As it was mentioned early the cost of quality consists of two components: the cost of conformance and the cost of non-conformance.
The cost of conformance is direct, measurable cost. It includes planning, prevention and assessment expenses. Misdirected cost-cutting efforts may attempt to curtail these expenses.
The cost of non-conformance is a future expense that is more complex to estimate:
- How much will it cost to please an irritated customer?
- How much is future business worth?
- What is the importance of a pleased customer?
- How huge will the rework costs be?
- What will be the reprimand?
These two types of costs are related. Spending not much on prevention and assessment can be expected to growth of the cost of non-conformance. Till the certain moment, spending more on prevention and assessment can be expected to curtail the cost of non-conformance. Quality Management may actually curtail overall project expenses, while increscent the cost of conformance, through reductions in the cost of non-conformance.
To reach the craved criteria of quality, the Project Manager must make an appropriate selection of many various items for use on the project as the Quality Management Plan is developed. The choice of the essential quality items is complicated and cost, schedule, and quality tradeoffs are an weighty piece of the decision making process.
Here are some aspects for which decisions should be made:
- Standards for processes and deliverables
- Manual or automated tools to support the activities
- Procedures for handling change
- Procedures for measuring the processes used and their betterment
- Processes for creating deliverables with minimum defects
To make the right decision, the Project Manager should think over how much investment should be made in the application of verification and validation techniques on the early stages of the project. This investment must be compared to the risk that the project will face additional software testing and rework expenses towards the finish of the project.