Quality management plan

The quality management plan is to give guidance on how the quality can be checked on the project through the design reviews, the documentation, and through other protocols. It provides the management and the customer a good understanding of how the quality can be maintained and what documentation work can be expected while addressing quality during the life of the project.

Project  quality  plan  helps  in  identifying  the  quality  standards  that  are relevant to the project by showing how to achieve them. This includes the implementation of the quality event like the peer review and checklist. The checklist can be executed by using various quality materials like the templates or the standards which are given within the organisation.

The Quality management plan is usually prepared by the project team which can be used both as a cross-reference for other documentation work and also as a guide which will help to understand the quality aspects of the project. The team members can refer the documents either in whole or use it as a reference which may help in examining the quality standards of the deliverables.  The  managers  will  refer  to  it  to  clarify  if  the  practices considered are essential for the quality performance and also to affirm the responsibility for the practices. Customer may refer to the quality management plan for the assurance that the quality practices are in place for the deliverables and also to identify the particular practices. There may be references to the performance standard guides, quality standards like the ISO 9000, and the internal support documents. The quality management plan is usually limited to a single project or the attempt within the project and in terms of the outlining responsibilities and ownership. The outline of the quality management plan might include the following:

• Definition of the scope - This explains the scope of the quality plan and not the entire project and also states how much of the project or the deliverables the quality plan has to encompass.

• Quality policy - This is defined to express the organisation's attitude toward the quality and the quality practices.

• Quality approach - This includes an extensive reference documentation which supports the quality plan. This includes documents required to validate the deliverable performance. It will also outline how the particular practices, like the design reviews, the management reviews, the customer reviews and the records management should be carried out.
• Supporting documentation - This consists of some information incorporated in the quality approach documentation like the flowcharts and the external references, the copies or the direction to copies which may be embedded in the appendices or in the supplemental folders.

The  quality  management  plan  normally  hinges  largely  on  the  quality practices and the policies of the supporting organisation. Some of the organisations with less emphasis on the quality may create the entire quality management  plan  as  one-  or  two-page  document.  While  developing  a quality management plan, it is necessary to consider the customer's quality practices. The customers with high levels of quality planning and expertise often expect similar levels of effort from the suppliers and the supporting organisations.