Have you heard the title Chief Quality Officer but wondered exactly what it was that they did?  Are they the equivalent of a QA Manager? Or something different?  More than just a title or yet another manager, the Chief Quality Officer should be the chief quality advocate.  Their primary role includes researching and driving best practices by keeping up with new techniques and software tools and how they could benefit the current organization.

A good quality officer will keep quality in the forefront of the company and be a strong advocate for quality process and the education of the QA team, as well as educating managers on the importance of quality in their organization. As such, their effect could be more widespread than just the software team, as quality can and should extend to other parts of the company as well.

Generally, they will consistently monitor gaps in the existing quality process and outline plans to address them according to the QA process and staffing.  More importantly, rather than just parroting process rules, the Chief Quality Officer knows the organization they are working with and designs improvement plans that suit the specific needs of their organization, while looking to the future needs that may arise.

They can and should evaluate the necessity of automation in the organization and what tools would suit the team best, possibly even working to get the automated tool implemented and arranging appropriate training.

Do you have a Chief Quality Officer in your organization?  If not, do you think you may need one?

About the Author

The author, Ruslan Desyatnikov, is the CEO & Founder of QA Mentor. He created QA Mentor to fill the gap he has witnessed in QA service providers during his near 20 years in QA. With Ruslan’s guidance, unique services and methodologies were developed at QA Mentor to aid clients in their QA difficulties while still offering a high ROI. Ruslan offers monthly seminars aimed at imparting his extensive testing knowledge that can be applied to start-ups as well as large companies. To learn more about QA Mentor and testing services please visit www.qamentor.com or contact Ruslan directly by sending email to rdesyatnikov@qamentor.com