Functionize QA Testing Gives Zenefits Greater Time and Certainty

“Functionize has the best all-in-one QA testing product I’ve seen.”

Zenefits provides a human resources (HR) software platform used by more than 10,000 small and midsize businesses throughout the United States. By integrating all the processes, apps, and data insights needed by HR professionals, the Zenefits platform gives employees more control, HR experts more time to focus on their work, and brokers smarter tools.

Challenges 

For Zenefits to succeed, certain functions of its HR software platform must work flawlessly. These can’t-break functions include things such as employee hiring, onboarding and termination; benefits enrollment including medical insurance; and payroll including deductions, taxes, raises, and bonuses... 

Functionize has provided companies, like Zenefits, a solution that alleviates Quality teams from having to write their own QA tests. As a company, Zenefits continually updates and advances new features for its HR software, the People Platform  

Brian Batraski, now Manager of Quality Engineering for Zenefits, initiated improvements to the testing process, implementing rigorous QA workflows. Still, Zenefits was using manual QA testing processes for its HR software platform—and relying on a QA team of three people to do all the testing. 

“Our manual testing approach was definitely not scalable,”said Batraski. 

Batraski began looking for a QA testing solution that could raise the testing throughput, make testing more accurate, and ease the pressure on the QA team. After evaluating some open-source solutions, Selenium-based testing tools, and all-in-one platforms, Batraski chose the Functionize autonomous testing platform. 

“Functionize has the best all-in-one QA testing product I’ve seen,” said Batraski. “And it’s real technology, not vaporware.” 

The Functionize Solution 

As the first autonomous AI - cloud-based testing platform, Functionize leverages machine learning and AI to integrate QA testing into the software development process, resulting in faster overall development times. Functionize took Zenefits’ manual regression testing and automated it. 

Zenefits first implemented Functionize for a pilot period, to see if it could handle the HR software company’s pace and to gain internal support for the choice. 

“We need QA testing that was able to move as fast as we do,” said Batraski. “From the start, it was clear that Functionize could keep up.” 

Zenefits operates in a market with strict regulatory and compliance requirements. “Our software has real impact on people’s lives,” said Batraski. “Some things in our software absolutely can’t break.” 

For the HR software company’s mission-critical can’t-break activities, Functionize supports Zenefits’ very methodical approach, providing detailed root-cause analysis of any issues encountered. 

At the same time, Functionize allows Zenefits to innovate in areas where there’s slightly less pressure on risk avoidance. 

Benefits 

“Importantly, Functionize automates not only test creation, but also test maintenance. Since everything is in one place in Functionize, we get a single source of truth for our software quality,” said Batraski. “Functionize saves us time—giving time back to me and our QA team—while increasing the throughput of our QA testing processes. 

“Now that our entire regression testing suite lives in Functionize, our QA testing is repeatable, it executes quickly, and it’s easy to maintain,” he said. 

While 100% certainty is an unattainable real-world goal, Functionize helps Zenefits get closer to that ideal. During a recent major rebranding of the Zenefits website, Functionize updated and ran all the tests with zero problems. 

“Functionize has allowed us to increase certainty with our software releases without sacrificing development velocity,” Batraski said. “And on a personal level, using Functionize has meant that I no longer worry about whether we’ll need to hire as many test professionals to get the job done. I’m confident that Functionize will handle it.”