If you want your company to be known for reliability and consistency when it comes to your products and services, it’s important to conduct regular quality assurance audits and compile your findings in a QA report. The purpose of the report is to outline how the products and services performed as compared to your quality parameters, and what recommendations there are for improvement.

Establish the Goal of the Quality Assurance Report

Begin your QA report by specifying what your goal is. What are the specific elements you are trying to determine about your product, service or process? For example, you could be testing the consistent size of brownies for your bakery, or the speed at which a cashier helps a customer at your grocery store.

Specify the Auditing or Testing Methodology Used

Outline what the parameters are for measuring quality. This is what you will compare the products, services or processes to during your audit or testing. Parameters need to be quantifiable and measurable. For example, do you need to ensure that all sweaters have three blue buttons and three red buttons, or do you need to ensure that the oil change is done by following the same step-by-step process by each of your employees?

Note how you performed the quality assurance audit or test. Did you measure the product using a specific measuring tape, or did you use a particular process management tool to note which order the steps were taken? It’s critical to conduct the testing in the exact same manner for each of the products you’re reviewing to ensure that you get fair results. If anyone has any issues with your findings, they may choose to retest the products. As a result, they will need to know how the test was conducted initially.

Explain the Findings in Your QA Report

In your QA report, specify what the results of your audit or test were. Depending on the kind of test you conducted, it may be easier to present your findings in a chart or graph form. For example, if you were conducting a QA test on color printing on all the printers at your printing services store, you could create a graph showing how many printers rendered the colors accurately versus how many were distorted.

Provide an Actionable Conclusion

Offer a conclusion that summarizes your goal, parameters, testing and findings. How is the quality of the products and services at your small business? In addition to reporting test results, your conclusion should provide some actionable advice. What are the next steps in terms of maintaining and improving quality at your business? For example, do you need to review your manufacturing process to ensure no errors occur or do you need to conduct additional staff training so they understand the standards to adhere to?

Offer Recommendations and Appendices

At the end of your report, elaborate on any recommendations to improve the quality of your products and services. Delve into what you can change to meet the parameters you set when conducting your audit and tests. For example, if you want to ensure that all sandwiches at your café include the right amount of ingredients in the right order, a way to improve your standards may be through employee training. In addition, you could rework the setup in your kitchen so that the ingredients are laid out in the exact order that they need to be put on to the sandwich.

Be sure to include any necessary appendices, such as your audit notes or any raw data from your tests. If anyone has questions about the findings or the testing methodology, they can refer to the additional information you provided.

Conduct Quality Assurance Regularly

Be sure to conduct your quality assurance tests on a regular basis, such as weekly, monthly or quarterly. Develop a quality assurance monthly report template that includes the necessary fields for your business. You can then fill out the report each month to ensure that your business continuously meets your high-quality standards.