Quality Assurance Planning

A manager and workflow.

Quality assurance in productivity is a common buzz phrase used to identify what is desired from a workplace. However, it takes a good manager to map out specifically what these words means as they apply to a project and what should be expected in terms of a successful product or result. Using quality assurance planning in a step-method is a recommended plan of attack.

Identification

A quality assurance plan is a written-down approach to map out and direct what the final delivery of product team should be both in specification and in terms of desired quality. In a sense, the document is like a business plan for the operational direction of a project. The document itself is framed into a planning phase, implementation, verification, and action on follow-up.

What is Desired

There are a number of methodologies and programs that can provide templates for quality assurance planning, but the details still need to be filled out and customized by your project. The goal is to be as specific as possible as to what is desired both in results and how good or satisfactory they should be when finished. Quantifiable metrics are strongly recommended when possible as these can easily be measured objectively later on.

Assigning Roles

Along with objectives the plan should also detail who is responsible for what in the organization and project. This includes the expectations for each team member. Avoid ambiguity; be as detailed as possible so there are few questions later on with regards to expectations. Again, use metrics when possible to reduce the amount of subjective evaluation that is needed later on.

Make Sure to Coordinate

Clearly most projects live in a world of larger and bigger plans. How does this project fit in the bigger scheme of the company goals and missions? Is it a high priority or a lower one? Does it rely on other projects to occur first or are packages waiting for this project to be completed? All of these possibilities and influences should be accounted for in the planning.

Detail the Deadlines

Within the scope and parameters of the goals written down, and the influences affecting performance, the project terms and when they are due should be identified. It also helps to visually display these demands using a Gant chart or similar graphic. Structure all the deadlines on deliverables that are due and when they are expected. Then work backwards from each one for all the tasks that need to be in place and performed to meet the deliverable as expected.

Follow-Up and Metrics

Quality assurance is confirmed by following up and making sure what was committed to actually occurs. As mentioned before, the use of metrics makes this part easier since the review should confirm the metrics were achieved. Subjective measurement can be used but it tends to be vulnerable to interpretation, and it's harder to hold someone accountable with. Objective metrics clearly define a unit goal to be met, and there is no ambiguity. Either the task is a pass or it's a fail.

References

• TotalQualityAssuranceServices.com: Developing a Quality Assurance Plan
• Peak-Brandeis University: Brandeis Peak Project-Quality Assurance Plan
• Rational Unified Process: Develop Quality Assurance Plan

Resources

• HUD: Quality Assurance Plan Checklist