t always schedule my free time. I love exploring new places, taking a walk at sunset while listening to music, and I try as much as I can to keep my beloved friends by my side and spend time together. Also, I don’t believe in boredom, but I don’t know what I would have done without my long list of hobbies, which are enjoyable at all times.
What's a fun fact about you many people may not know?
When I was little, I firmly believed I was immortal. I don’t know what seed was planted in my mind or where it came from.
Still, I remember very clearly the conversations I had with my mom, who was probably worried that her 5-year-old daughter might be a little crazy: “Hey, Mom, I know you don’t believe me, but I will never die. You do you, but I just don’t ever wanna die, so I’ve decided to live forever.”
Where's your favorite place in the world?
I know it sounds cliché, but my favorite place in the world is any place where I feel happy and I have the people I love by my side. It can be a new city I visit, a nature spot, a mountain peak where I used to collect memories or just my home. .
If given a chance, who would you like to be for a day?
I always imagined how it would be like to live in the past, and for this, I would choose the Renaissance period. I don’t want to be a Michaelangelo, a Brunelleschi, or a Medici but someone interacting with them, either their friend or their employee.
I would like to see how the greatest artists of the past saw the world and talk to them about it, and I would also love to see the overall image of that society.
What's the weirdest fact you know?
I know that life is as hard as it is beautiful, and for me, this is the weirdest fact I know.
If you’d like to know more about Bianca and the rest of her colleagues at BetterQA, we’ll be happy to schedule a meeting!
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