Hi! I’m Jay Newlin, and welcome to my website! I have long joked that I’m the “QA guy of your nightmares dreams.” That’s especially true if you’re a software bug: I will find you and work hard to quash you.
I don’t just test software. I help teams build systems where quality becomes inevitable.
I’ve worked with teams as small as two people and with organizations of over 150. I’m at my best when I can help clarify, organize, and strengthen the practices that turn good intentions into reliable, high-quality outcomes.
To put it simply: I help teams turn good software practices into a sustainable, real-world Culture of Quality.
I’m currently the Director of Quality Assurance for Hunter Strategy, where my work has expanded into ISO 9001:2015 auditing, CMMI practitioner training, and CMMC-aligned practices.
Those frameworks matter — but they’re not the goal. They’re tools. And by themselves, they can’t create quality.
Quality isn’t a checkbox. It’s how systems earn user trust.
Software quality is emergent from good practices directly aligned with my basic Philosophy of Quality: Quality as Fitness for Use. I help teams build software that is not only correct, but fit for use, through properly planned and executed testing, practical quality systems, and real-world experience.
A note for apprentices, interns, and those learning about Quality Assurance
If you’ve landed here and you’re new to Quality Assurance (QA) — or just beginning to explore it — you’re in the right place.
Start with these pages. They’ll give you a solid foundation and help you understand how everything else on my site — and in QA — fits together:
- Quality as Fitness for Use — the core definition of what Quality actually is
- QA 101 — who testers are and what they do
- Three Sets of Eyes — how QA fits within a development team
Once you’ve got the basics of quality and the role of a tester, you can go deeper into how the work is actually done:
- Exploratory Testing — a practical guide to manual testing that will help you find bugs others miss
- How to Write a Good Bug Ticket — because bugs that aren’t reported well don’t get fixed well
- Software Testing Heuristics — simple, memorable ways to sharpen your bug-finding instincts
As you read through my site, you’ll start to see something important: Quality isn’t just about software or bugs — and it isn’t about a job title. It’s a way of thinking.
What I do
Quality Strategy
- I help organizations move from reactive testing to a culture of quality, where quality is built in from the beginning, not just “verified & validated” at the end.
- I teach teams how to think critically about their systems, uncovering risks and behaviors that scripted testing alone will never find.
- I bring structure where it helps, without letting “The Process” become the goal instead of the tools to achieve true quality.
Bridging Business and Technology
I help ensure that software works not just technically, but meaningfully — for users, stakeholders, and the business itself.
That means translating between perspectives:
- Business needs into testable outcomes
- Technical implementation into real-world impact
- Risk into something teams can actually act on
How I think about quality
I define quality the way Joseph Juran did: fitness for use. (See Quality as Fitness for Use)
That means software isn’t “high quality” just because it passes tests. It’s high quality when people can use it effectively, confidently, and even enjoyably.
Testing is not about proving that the system works. It’s about discovering how, where, why (and perhaps even when) it might fail.
The best results come when quality is shared:
- Business analysts capture the users’ needs as requirements
- Designers create UI/UX that turns requirements into usable systems
- Developers build with intention
- Code reviewers strengthen the work
- Testers explore, challenge, and reveal
Many members of the team, one shared goal.
Writing & Ideas
In the left nav, you’ll find articles and essays I’ve written over the past 15 years on achieving true software quality.
- Foundations of Quality begins with Quality as Fitness for Use as the basis by which to understand and hints at how to achieve quality. The other articles expand on those thoughts a bit further.
- Quality Systems includes the approaches that I encourage for planning, managing, and executing testing strategies. Three Sets of Eyes provides an underpinning for organizing your development team around a common goal: producing great software.
- Teams and Culture is where you’ll find my thoughts on how to build and maintain teams that are committed to each other as much as they are to the software that they produce.
Please note that I’m still developing and refining many of the articles and even the organization of this site itself. If we know each other well and you like how I think/write about Software Quality, come back frequently to see what is new or has changed. This is a living body of work — some sections are still evolving, and a few pages are still very much in progress.
Speaking & Conferences
I’m comfortable speaking with groups as small as 1:1 training or discussions up to a room of a couple hundred people. What many people don’t know is that I spent 14 years of my career serving as a pastor, and public speaking and teaching are strong suits for me.
I have developed and delivered talks, webinars, and classes that range from 15 to 90 minutes. My main subjects include software quality, testing, and building sustainable quality systems, all drawn from decades of experience with many teams and clients.
Topics include:
- QA 101 (for those unfamiliar with basic concepts or the testing career path)
- Exploratory Testing in Practice
- The QA Professional’s Guide to Becoming Your Company’s Quality Management Hero
- Building a Culture of Quality
Interested in having me speak? Let’s connect.