CIO Perspectives on Quality – Quality Driven From The Start (Video Transcript)

The Importance of Quality Assurance & Opportunity Cost

When it comes to Quality Assurance there’s probably from a functional standpoint nothing more important in being a value added IT Department than both doing the right things and doing things right.

My name is Martin Howard I am a partner with Fortium Partners. Fortium Partners is a group of of about 130 CIOs, CISOs and CTOs. All of us have probably at least 25 years or so experience in both Consulting and Industry. We offer Technology Leadership as a service for fractional interim and transformational roles.

Often and perhaps too often people make decisions based on or largely influenced
by proposed cost for a project. And while that is a factor and is important, again doing it right the first time overwhelms everything else.

Opportunity cost, the cost of redoing things is enormous. From a cost standpoint, from a time standpoint but, also from a morale standpoint. and a cultural standpoint. Doing it right delivering as promised is always something that has tremendous value.

I think the lessons learned are the quality assurance is not an IT role, it is a business process role. All of the software out there is designed to support a business process. To move information from one place.
To provide analytics, to provide information and the getting the software right is only one component.

The question is does it meet the business need?
Is it the most efficient? Organizations, vendors that do this for a living, Quality Assurance experts can really help an organization think through how quickly can they get it done. Making sure that it is right.

Choosing a Quality Assurance Vendor

Looking for specifically a quality assurance vendor. I look for folks who are going to challenge how we do things. One who is looking to build that long-term relationship as opposed to simply complete a project and get reimbursement.

So the QA, where value can be added, is not simply replicating an old process correctly but, opening the organization’s eyes to improving and streamlining the process.

Again the cliche of begin with the end in mind. What is this new process designed to do? and is there a way to do it even better? And that’s where a CIO, using appropriately selected vendors, vendors who will truly partner like QAC, can take that mindset and use it to be a true strategic partner for the rest of the business.

The squad model that QAC implemented, was of tremendous benefit, and was one of the reasons why they were selected. From a cost basis, keeps cost under control and again makes sure we’re paying for what we actually need.

It also helps with the quality of the work that’s been done. And again is an indicator that QAC has been focused on delivering the best outcome for the organization. Not simply saying well this is the team assigned to that Project, x number of hours per week for the next 6, 12, 18 weeks.
We thought was an outstanding characteristic. Turned out to be correct in that it provided great value for us