The Emotional Side of Building QA in a Startup
Some days I feel like I’m drowning. Other days I want to set my computer on fire. That’s startup life — an emotional rollercoaster. Building a QA and automation discipline from scratch in a startup isn’t just about trying to bring order to chaos — or choosing frameworks, workflows, tools, pipelines, and test coverage. It’s emotional. It’s lonely. It’s that mix of excitement and frustration that only people who’ve been there truly understand. One moment, you’re on top of the world because your first automated tests finally start to run. The next, someone pushes an untested “quick fix” straight into your testing environment, undoing hours of validation you’ve already performed — because “we’re moving fast.” It’s not just about testing — it’s about resilience, communication, and learning when to fight and when to let go. I’ve been here before — this isn’t my first time building QA from scratch. And somehow, despite the chaos, I keep finding myself drawn to it. I guess that deep dow...