Is the presence of a software test engineer necessary during the early phases of development?

Test Engineers play a vital role in the early stages of development, essentially from the commencement of the Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC). Employing the shift-left approach enables the early detection of bugs in the development cycle.

When a product introduces a new feature, it is prudent to involve testers right from the requirements-gathering phase. In this capacity, they function as QA analysts, scrutinizing the requirements for any potential design flaws in both Low-Level Designs (LLD) and High-Level Designs (HLD).

Establishing a POD(Project Organization and Development) for a project or a new feature facilitates seamless collaboration between Developers (DEVs) and Quality Assurance (QAs) right from the initial stages of development. Even in the absence of a ready User Interface (UI), testing of the Application Programming Interface (API) can be conducted concurrently with its development.