Improvement is not only about metrics.
Accelerate with Quality at Speed software requires a high-performing organization able to work effectively as a whole.
While the team dynamic or the quality of its interactions cannot be measured with precise numbers, it can be assessed as a group.
Taking the temperature of a team can be achieved with criteria and scales that bring a factual aspect to subjective perceptions.
Quality Engineering Health Check is a methodology supporting continuous improvements within and between teams to deliver Quality at Speed software.
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What is Quality Engineering Health Check
The Quality Engineering Health Check is a collaborative exercise driving continuous improvement learning from concrete experiences.
The methodology is tailored for the Quality Engineering framework and inspired by the Spotify Health Check and agile retrospectives.
It consists in a team self-evaluation among 3 categories of Quality Engineering, that contain themselves evaluation criteria on the big picture.
Quality Engineering Health Check can be applied at a single or multiple team levels depending on the perspective required and the organization maturity.
The team assess itself for each item on 4 possible values, forcing to make choices:
- Green: things are going well, without much need for improvement
- Yellow: minor and few problems are identified, but can be live with
- Orange: significant warnings signs or issues are impacting the team
- Red: important issues must be tackled in priority over the other ones.
The indicators evaluation guides are available in the implementation section in the following part of the article.
This methodology is not a management or measurement technique like a Balanced Scorecard or Value-Stream analysis—it relies much more on collaboration and alignment.
Similarly to the Spotify model, arrows can be added to represent the evolution trend for each indicator, even if it is optional to start in the first place.
The exercise brings a temperature map among the various areas of Quality Engineering to then solve the identified problems in the next iterations.
That’s where QE Health Check is useful for Quality at Speed software.
Why using QE Health Check in Quality Engineering
Organizations are searching to accelerate to survive in a digital ecosystem where actors attracting most of the demand rapidly improve their value proposition.
That velocity is sustained through fast cycles of software iterations that support high-standard software delivery and innovative digital offerings.
Reaching that state of rapid iterations results from an organizational capability of continuous improvement, allowing to attain and maintain the high standard.
Quality Engineering Health Check is one of the core mechanisms supporting a culture and systematic execution of continuous improvement across the software lifecycle.
How does QE Health Check contribute to Quality
Quality Engineering requires to meet the expectation of the various quality attributes at the high-standard to deliver successful digital offerings.
But organizations cannot be high performing from day one; they have to continuously improve what’s missing by confronting themselves to the reality.
Performing QE Health Check as a collaborative exercise is the way to systematically challenge the team to reach the quality imperatives.
Quality Engineering Health Check contributes to Quality being:
- Result-driven in assessing if the quality outcomes are delivered
- Systematic as following a review list of the entire software lifecycle flow
- Scalable as progressively applicable from one to many teams.
How does QE Health Check contribute to Speed
Being fast in Quality Engineering requires to meet short-term demand while maintaining a continuous flow of software changes at the high standard.
Teams have to solve limiting factors in their software lifecycle depending on their context to accelerate the rhythm of software delivery.
The systematic application of QE Health Check enables teams to identify and solve issues in their current organization to increase speed.
Quality Engineering Health Check contributes to Speed with:
- Focus on the major areas to address in their software lifecycle
- Rhythm in being executed regularly and improve the rate of delivery
- Asynchronicity in allowing a preparation and sharing among teams
- Visibility with factual actuals that can be shared in the organization.
How to start with Quality Engineering Health Check
The QE Health Check is a progressive methodology that has to start with a team to iterate on the model prior to expanding.
Start by aligning everyone on key points of the methodology:
- The perspective must be end-to-end on the lifecycle
- It is a collaborative exercise for continuous improvement
- The value resides in the workshop, visuals and in sharing
- Outputs are useful for the team and outside of the team
- The exercise is best done regularly at frequent intervals.
You can then follow these implementation steps:
- Prepare the QE Health Check structure
- Organize and execute the workshop
- Communicate and share the visuals
- Integrate outputs in the OKRs and backog
- Plan the next review and assess the expansion.
Prepare the QE Health Check structure
This stage of preparation focuses on the operational part of the workshop.
Your main task is to prepare the board that will be used for the review, putting on a vertical axis the different QE health checks.
- Quality at Speed
- Quality
- Speed
- Complexity
- MAMOS Practices
- Methods
- Architecture
- Management & culture
- Organization
- Skills
- Software Lifecycle Flow
- Plan
- Focus
- Specify
- Design
- Implement
- Review
- Learn
- Adapt
You can also decide to review the scales for each criteria; that level of customization is up to you.
Pick an on-site or remote format depending on your context, keeping in mind that you can prepare the meeting asynchronously while running it on-site.
Organize and execute the workshop
You need 1.5 to 2 hours to perform the QE Health Check workshop with the different team members.
As organizer of the workshop, your role is to make respected the rules of the exercise, foster the collaboration of everyone, and be the time-keeper.
The following actions must be done through the workshop:
- Each person sets its assessment per criteria
- The team discuss the levels set per criteria
- The team agree on one of the 4 colors
- Each person got 3 votes to select themes to address
- A silent session let people put ideas for identified problems
- Proposed solution are voted in the same way
- The action plan is confirmed and marked for sharing
- Additional meetings plan if root causes were not found for example.
Communicate and share the visuals
That step is important to make the effort of the team concrete, maintain a culture of openness, and share the learning.
Use the diffusion channel that is more pertinent in your organization, leveraging opportunities such as townhall and talks.
Also make sure to keep the outputs of the workshop in a reusable format for the next workshops, as you will be able to compare results over time.
Integrate outputs in the OKRs and backog
This step seems trivial but is forgotten by many people, resulting in meetings that generate ideas that just remain ideas.
The action points identified in the workshop are issues impeding the performance of your team and will not be resolved as a side-project.
Injecting the necessary tasks in the standard flow of work also passes a message of importance in the team and organization to address such topics.
Plan the next review and assess the expansion
The last part is to ensure the systematic execution of the methodology to drive continuous improvements.
Book in advance at a defined frequency the health check, being between one and three months with the OKRs planning to let time to improve things in between.
Quality Engineering Health Check within MAMOS
The visible part of a health check is usually the test part, generating a whole set of indicators to perform a diagnosis.
The hidden part is the transformational change that can result from a health check feedback, acting as a true catalyzer of change.
Performing Quality Engineering Health Check is the way to get that continuous catalyzer of change active in your software lifecycle.
Doing a health check for the sake of it can satisfy our good conscience, but it will not save our company from underlying structuring issues.
Be the one transforming health checks into action.
References
Henrik Kniberg (2014), Squad Health Check model – visualizing what to improve. Spotify Engineering.
Yuval Yeret (2022), Assessing Agile Health Using the Spotify Squad “Health” Check beyond the Squad during the COVID19 pandemic. Agile Parks.
Christian Heidemeyer, Spotify Health Check: Everything You Need To Know. Echometerapp.
What is the Squad Health Check? Team Retro.