Are We Hiring Testers to Push Buttons Instead of Solving Business Risks?
During workload analysis before a first release, we found the mail provider could only handle 25% of expected load — a hidden risk that could have broken onboarding.
Before a first production release, I was asked to run performance tests. During workload analysis, we found that the mail provider's SLA could only handle 25% of the expected load. Since email was critical for registration and notifications, this could have caused massive onboarding failures and user drop-offs.
Our mitigation: we mocked the mail service with MailCatcher for testing and escalated the issue. The dev team had time to switch providers and reconfigure the app before release.
Lesson learned: performance testing early isn't just about speed — it's about protecting the business from hidden risks.
And here's something interesting: in my interviews for performance tester roles, only about 10% of interviewers ask about workload analysis. Most focus mainly on tools like JMeter or k6. But as this case shows, workload analysis can make or break the entire release.
What do you think — should interviews focus more on workload analysis, or are tools still the main priority?