Who is responsible for Quality?

Many of us think that Quality is a value addition that we provide to our customer; but actually it is not. It is one of the parameters of the service that we provide to the customer which will also act as a marketing tool for getting more business or sustaining existing business. Customers are really concerned about quality nowadays and expect quality out of every penny they spend. Also, they don’t mind spending a little more if they could get good quality product. GE’s Jack Welch ably summed up the importance of quality - “Quality is our best assurance of customer allegiance, our strongest defense against foreign competition, and the only path to sustained growth and earnings.”

In a software project, who is responsible for a quality product?

If you ask the Customer, he would say that the Software Vendor is responsible. If you ask a Project Manager, he would say that the Software Engineers are responsible. If you ask the Software Engineers, they would say that it is the job of the Project Manager to ensure Quality. The fact is that everyone is responsible for the quality of the software product.

It is an accepted fact that software (or rather any product for that matter) cannot be 100 % error or bug free. There will be errors or bugs, but at the same time there should be acceptable limits to the errors or bugs that would be present in the software. This is what I would call as “Acceptable Quality”.

The Customer would be responsible for defining the “Acceptable Quality”. Without the Project Manager agreeing on the “Acceptable Quality” with the customer and setting guidelines, standards and checklist, the product will not be of acceptable quality. Similarly without the Software Engineers adhering to the guidelines, standards and checklists, the product will not be of “Acceptable Quality”. So, everyone will be responsible for the quality of the product.

Electronics giant Siemens has the quality motto: “Quality is when our customers come back and our products don’t.”