Test plan creation in absence of requirement specification document

This article addresses a software product and not software project.

This situation is common at some places and there are different ways to tackle the situation.

The problem is less complex when talking about product. If it was about a project then situation & resolution could have been relatively more complex. I am also assuming that its not the first release of your product.

So, first thing one need to do is to thoroughly go through the product last release and all sort of documentation available for that release.

Next task is to understand the changes in old features of the product and the new features. For this one need help of project manager, business analyst and development lead. Talk formally and informally with the development team lead. Ask what is he implementing and how much time he will be taking for his development with how many number of developers. How he plan to do the unit or development testing? You can ask project manager or dev lead that results of development testing should be shared with the testing team.

Also one need to start creating a document for yourself. That document will list down all the features /specification that you have understood. This document can be used as source for test cases. This document should be reviewed by the project manager and by development lead.