Media

 

D&B Winners in Quality Stakes…Again

When D&B won the International Direct Marketing Fair award for best Business List and Data Product for the second year in a row in 2004, then went on to receive the overall new product award for their MarketDirect product, it was not an accident. D&B recognise that the quality of the product delivered to customers is of paramount importance.

Previously D&B had decided to outsource their application development to offshore partners, and needed to ensure that the quality of the products met the standards required by the business and their customers.

To achieve the best possible quality, D&B engaged SIM/SQS to assess their project lifecycle processes against industry best practices.

The QA assessment reviewed and analysed project processes from requirements capture through to operational defect handling. It highlighted areas that could be improved to significantly improve the effectiveness and efficiency of the development area by avoiding rework, and to improve the quality of the final products and services presented to the customers.

Following on from this, SIMSQS designed and implemented a Quality Strategy to deliver:

  • A roadmap of the current development project lifecycle, test processes and procedures
  • A QA process that would address the perceived risks and priorities
  • The capability to measure and continuously refine this process.

 

 

 

Several key issues were addressed by implementing the process:

  • Entry and exit criteria - project acceptance criteria were agreed and quality audit checkpoints were created and implemented
  • Issues management - the current process was reviewed and a uniform best practice initiated
  • Requirements Tracking - requirements specifications were reviewed and traced throughout the project lifecycle to User Acceptance Test stage
  • Testing - a test plan format was designed and a defect tracking process put in place.
  • Reviews/Inspections - a review and improvement process for documentation was put in place
  • Risk management - risk assessment and analysis, mitigation and tracking procedures were implemented with continual assessment at the audit points.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The second phase of the EWOW project piloted the QA process and achieved the high quality level expected of a world class company.

"When it was proposed that EWOW would pioneer the quality process we knew that we would bear the pain of the initial implementation." said the Senior Project Manager, EWOW. "It was instrumental in the success of the project and we have become enthusiastic supporters of the process. It has enabled us to capture defects at an earlier stage in the lifecycle, leading to improved deliverables from our outsourced suppliers. Our communication of requirements to our outsource suppliers is clearer, enabling them to understand and meet our requirements more fully"

In addition, the need for improved Load & Performance Testing was highlighted by the assessment, and several bottlenecks identified for the EWOW pilot. An ongoing initiative continues to improve the application of Load & Performance Testing within development lifecycle to ensure that performance service levels are met.

The success within the second phase of EWOW project encouraged D&B to apply the Technology Quality Process to the more challenging task of the new e-business sector that MarketDirect represents. The process kept business and technology partners on track, both on and offshore, whilst lifting quality levels.

The process, together with code reviews which also detected design issues, facilitated the early delivery of code that D&B could confidently utilise to instigate User Acceptance Testing at Beta Test sites. This enabled early analysis of the reaction of real customers to the delivered application.

Continuing with the strategy, D&B rolled out the process to all significant development projects to deliver the best possible quality - in the shortest possible time scale - at the lowest cost.

"SIM/SQS helped us look at holistically at our processes. The process encourages early involvement of our business partners. Normally end users are only involved at the User Acceptance Testing stage; early reviews enabled business leaders to be part of the flow of the development of the whole system, resulting in a better delivery of the business requirement at an earlier stage in the lifecycle." said D&B Team Leader - European QA.

"The SIM/SQS team acted as QA leads and integrated into our project team very successfully. They provided flexible resource to suit our business requirement. They also provided a significant knowledge transfer resource to enable our in-house team to learn and improve."

The implementation of the Quality Assurance and Control methodology as part of the strategy will assure that D&B ensure success by design and not by accident. Sustainable improvements will be delivered in the future and D&B will win again.