By Hanno Ekdahl

Frequently, testing is often shortchanged in the implementation cycle because it is often the last step in the process. Delays in design and development are often mitigated by reducing testing time to meet deadlines, or at least minimizing delays. While this strategy may alleviate leadership's concerns in the moment, it is unlikely to deliver a fully functional solution that doesn’t require rework or extensive support. So, without further ado, here are our Top 10 Reasons to test end-to-end:

1. Simulates real user experiences: E2E testing replicates actual user interactions, ensuring the application behaves as expected in real-world scenarios. Involving end users in the testing is always recommended to catch issues with the user interface, process flows, and potential edge cases.
2. Validates complete system functionality: It ensures that all application components, including databases and third-party services, work together seamlessly from the front end to the back end. For identity management, in particular, configurations in your HRIS system can hurt outcomes. It is best to test the identity lifecycle from creation through separation to validate that all the data flows, the processes align, and the outcomes are intended.
3. Expands test coverage: E2E tests provide a more comprehensive assessment of the software's functionality, covering areas that unit and integration tests might miss. Again, getting the end users engaged in testing across different systems will yield insights and improvements before the business is impacted.
4. Reduces production errors: By thoroughly testing the entire system, E2E testing helps catch and fix issues before they reach end-users, reducing the number of errors found in production
5. Ensures cross-platform compatibility: E2E testing verifies that the application performs consistently across different devices, browsers, and platforms. Plan your test and test your plan!
6. Verifies critical business workflows: It validates the application's business logic and ensures that essential user paths function correctly. Does the HR process align with the IDM provisioning functions for identity management? If HR does not complete the worker’s record by the start date, we will encounter problems automating access and asset provisioning.
7. Improves overall software quality: By detecting system-wide issues early, E2E testing contributes to a more stable and reliable application. Identity management affects everyone and everything; it is best to identify and fix bugs before they impact the end user.
8. Enhances user experience: Testing leads to more intuitive and user-friendly solutions that meet or exceed user expectations. We can borrow a page from concurrent engineering, where different user types come together to validate functionality and ensure all stakeholders’ requirements are met.
9. Eliminates negative surprises. Surprise and preparation very rarely go together. Simulating events through Postman or other tools only gets you so far and does not encompass real-world operating conditions. Moving to Production without end-to-end testing can surprise you if critical user paths are not actually supported by the data, processes, and system configurations in place.
10. Provides confidence in releases: Comprehensive testing gives developers and stakeholders confidence when deploying code/ releasing new features. Disciplined testing ensures that critical functionalities are thoroughly tested and ready for prime time.

End-to-end testing is often considered a mundane task that is necessary but not necessarily valuable. At Idenhaus, we argue that the devil is in the details. Avoiding negative surprises for end-users not only builds goodwill with the business but also makes your overall development efforts more efficient. Consistent delivery of reliable, high-quality solutions begins with comprehensive testing.