An Investigation in Attitudes to formal Quality Management Systems Depth study- TDT 4735- Fall 2005

Since the beginning of the 1990s, quality management in software development has become a hot topic. A lot of resources and effort has been invested in making formal routines and process descriptions, which have resulted in extensive systems, so-called Quality Management Systems(QMS). In recent years, there has not however, been a lot of work done in studying how these systems are used, and what attitudes that exists in different companies towards them. This report gives a theoretical presentation of some important aspects concerning quality management. It also presents the empirical work done during the fall of 2005. This work includes a survey based on interviews with both quality managers and developers in 10 Norwegian software companies. This project is a prestudy for an upcoming graduate thesis, to be written in the spring of 2006. The main research questions for the project are: R1 Are developers negative to routines and formalities in the QMS? R2 Are there conflicts between the different parts of the QMS? R3 Do formal certifications increase quality? The report discusses these questions based on the results from the empirical work and previous work done in the field. The report concludes that consulting companies developing software are generally more positive to formal routines and the use of such, than what is the case in ordinary software developing companies. It also concludes that the different parts of a Quality Management System are usually not in conflict, but that the balance between formal routines on one side, and the freedom of developers on the other, is difficult to maintain. In addition to answering the research questions, the report also suggests some other interesting issues within this area, and propose some further work. i i