Total Quality Management with software

If you (the reader) is familiar with TQM the following three rows should be familiar:
Don’t Inspect Quality In.
Constantly Improve the System.
Break Down Barriers Between Departments.

If you are not familiar with TQM it is arguably the reason Japan's industry creates things faster, cheaper and better than the west. Deming is a name to remember for this.

Now... what can we learn from this?

Don’t Inspect Quality In.
In a large enough project there are special testers that apply their magic when the code already is written. Wouldn't it be nice to not write the bug in the first place?

Constantly Improve the System.
When did you last look over you development method? Your debugging method? Your deployment method? There is even a book written about it called Debugging the Development Process.

Break Down Barriers Between Departments.
Does your project have "programmers", "designers", "architects", "testers" and "project leaders"? Why does it? Because the need arouse or just because that is how it was done last time?

The inspiration for this article was found here.