Oleg Sadikov, co-founder and CEO of the software testing company Deviqa.
Tesla recalled over 2 million cars in 2023 due to Autopilot system defects. The QA’s bad, right? It’s not—there was a deeper issue that was rooted in the lack of a culture of quality rather than in a specific testing process. The recall cost Tesla a fortune and clearly showed that quality decisions made at the design stage can have massive downstream impacts.
I’m not about to blame Tesla; it’s not just their problem. The main point is that the quality stage can’t pop up at the end of the development life cycle as a separate part. Product quality isn’t just the QA team’s responsibility—this is a misconception that leads to costly mistakes and poor user experiences.
Do you know what separates the most successful companies in terms of product quality? They don’t treat software quality checks as a phase within the software product life cycle. Instead, they implement what I call “quality everywhere”—a culture where quality is everyone’s responsibility.
Let’s hash out this effective software quality culture and practices you’ll want to use along the way.
What’s Wrong With Relying Solely On A QA Team
We’ve all been there: a development team tossing their code “over the wall” to be checked just days before release. Just imagine what could have happened to Zoom if their development team had done this at the beginning of the Covid-19 explosion. They simply couldn’t have handled that rapid jump from 10 million to 200 million daily users.
For years, software testing best practices included how rigorous testing should be but not when to perform it. When you come to a Michelin restaurant, you might expect the chef to oversee grocery shopping and inspect the food at every stage of cooking. That’s not exactly the reality, but you get the message. Similarly, user-centric software development should include testing procedures at every stage of development. Here’s why:
• Late bug detection can skyrocket the cost to fix it. The internet is abuzz with the rumor that post-release fixing multiplies its cost by 100. Although there’s no exact confirmation of this, the cost of fixes is still large, especially if we take into account the possible reputational loss due to a bad release.
• You could fall behind. Agile and DevOps practices require continuous integration and deployment. Without ensuring this, you can’t keep up with further app advancements.
• You can’t innovate. Stuck to convenient methods and won’t try anything new? Chances are, you won’t innovate and, thus, won’t become a market leader.
• You can avoid insufficient test coverage. When you only test at the end of development, you tend to run a limited number of tests. It’s common sense: The fewer scenarios you test, the more problems you should expect.
What I Call A Culture Of Quality
A culture of quality in software development implies everyone (e.g., developers, product managers and designers) takes ownership of the result. Another aspect is proactive quality management: Don’t wait for issues—predict them and nip them in the bud.
Do you feel how big the difference is between the described approach and the traditional one? Old-fashioned testing treats QA as a final step. As a result, teams can’t help but get bogged down in the routine and end up having to put out fires in terms of fixing last-minute defects.
A Culture Of Quality: Five Elements
1. Shared Responsibility: Developers, designers and product teams prioritize quality from the outset. Collective ownership addresses issues earlier than if the quality was solely the QA team’s prerogative.
2. Shift-Left Testing: A shift-left testing strategy places the testing phase at every stage of development, encouraging faster feedback and more efficient development.
3. CI/CD Integration: Modern AI-powered testing tools integrate with CI/CD pipelines to catch issues quickly and without extensive human control.
4. User-Centric Approach: Everything you do is for your clients. Therefore, you should develop products with your users in mind. Usability and real-world testing help ensure the software meets their needs.
5. Metrics And Feedback: Data is the new gold. Targeted insights (which are provided faster due to the each-stage testing) help us learn from past projects and continuously improve the approach.
Build A Culture Of Quality In Five Steps
1. Create a collaborative atmosphere.
Open communication and teamwork are key. This begins with your HR and hiring practices—you shouldn’t hire people who aren’t willing to collaborate and go beyond typical solutions. Also, I’d say that leadership matters the most. If your employees believe in the CEO, founder and other top executives, they’ll be more willing to go the extra mile.
2. Implement test-driven development (TDD) and behavior-driven development (BDD) approaches.
Write tests before code implementation to identify potential issues early and ensure that the software meets both technical and business requirements.
3. Leverage continuous testing and monitor wisely.
Don’t shy away from modern monitoring tools, but check if they support continuous monitoring (at every stage and in real time). With such an aid, you can obtain more data for informed decisions.
4. Build a knowledge-sharing space.
This learning environment can be virtual or physical. Virtual learning is more convenient to access but in the physical space, it’s easier to create the appropriate morale for learning. As a virtual option, you can choose existing platforms such as LinkedIn Learning or Coursera.
5. Set relevant KPIs.
In the beginning, focus on defect density, code coverage and customer-reported issues. Use the SMARTCBP framework. It’s the well-known SMART framework but with three new elements: C—comparable (to measure the adequacy of your goals), B—brief (to head off redundancies) and P—public (to provide some motivation).
The Focus Point
If you want to reduce costs, achieve faster releases and boost customer satisfaction, you can do so with the five-step plan I provided in this article. But your first step is to rethink your approach to quality. From there, the road arises under the footsteps of the walker.
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