Quality Control refers to
quality related activities associated with the creation of project deliverables.
Quality control is used to verify that deliverables are of acceptable quality
and that they are complete and correct. Examples of quality control activities
include deliverable peer reviews and the testing process.
Quality Assurance refers to
the process used to create the deliverables, and can be performed by a manager,
client, or even a third-party reviewer. Examples of quality assurance include
process checklists and project audits. If your project gets audited, for
instance, an auditor might not be able to tell if the content of a specific
deliverable is acceptable (quality control). However, the auditor should be able
to tell if the deliverable seems acceptable based on the process used to create
it (quality assurance). That's why project auditors can perform a quality
assurance review on your project, even if they do not know the specifics of what
you are delivering. They don't know your project, but they know what good
processes look like.
Here's an example to drive home the point. Let's say a project manager asked the
sponsor to approve the Business Requirements Report. If you were the sponsor,
how would you validate that the business requirements seemed complete and
correct?
One solution would be for you to actually review the document and the business
requirements. If you did that, you would be performing a quality control
activity, since your actions would be based on validating the deliverable
itself.
However, let's say the
document was thirty pages long and that you (as the sponsor) did not have the
expertise, the time, or the inclination to do a specific content review. In that
case, you wouldn't ask to review the document itself. Instead, you would ask the
project manager to describe the process used to create the document. Let us say
you received the following reply.
Project manager - "I gathered eight of your major users in a facilitated
session. After the meeting, I documented the requirements and asked the group
for their feedback, modifications, etc. I then took these updated requirements
to representatives from the Legal, Finance, Manufacturing and Purchasing groups
and they added requirements that were needed to support company standards. We
then had a meeting with the four managers in your area that are most impacted by
this system. These managers added a few more requirements. I then asked your
four managers to sign off on the requirements and you can see their signatures
on the last page."
If you were the sponsor,
would you now feel comfortable to sign the requirements? If it were me, I would
feel pretty comfortable.
That's the difference.
Quality control activities are focused on the deliverable itself. Quality
assurance activities are focused on the process used to create the deliverable.
They are both powerful techniques and both must be performed to ensure that the
deliverables meet your customers quality requirements.
