The concept of responsibility fits another root cause for quality problems, too. Responsibility works best when it is accepted or assumed even if it hasn't explicitly been given. In most troubled organizations nobody has assumed responsibility for quality. Sometimes a quality manager seems to be the only one struggling with quality issues, often reduced to the role of a quality accountant more than anything else. Keeping track of metrics without them having any influence on the busy schedule isn't doing much for the quality of the product. Quality isn't a one-man job. It isn't a management job, either. Software quality is the responsibility of the people who have a chance of influencing the development of software. Everybody able to change the software, should consider improving it his or her duty.

Idealistic thoughts aside, one root cause hampering quality is simply the lack of skill. If the developers don't know how to create simple and maintainable software, they aren't going to. Their code will be terribly complex, and it will contain errors. It will contain errors that are hard to detect in testing, it will contain errors that a blind chicken would notice, it will contain errors that are difficult or impossible to fix, and it will contain errors a blind chicken could fix, assuming you pointed the keyboard to it. The developers will try their best to reach good quality levels but won't succeed very well. Many beginners fit this description. They will be enthusiastic about the new functionality they get to implement, but have no idea about quality. And the results will be messy.

If the organization has no safeguards for dangerous beginners, the situation becomes even nastier. If the novice developer doesn't get too bad feedback on his code, he might assume it to have been quite good, at least of average quality. He might even be satisfied with himself. If the organization offers no training or requires no improvement from the developers, the developer might be stuck at his beginner level for good. He'd assume a careless attitude towards quality, which explains the multitude of quality problems with seemingly experienced developers. Such developers with many years of coding under their belts are actually just old beginners. Their level of coding is bad, unimaginative but good enough for the organization they are in. They don't care about quality, they have never had to and they aren't going to change their ways after all these years. As if they could learn.

The developers aren't really to blame. The organization has conditioned them to respond to functionality and deadlines, and to ignore quality. As always, the management is to blame. When quality is just a buzzword, unsupported by the software development processes, it is virtually impossible for the developers to do anything for quality. If the deadlines just get tighter with every project success, the projects soon learn not to succeed. If the developers do not have time for quality, they cannot produce quality. If they don't get the necessary training, they won't learn. If they only "get to taste their own medicine", i.e. always just see their own code, they won't be able to expand their imagination. If the developers aren't allowed or encouraged to read books or work on experimental projects, they won't evolve. If they cannot try out new languages and tools and methods, they are going to stay on their current level of development, which means getting left behind in the real world.

Systemic support of quality is important. After the developers have gained the necessary skills, they need to feel that they are allowed to use those skills for good. That feeling comes from the management's reactions to quality work. If the management only pays lip service to quality, the developers will notice it in a crisis. Suddenly there is no time for quality, suddenly it is all about adding more functionality and getting it done quickly.

If product quality isn't taken seriously by everyone, if it isn't an explicit goal, if the people involved don't have the necessary skills, knowledge and attitude, if the systems of the organization don't support quality work, if the necessary tools and methods aren't available and if the people involved aren't striving to improve, there will be quality problems. It won't be easy to pinpoint a specific root cause in each individual problem case, but there is always a reason. It is absolutely vital to understand the root causes, otherwise the decisions and improvement attempts will be chaotic and have chaotic outcomes. It is important to understand whether a tired developer makes an error, or the management moving the arbitrary deadline a few weeks earlier causes havoc, or the developer staff works as best it can still causing problems. In one case you need to cut the developers some slack, on another you need to work on commitment and motivation on all levels of the organization and in one case you'd better find a learning solution.

Quality is everybody's responsibility. The developers need to keep their skills and tools up to date, the managers need to support the necessary changes in their planning. The whole organization must be behind continuous improvement for quality.

Another well-pondered question in Chapter 3. "Root Causes".