quality management Questions

After 20 years of leading AD teams, I'll be transitioning into leading my companies shared software QA team.  This is a very large company (Fortune 50) where IT budgets are determined by LOB.  The AD teams own the budgets and allocate funds to shared QA org.  Our annual planning cycle starts in July and closes in November for the subsequent year.  The problem is multi-faceted:

1. As part of annual planning the AD teams are not allocating or under allocating $ to support QA
2. QA leadership needs to beat the bushes for $ to support IT projects (e.g. allocate $ to our resource role)
3. Constantly battling for money means the only resources supported are the ones specifically budgeted to support testing a new development project - we can't build a center of expertise, invest in tools, take training, improve processes, and ultimately improve quality due to funding contraints.

Are there any best practices in defining a standard allocation model?  For example, X% of AD budget funds core QA resources (FTE, Key Consultants - including resources for CoE) and Y% funds project related work.  Internally we're calling this a "blended model".  

All thoughts are appreciated.

I'm working on refining our definitions for test results and have the following:

Pass - Test executes and all verification points pass (behavior matches requirements)

Fail - Test executes and 1 or more verification points fail (it does not meet requirements)

Blocked - Test case cannot be executed due to a defect in current or associated product (something like.. i cant even install the software)

Skipped - Tester determined that test did not need to be run and did not execute the test (He/She knew it would fail due to an already logged defect for example)

There is a contingent of folks who want to use the following result:

Pass with Exceptions -- Test case passed all verification points but failed due to an anomaly found in a related product or in an area not related to the requirements being tested.. for example -- i'm looking at load performance and i see an unrelated defect in the GUI.

I am opposed to this definition as it seems to be a little unclear with regard to intent and I have seen the definition get changed to allow failing test cases to "Pass with exception"

Has anyone seen any standards published that provide guidance in this area?

Thanks,

Mike

Hello,

Iam new to this site and found it very useful. I have worked as a software tester for 7 years  and would like to return to the testing market again after a gap of 2 years from the industry as my child is young.

I have worked on Agile methodologies and some scripting in ruby (basic knowledge) with Cucumber.

I would like to learn few technologies and an automation tool before I start looking for jobs. Please advice me what scripting langauge and automation tools I should focus on.

Since I have a gap of 2years I would like to gain skills before I start giving interviews.

Please help!

Dektop application automation tool for testing