QA Career
Get your first QA job: how hiring works, take-home assignments, a CV and portfolio without experience, and where ISTQB fits.
- 01
How QA Hiring Works
The typical stages of hiring a junior tester, from the application and ATS to the offer, what each stage really checks, how to prepare for it, the live tasks you are likely to get and the questions to ask back.
10–15 min beginner Quick & detailed
- 02
Take-Home Assignments
How to handle the classic "test this app and send us bug reports in 48 hours" task, from scoping and a short test approach to prioritized bug reports, a clear summary and the ethics of testing someone else's system, with a worked example on FoodDash.
10–20 min beginner Quick & detailed
- 03
A QA CV and Portfolio Without Experience
How career changers and graduates can write an honest QA CV, turn past jobs into transferable skills, build a small portfolio of test plans, cases and bug reports, write a LinkedIn profile and use the keywords recruiters search for, without overstating anything.
9–15 min beginner Quick & detailed
- 04
ISTQB and Certifications
What the ISTQB Foundation Level (CTFL) certificate is, whether you need it for a first QA job, how the exam works, and a chapter-by-chapter map of the CTFL v4.0 syllabus to Bugwise lessons, with honest notes on what to study from the syllabus itself.
7–12 min beginner Quick & detailed
- 05
Tell Me About Yourself and Why QA
How to answer the opening interview questions for a junior QA role, with a 60 to 90 second present-past-future pitch, honest answers to "Why QA?" and "Why us?", a calm way to handle salary expectations and "you have no experience", and fill-in templates.
8–15 min beginner Quick & detailed
- 06
Your First 90 Days as a Tester
What to expect in your first QA job, from onboarding and learning the product to asking good questions, filing your first bug reports, working with developers and choosing where to grow next, such as automation or a specialization.
6–10 min beginner Quick & detailed