Quality is Care

TLDR; When we think of what quality is, I keep going back to the idea that quality is care. It succinctly explains the beauty of what quality can mean. The simple act of caring leads to better quality software—the odds of better outcomes are increased tenfold.

Where it started. I love the world of testing and quality. My other love is community building. The MoTaverse is a combination of my two loves. It’s like those two things met and the MoTaverse baby was born. 

I’ve spent the past few years deep in the world of studying, writing and teaching what community is.  As part of this journey, I went through various ways of trying to explain what community is.

One such example was: a community are a group of people who have something in common. Which is factually correct, kind of, but a group of people with something in common doesn’t mean there is community. It could be a cult. Or maybe they had something in common, but there was no connection, as a result community wouldn’t really exist.

In the end, I’ve ended up with community is care. And it just works. Wherever care exists, community naturally arises. When you show a lack of care, a community withers away.

I believe the same is true for quality. Wherever care exists in our businesses, quality naturally arises. When you show a lack of care, it’s hard to build quality into the complexity.

What’s more. I discovered that the way I’ve been talking about community is pretty much how we could talk about quality. To the extent that my mind has been mindblown, is community essentially the same as quality?

10 Ideas on "Quality is Care"

At the heart of Quality is Care is the idea that we continually make attempts to spread quality everywhere. We can visualise this in the image below, where each coloured section is maybe a team or a department within your organisation. Our mission is to continuously evaluate how good quality feels across the organisation. The ‘heart’ is the CEO, or leadership.

I'm comparing community and quality, as the care angle originated from my community work.

Community is at the heart: Community is not something that exists on the side. To be truly community-led, it has to exist as part of the culture. This means it comes from leadership, ideally the CEO.

Quality is at the heart. We can’t achieve quality without everyone understanding that it is part of our culture. Quality does not come from testing, it comes from leadership caring and striving for excellence.

Community is glue work. We are everywhere. We work within the system. We keep the flywheels going. We are often invisible and never get the credit for the work we do.

Quality is glue work. We are everywhere. We work within the system. We keep the flywheels going. We are often invisible and never get the credit for the work we do.

Everyone wants community. Yet few understand how to make it really happen.

Everyone wants quality. Yet few understand how to make it really happen.

Community is always justifying its existence. We’re misunderstood to be ‘engagement’, community goes much deeper than that.

Quality is always justifying its existence. We’re misunderstood to be ‘bug finders’, quality work goes much deeper than that.

Community is everywhere. It’s a symptom of glue work. We work in the system. We are generalists willing to pull up our sleeves to a variety of tasks.  We cannot pinpoint community because it exists everywhere. In every action. Every communication. Every decision we make. It is why a community coaching approach makes sense. Sometimes it’s a role, other times it is how the whole team shows up.

Quality is everywhere. It’s a symptom of glue work. We work in the system. We are generalists willing to pull up our sleeves to a variety of tasks. We cannot pinpoint our contributions because it exists everywhere. In what we prevent. In the processes we set up. In the way we think. It is why there is a rise in the concept of quality coaching, we don’t police, we support. Sometimes it’s a role, other times it is how the whole team shows up.

Community is everyone’s responsibility. We all help make community happen, or not. It cannot happen with an individual mindset. People have to commit to show up to make it work, not all the time, just when it matters.

Quality is everyone’s responsibility. We all help make quality happen, or not.  It cannot happen with an individual mindset. People have to commit to show up to make it work, not all the time, just when it matters.

Community requires a research mindset. To get to know our people and what they care about and to serve them, we have to research. Talk to people. Explore the ecosystem. Collect the data. And then report it back to those that matter.

Quality requires a research mindset. We have to explore the system. Our product. Our competitors. The Tech. Our customers. The latest software development trends. We have to build a picture. And report back the information to those that matter.

Community requires good communication. It’s not about engagement, nor specifically about ‘conversations’. It’s about understanding how and when to communicate what matters.

Quality requires good communication. We have to communicate many things to many people, across the organisation. Communication doesn’t just happen; it needs to be intentional.

Community brings abundance. It is magical, but it doesn’t happen by accident. It happens with intention, with care. With the ability to spot opportunities and problems.

Quality brings abundance. Yet often it is quiet and unseen. The abundance is when everything feels just right, when we see and feel the positive feedback coming in, from all angles.

Community is about care. When there is no care, there is simply no community. There are people in silos. Not talking to one another. Which leads to so much waste and lack of opportunity to simply do things efficiently and with care.

Quality is about care. When there is no care, there is waste, there are problems, there are systemic issues and it is hard to make things flow. Contrast that to when we do care, we see problems in the moment, we stand up to what we believe, we look for opportunities to do better.

Community is beautiful. Quality is beautiful. You know it when you see it, but you can never quite grasp it.

If care then becomes part of your quality strategy, we then need to hire people that care over the direct skills they have. Skills are easier to teach than it is to get people to care.