Quality Assurance and Product Management
Question: "Is the Quality Assurance (QA) Engineer a part of the Development or the Product Management department?"
Quality Assurance (QA) cannot be part of Development because of the inherent conflict of interests. QA and Development are two separate entities, which is demonstrated well in the MSF Team Model. Please see the Microsoft Solutions Framework (MSF) Team Model diagram which distinctly maps the entities in a product delivery project.
From the outset of a company's inception, an Engineering body is built and it serves as a container for all corporate technical functions (QA and Development included). Please see the "Blackblot Marketing Model – Corporate Organizational Structure" diagram where the Engineering body holds the User Experience, Quality Assurance, and Development departments.
