TABLE OF CONTENTS As presented in Chapter 7, the concepts of project management are being presented in Chapters 7 through 11. The quality management process areas of Process and Product Quality Assurance and Configuration Management are now described in this chapter as project management functions that provide input to project managers to help them better manage and control and not simply go through the motions to satisfy audit or assessment criteria.
While the continuous representation of CMMI chose a categorization scheme that placed CM and QA in the category of support, it is my experience that effective use of the engineering principles of CM and QA are best realized by thinking of them as project management functions. This section of Chapter 9 focuses on the support that a project manager can and should expect from the functions of Process and Product Quality Assurance.
Process and Product Quality Assurance is often misunderstood or purposefully equated to testing. Perhaps it is important to firstly distinguish between quality control and quality assurance. Quality control evaluates or checks the quality of the products and life-cycle work products. Quality control functions or activities help to determine if the product is within defined tolerances and of acceptable quality. Tools and techniques used for quality control include peer reviews such as inspections or structured walk-throughs and the different levels of testing. Peer reviews and most testing techniques are described in the process areas of Verification and Validation.
Quality assurance...
