Microsoft CEO wants to merge 'testers and developers', cut traditional testers.

Today, Microsoft announced that it will cutting up to 18,000 jobs in the next year". Two days ago, this report revealed the new Microsoft CEO's vision for team structures, in particular, the change of role on 'software testing'.

"Engineering teams have traditionally been split between program managers, developers and testers. Yet with new cloud methods of building software, it often makes sense to have the developers test and fix bugs instead of a separate team of testers, Nadella said in an interview last week after unveiling his memo."

"Some of the cuts will be among software testers,"

Well, I don't think there will be total elimination of dedicated manual software testers. However, there are more facts to support that software testing nowadays are getting technical and developers need to actively involve with testing.

My advice to manual software testers: Learn writing automated test scripts, it was not that hard; programmers: Learn habits of developing or (at least) running automated tests to enhance your productivity; and for both: it is fun to do.