Anjali Chaudhary

In a world where technology influences everything, it becomes essential for companies to sustain their competitiveness. An engineering competency matrix or a skill matrix is a tool that helps companies define, visualize, and access their employees’ skills and competencies. The competency matrix also helps in determining engineering competencies and managing them effectively.

This post discusses the benefits of developing a robust engineering competency matrix for your organization. 

Benefits of building an engineering competency matrix

Identifies and eliminates skill gaps

Skill matrices help organizations understand an employees’ current skills and competencies and identify the skills required for executing a new project or improving existing ones.

Increases organizational performance and productivity

When managers know their teams’ capabilities, it becomes easier to allocate resources and delegate responsibilities effectively. And thus, the skill matrix enhances the overall productivity of the organization.

Augments the hiring process 

Recruitment teams can leverage the competency assessment to structure their hiring processes, write better job descriptions, set expectations, and make unbiased decisions. 

An engineering competency matrix also comes in handy while scaling the organization. The matrix helps employers recruit the best talent with the required experience and skills. 

Enhances training and development programs

With the knowledge of employees’ strengths and weaknesses, companies can plan and execute various training and development programs. Such initiatives help employees upskill and contribute effectively to the organization while accelerating their careers.

Initiates team restructuring

A skill matrix provides insights into the competencies and deficiencies of an employee. This knowledge assists the managers in restructuring the team and improving performance.

Promotes reward management

Team leads can utilize engineering matrices to assess their team members’ strengths, evaluate their performance, and reward their dedication and hard work. Reward management is crucial to ensure a company’s success. What’s more, this system motivates individuals to perform better and step up their career ladder. 

Build an engineering team competency matrix with these simple steps

Quantifying a person’s skills is challenging. However, it is possible to build an effective engineering competency matrix with proper planning and execution. A company can implement cost-effective practices to stay ahead of the competition with a strategic approach to analyzing the strengths and weaknesses of its workforce.

Here’s how you can build an effective engineering competency matrix:

• Delegate responsibility
  

  The first and the most important step in the process is to assign a dedicated resource to take the responsibility of building the skill matrix from the ground up. This person should be aligned with the company’s objectives and values to help create and execute an effective assessment plan.

• Define the objectives and team values
  

  Be clear about the goal behind creating a skill matrix. Once the goal is clear, define the company or team values. Setting the priorities right helps in building a cohesive work environment. Your goal could be one of the following:
  • Evaluate employee performance
  • Define skill gaps
  • Improve hiring processes
  • Build or restructure the team (if required)
  • Start a new project

• List down the core competencies.
  

  Develop a list of the core engineering skills necessary to perform the job and categorize them into two groups: hard skills and soft skills.
  Hard skills can include prototyping, coding, proficiency with programming languages (Python, Java, C++, etc.), database management, code debugging, testing, QA, and familiarity with related libraries, tools, and frameworks. Critical soft skills can include teamwork, communication, conflict resolution, problem-solving, etc.
  Create a task to regularly review and update this list to identify new skills and remove obsolete technologies as per the business requirements.

• Define the level of competencies
  

  The next step is to define the range of different levels of competencies for each of the core skills. This step aims to identify an employees’ existing skill competencies and devise a training plan to enhance their performance.
  For example, if the core skill is Python, different levels of competencies can be identified as follows:
  • Expert or Advanced
  • Intermediate
  • Beginner
    
    

• Take feedback and iterate
  

  Once the first version of the engineering competency matrix is ready, send it for review and feedback. Remember, the skill matrix will influence cross-functional teams and overall business decisions. And so, feedback from the stakeholders will help improve the matrix and deliver expected results.
  
  Pro tip: Make these iterations a part of the company’s quarterly or annual planning process to meet business objectives.

To sum up, an engineering competency matrix can help organizations in multiple ways

Engineering leaders and hiring managers should harness human capital by assessing skills and competencies. They must know when to redesign the matrix to sustain competitiveness and drive growth within the organization. Last but not least, leaders and managers should use a competency matrix to make informed decisions about training and development processes and determine the company’s hiring needs.

If you have identified skill gaps in your engineering competency matrix and are looking to hire talented software developers, try Turing.com.

Turing.com is a data-science-driven deep jobs platform helping companies spin up their engineering teams in the cloud at the push of a button. With Turing, companies can hire pre-vetted, Silicon Valley-caliber remote software talent across 100+ skills in 3-5 days. Turing’s Intelligent Talent Cloud uses AI to source, vet, match, and manage over a million developers worldwide.

Unlike in the past, software testing is not just about identifying and troubleshooting application errors. Earlier, the goal of such testing was to ensure high performance and quality in the shipped products. Nowadays, companies need to optimize their time-to-market metrics, automate manual tasks, maximize resource utilization, and scale their team’s productivity to deliver an exceptional user experience. Automation testing helps companies achieve their business goals by speeding up the product delivery process while maintaining quality.

With rapid advancements in modern technologies such as IoT, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, etc., the demand for automation testing is at an all-time high. 

According to MarketsandMarkets, “The Automation testing market size is expected to grow to USD 49.9 billion by 2026, at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 19.2% during the forecast period.”

This post will discuss the top eight automation testing trends for 2023. 

Let’s get started!

1. Hyperautomation testing
   

   One of the top trends in the automation testing market, hyperautomation, combines the power of Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, and automation technologies. It augments human capabilities and offers flexible, scalable, and faster product development.
   QA teams can now deploy digital testers (supported by various test pipelines) to reduce human intervention and automate the entire testing process. In addition, companies can leverage advanced technologies such as Business Process Management (BPM), Robotic Process Automation (RPA), AI, and ML to achieve their business goals.

2. Cloud-based cross-browser testing
   

   Gone are the days when developers wrote different codes for different devices and browsers. With advancements in technology supporting cross-platform development, automating the testing processes across multiple browsers and testing environments has become crucial.
   Companies nowadays adopt cloud-based cross-browser testing methods to reduce testing infrastructure costs and enhance scalability. This process enables QA teams to test their web apps seamlessly across various device-OS-browser combinations and deliver high-quality products.

3. Non-functional testing
   

   Customer satisfaction is one of the crucial metrics to measure a software product’s success. Therefore, it becomes critical to perform non-functional testing to increase the efficiency and usability of the product and reduce production risks and costs. Some of the main categories of non-functional testing are:

   • Accessibility testing

   • Security testing

   • Performance testing

   • Infrastructure testing

   • Stress testing

   • Load testing

   • Disaster recovery testing

4. Automated regression testing
   

   Automated regression testing ensures that recent code modifications do not break the existing functionalities and provide a safety net to find regression bugs. This feature saves time and helps deliver efficient solutions with enhanced scalability and speed.
   ROI and effective bug detection are the key advantages of automated regression testing. Automated regression testing tools include Selenium, TimeShiftX, IBM Rational Functional Tester, SilkTest, TestComplete, Ranorex, etc.

5. API testing
   

   It is common to use third-party libraries and APIs while developing web applications and software solutions. However, with thousands of applications using the same API, testers and developers must test these APIs thoroughly to ensure the error-free performance of applications.
   Automating the API testing process helps QA teams quickly identify and troubleshoot bugs. It also allows seamless integration with third-party API services.

6. DevTestOps
   

   

   Trends in automation testing: DevTestOps

   DevTestOps is the latest trend in the software testing domain and will continue to trend in 2023. While DevOps helps organizations deploy system changes efficiently and quickly, DevTestOps enhances deployment quality through continuous and automated testing.
   QA teams can use CI/CD pipelines with AI to boost the automated testing and product delivery processes.
   The main advantage of DevTestOps is the identification of bugs before the final release of the software, which improves the customer experience.

7. Codeless automation
   

   Codeless automation is the next big thing in the world of automated testing. Testers can now save a lot of time by automating the process of writing and running test scripts.
   According to Future Marketing Insights, “The demand for codeless testing will rise at 15.5% CAGR between 2021 and 2031.”
   Codeless automated testing eliminates the need to write thousands of code lines, regardless of the application’s type and size. This feature maximizes testing efficiency, reliability, and stability across the SDLC process. Selenium is one of the most popular testing tools that offer codeless automation, allowing developers to focus more on building innovative products. 

8. Mobile automation testing
   

   With the ever-increasing usage of mobile devices and the internet, mobile automation testing will continue to be a top automated testing trend in 2023.
   According to Market Research Future (MRFR), “The global mobile application testing services market is expected to reach a market value of USD 13585.73 Million by 2026, growing at a CAGR of 20.3%.”
   By automating mobile application testing, QA teams can improve regression test cases, boost testing productivity, reduce product delivery time, and ensure higher customer satisfaction.

Here is a list of the top eight automation testing tools to use in 2023:

1. Selenium

2. IBM Rational Functional Tester (RFT)

3. TestComplete

4. Katalon Studio

5. Appium

6. Cucumber

7. SoapUI

8. WorkSoft

Wrapping up

Automation testing helps organizations significantly reduce product delivery time and accelerate progress. It also assists development and testing teams to improve software quality by providing comprehensive error reports. 

Large-scale enterprises and fast-growing start-ups can leverage automation testing services to ensure the smooth functioning of their business operations, reduce operational costs, and improve customer experience. 

Undoubtedly, automation testing is the future of software testing. Adopting the latest trends will prove to be an effective strategy for businesses to gain a competitive edge in the industry.

Turing is a data-science-driven deep jobs platform helping companies spin up their engineering teams in the cloud at the push of a button. Turing’s Intelligent Talent Cloud uses AI to source, vet, match, and manage over a million developers worldwide. With Turing, companies can hire pre-vetted, Silicon Valley-caliber remote software talent across 100+ skills in 3-5 days. 

The server-side or backend of an application is the core foundation of any project. It is this foundation that supports the client-side, user-facing elements of a web application. And thus, picking the right backend technology can be a gamechanger when building high-performance applications. This post compares two of the most sought-after backend technologies, Node.js vs Python, to help you make an informed decision while picking one for your project.

Let’s get started!

What is Node.JS? 

Node.js is an open-source, JavaScript runtime environment that runs on Chrome’s V8 engine and executes code outside the client’s web browser. 

It is a cross-platform and asynchronous event-driven environment designed to build fast and scalable network applications. Node JS developers make optimal use of this technology for server-side programming and performing non-blocking I/O operations. 

What is Python? 

Python is an interpreted, high-level, general-purpose programming language with dynamic semantics. It is widely used for backend development and follows an object-oriented approach. 

Features like dynamic binding, built-in data structures, dynamic typing, etc., make Python a perfect choice for RAD (Rapid Application Development). It is also used as a scripting or glue language to connect the existing components. 

Python developers are responsible for building the backend of the web, mobile, and desktop applications. 

Node.JS vs Python: Comparing the pros, cons, and use cases

Node.js Pros and Cons

Python Pros and Cons

Top five Node.JS use cases

• Netflix and Trello use Node.js to build single-page web applications.

• LinkedIn uses Node.js due to its performance efficiency and scalability.

• PayPal prefers Node.js as it provides faster development, improves the average response time, and reduces the lines of code significantly.

• Uber relies on Node.js for building its matching systems as it provides faster deployment and processes enormous amounts of data efficiently, thus meeting Uber’s business requirements.

• eBay uses Node.js as it offers speed, streamlined development, and automation while handling I/O bound operations.

Top five Python use cases

• Instagram uses Python for developing its backend and scaling service infrastructure. 

• Google relies on Python as it offers simplicity, speed, and ease of deployment.

• Spotify uses Python for performing data analysis, building backend services, and speeding up the development process.

• Quora prefers Python due to its readability, ease of writing code, and availability of many frameworks such as Pylons, Django, etc.

• Industrial Light and Magic (ILM) opt for Python as it offers easy interoperability with C++ and C and helps in building efficient production pipelines & extending existing applications.

Node.JS vs Python: Which one’s the best for your project?

Understanding the functional requirements is one of the most critical factors that determine the success of your project. 

Once those are clear, you can use these criteria to decide which backend technology fits your project best:

1. Learning curve and syntax
   

   The syntax of Python is pretty straightforward. It requires fewer lines of code, making the code easy to debug and understand.
   Any developer with a strong technical background can quickly start working with Python. Node.js syntax is identical to JavaScript, and developers with previous experience in JavaScript often find it easy to understand Node.js. 

2. Architecture

   Node.js is an event-driven runtime environment with the ability to perform non-blocking I/O operations. It can process thousands of concurrent requests without incurring thread context switching.
   These features make Node.js the best pick for real-time web apps like chatbots and gaming applications. On the other hand, Python has an architecture that’s synchronous and, therefore, is slow in performance and speed.
   But, for parallel processing and event-driven projects in Python, developers can use libraries like Ayncio and modules like CPython, respectively. 

3. Libraries

   Pip is the default package handler for Python libraries and packages. Python has over 220K packages for various categories, including data science, image processing, calculations, etc.
   Node JS libraries and packages are handled by Node Package Manager or npm, with over 1.3 million well-documented and easy-to-use packages. 

4. Speed and performance

   Node.js executes the code outside the client’s browser, and it also provides a non-blocking architecture, hence offering high speed and performance. In addition, Node.js enables caching fetched data which makes the apps responsive, reducing load time.
   In comparison to Node.js, Python is slower as it does not support multithreading. Therefore, Python won’t be a good choice if your project often needs to recall data from the web servers. 

5. Scalability

   Python lags in scalability as it does not support multithreading and uses GIL (Global Interpreter Lock (GIL). Python is also an interpreted language, which makes it a slow programming language.
   Node.js offers high scalability as it supports multithreading and comes with a cluster module that can handle the full processing power of the machine. With Node.js, developers can scale their apps vertically and horizontally by adding more resources and new nodes to the system, respectively. 

6. Error handing

   It is essential to have a robust error handling system to offer your customers a better user experience and write clean and reusable code.
   Python is better in error handling due to its clean, readable code and compact syntax. As a result, it takes less amount of time to troubleshoot and fix errors.
   Node.js can debug errors, but it becomes difficult to do so when multiple requests are processed concurrently to achieve high performance with multithreading.

7. Extensibility

   It’s easy to extend both Python and Node.js. Developers can use Python frameworks such as Robot, CherryPy, Django, Flask, etc., and APIs to extend the language’s features and capabilities.
   The functionalities of Node.js can be extended using its built-in APIs, frameworks such as Meteor, Hapi, Fastify, etc., testing frameworks such as Jasmine, and more. 

8. Community

   When it comes to finding peer support and online resources, Python and Node.js have large and active communities.
   Their community forums offer excellent opportunities to collaborate with developers from across the globe with different levels of experience and expertise. Skilled developers worldwide are free to contribute to Node.js and Python, including their packages.

Node.JS is suitable for projects like:

• Messengers and chatbots

• Complex single-page apps (SPA)

• IoT implementations

• Collaboration tools and systems

• Data streaming applications

• Microservices architecture

• Online eCommerce and gaming platforms

Node.JS is not suitable for projects like:

• Apps that require heavy computations

• CRUD or HTML applications

• Backend apps with relational databases

• Multi-threaded programming projects

Python is suitable for projects like:

• Progressive web applications (PWAs)

• IoT projects

• Data visualization & image processing

• AI/ML and Neural Networks

• Voice and facial recognition

• Startups, Fintechs, Finance

• Data Science and Engineering

Python is not suitable for projects like:

• Mobile app development (Not supported by iOS and Android)

• Game development (High memory consumption)

• Projects that require interaction with complex legacy data

Node.JS vs Python: Conclusion

Choosing between Node.js and Python can be overwhelming, especially when developing a full-flagged product instead of a side project. However, both these languages have their own set of advantages and disadvantages.

And thus, the goal of the project and the developer’s competence are the two most essential factors that you should consider when deciding on a technology for the development process. 

Turing is a deep jobs platform that allows companies to source skilled and experienced engineers planet-wide. 

You’ll have access to a talent pool of the top 1% of 1M talented and experienced developers with strong technical and communication skills who can work according to your requirements. 

Additionally, Turing’s tried-and-tested vetting process evaluates developers to a Silicon Valley standard allowing you to have your pick of qualified software developers without sucking up all of your engineering team’s time.

Due to the increase in the complexity of cyberattacks, companies are investing more resources than ever to secure their systems from reputational and financial losses. One of the most used security testing techniques is web application penetration testing, Pen Test or Pen Testing. 

Web Application Penetration Testing: Market Research

Web application penetration testing involves simulating cyberattacks against application systems (APIs, front-end servers, back-end servers) to identify exploitable vulnerabilities and access sensitive data. It helps companies verify their systems’ security, identify any vulnerabilities and their scope of the damage, and develop strategies to mitigate potential threats. 

Types of web application penetration testing

There are two major types of penetration testing for web applications:

• Internal pen testing

  This type of testing focuses on the web applications hosted on the intranet within the organization. The goal is to identify any potential vulnerabilities within the corporate firewall by using invalid credentials to access the system and determining the possible damage and route of attacks. Some of the most common internal attacks are: 
  1. Simulation of Phishing attacks 
  2. Malicious employee attacks 
  3. Attacks using user privileges 
  4. Social engineering attacks

• External pen testing

  This type of penetration testing focuses on external attacks on the web applications hosted on the internet. The testers (aka ethical hackers) simulate external attacks using the IP address of the target system. External pen testing involves testing the applications’ firewalls, IDS, DNS, and front-end & back-end servers.
  In addition to these, there are a few more approaches to pentest, such as blind testing, double-blind, and targeted testing.
  

  Web Application Penetration Testing: Importance

Steps of Web Application Penetration Testing:

• Planning and reconnaissance

  This step involves defining the goals and objectives of the test process, gathering information (servers, networks, domain names, etc.), and choosing the tools and techniques for testing. Based on the type of interaction required with the target system, there are two types of reconnaissance:

  • Active Reconnaissance

    In this process, the tester directly probes the target system to gather information. Some of the approaches for active reconnaissance are:
    • Shodan network scanner 
    • Fingerprinting the web application 
    • DNS zone transfer 
    • DNS forward and reverse lookup

  • Passive Reconnaissance

    The tester gathers the information available on the internet without having a direct interaction with the target system.
    Some of the popular tools used for web application penetration testing are listed below:
    • W3af
    • Veracode
    • Burp Suite
    • SQLMap
    • ZAP
    • Metasploit
    • Acunetix
    • Vega
    • Skipfish
    • Ratproxy
    • NetSparker
    • Watcher

• Scanning and exploitation

  Once the testers have all the required information at their disposal, they can simulate cyberattacks on the web applications and discover the target’s vulnerabilities. The next step is to exploit those vulnerabilities by gaining access to privileged information, stealing data, modifying system configurations, intercepting traffic, and more to estimate the amount of damage they can cause to the target system. Some of the test scenarios for simulating cyberattacks are listed below:
  • Cross-Site Scripting
  • Security Misconfigurations
  • SQL Injection
  • Password Cracking
  • Caching Servers Attacks
  • Cross-Site Request Forgery
  • File Upload flaws
  • Broken authentication and session management

• Analysis and reporting

  A detailed report is compiled to outline the significant findings of the test process. The report includes all the details such as sensitive data exposed, a list of exploited vulnerabilities, the time duration for which the tester could maintain undetected access to the system, etc. This information is shared with the security personnel to analyze and configure the company’s WAF settings, fix the most critical parts, and implement application security policies to patch vulnerabilities and protect against future threats. 

Conclusion

Web Application Penetration Testing: Conclusion

Web applications are the primary source of business for numerous companies. With thousands of transactions taking place every second, securing these applications from attacks and data theft becomes crucial. Web application penetration testing can help organizations achieve the highest system security and prepare for any potential threat. Security personnel can leverage the latest testing tools to examine the existing source code, servers, WAF, database connectivity, APIs, third-party integrations, etc., to discover vulnerabilities, mitigate risks, and update security policies.

Excellent security measures are intrinsic to a great web application, but so are superior software developers. So if you’re looking to scale your software development team, try Turing. 

Turing’s automated platform lets companies “push a button” to hire senior, pre-vetted remote software developers. Access a talent pool of the top 1% of 1M+ developers with strong technical and communication skills who work in your time zone. There’s no risk. Turing offers a free two-week trial period to make sure your developers deliver to your standards.

For more information, visit Turing’s Hire page.