How To Plan, Manage, and Check Quality In Projects
What exactly is project quality management, and does every project really need yet another plan?
Not always. Project quality management is not about adding paperwork to every project. It is about making sure the deliverable meets the standard it is supposed to meet, especially when safety, compliance, cost, or operational impact are involved.
For lower-risk projects, quality can often be built into your regular project documents. But for high-risk or highly regulated projects, quality needs to be planned, managed, tested, documented, and approved throughout the work.
In this blog, I’ll break down what project quality management really means, when a formal quality plan makes sense, and the simple quality check that can help protect your project, your company, and your credibility as the project manager.
Key Takeaways
- Project quality management helps you define what “good” actually means for a specific project before the work gets too far along.
- Not every project needs a separate formal project quality management plan, but high-risk, highly regulated, or high-consequence projects often do.
- The three core parts of project quality management are quality planning, quality assurance, and quality control.
- Quality should not be something you only check at the end of the project. It needs to be built into the work, reviewed along the way, and confirmed before the deliverable is approved.
- A simple quality check before you call work complete is this: Does this meet the agreed requirement, and would the stakeholder define this as successful?
What Is A Project Quality Management Plan?
Project quality management is not about making every single project bigger, more complicated, or more document-heavy than it needs to be. Project management already has a lot of documents, and not every project needs a formal project quality management plan. But some projects absolutely do.
If you are managing a high-risk project, a highly regulated project, or a project where the consequences of getting it wrong are serious, then quality cannot just be something you casually check at the end. It has to be planned, managed, tested, documented, and approved throughout the project.
Where quality matters most
Think about projects in healthcare, government, construction, infrastructure, engineering, safety, compliance, or any environment where a poor-quality result could impact people’s safety, violate regulations, cost the organization a lot of money, or create major operational problems.
A bridge is a perfect example. If you are managing a project to build a bridge, quality cannot be vague. You have engineering standards, safety regulations, materials, inspections, approvals, and testing that all have to be followed.
If that bridge does not meet the required standard, that is not just a small fix at the end. That is disaster territory. People could get hurt, the company’s reputation could be damaged, and the cost of fixing the issue could be massive.
That is where project quality management comes in. Along with your overall project management planning, project quality management gives you a structured way to define what quality means for that specific project. It helps you clarify:
- what standards need to be met
- what regulations apply
- what testing needs to happen
- who needs to inspect or approve the work
- what documentation is required
- how you are going to make sure the final deliverable is safe, functional, and compliant
Quality does not mean perfect. It means the deliverable meets the standard it is required to meet. And in the types of projects I’ve mentioned here, that standard cannot be vague. It has to be clearly defined, built into the work, checked along the way, and confirmed before the project is considered complete.
The 3 Parts Of Project Quality Management
Project quality management is most effective when it is clear, intentional, and appropriate for the level of risk involved. It does not need to create unnecessary complexity, but it does need to give the team a structured way to define, manage, and confirm quality throughout the project.
At a practical level, that comes down to three core parts: quality planning, quality assurance, and quality control.
Quality planning defines the standard
Quality planning is where you define the standard. This is where you ask: What does this deliverable need to do? What requirements does it need to meet? What criteria will be used to approve it? Are there any regulations, testing requirements, accessibility needs, safety standards, or performance measures we need to consider?
This is where you decide what “good” looks like before the work gets too far down the road. Without that standard defined early, the team may work hard, complete tasks, and still end up with something that does not meet the actual requirement.
Quality assurance checks the process
Quality assurance is where you confirm and ensure your process is working properly. If the process is messy, unclear, or missing key checkpoints, then the final deliverable is probably going to have problems.
This is where you ask: Are we following the right steps? Are the right people involved? Are reviews happening at the right time? Is the team using the right standards, tools, or templates? Quality assurance is not only about the final output. It is about making sure the process being used to create that output is strong enough to produce the right result.
Quality control checks the work
Quality control is where you check what you are building as you go. This is where you inspect, test, review, validate, or compare the actual work against the requirements and acceptance criteria.
You are asking: Does it meet the standard? Does it do what it is supposed to do? What do we need to do to course correct? And you do not just do this at the very end, because by then it may be too late, too expensive, or too risky to fix the problem properly. You do this during the process, along the way.
A simple way to remember it is this: quality planning defines the standard, quality assurance checks the process, and quality control checks the work. As the project manager, you need all three. Quality management is something you plan for, manage through the process, and confirm before the work is approved.
Related: 6 Common Project Management Challenges and How to Solve Them
Why Project Quality Management Matters
The Impact of Poor Quality on High-Stakes Projects
Why does quality management matter so much on the kinds of projects where a quality management plan is needed? Because on high-stakes projects, when quality is not managed, it can be highly detrimental to the deliverable and to the people or organization relying on it.
How Projects Can Appear Successful While Quality Issues Build
Think back to the bridge example. On paper, a bridge project may look like it is moving along nicely. Materials are being ordered. Tasks are getting done. Updates are going out. People are busy. Everyone feels like progress is happening.
But underneath all of that, if the right inspections are not happening, if the materials are not meeting the required standards, if key engineering requirements are being missed, or if approvals are happening too late, that bridge may be moving toward completion in a way that is not safe, compliant, or ready to use.
The Consequences of Failing to Manage Project Quality
That is when things can go very wrong. Your sponsor or client sees the final result, and they are not happy. The company now has to spend money fixing the problem. Leadership starts asking what happened, why it was not caught in time, and how the project got this far without meeting the standard.
That is when suddenly, you as the project manager are in the hot seat. From the outside, it does not matter that people were busy. It does not matter that the team worked hard. It does not matter that everyone had good intentions. The issue is that the deliverable did not meet the quality standard it was supposed to meet.
Understanding the Cost of Quality in Project Management
This is also why cost of quality is so relevant to project management. According to a 2025 American Society for Quality Excellence Report, only 31% of respondents said they fully understand the impact quality costs have on their organization’s financial performance. That is important, because when organizations do not clearly understand what poor quality is costing them, it becomes much harder to prevent rework, delays, missed requirements, and avoidable fixes later.
For project managers, the point is simple: quality problems are usually cheaper and easier to deal with when they are caught early. If quality is only reviewed at the end, the issue may already have affected the timeline, the budget, the client relationship, or the final deliverable.
That is why quality management is not just a nice-to-have. It protects the project outcome, the client relationship, the company’s money, and your credibility as the project manager.
Related: The ROI of a Strong Project Management System
How To Manage Quality During A Project
The good news is that project quality management does not have to be complicated. But you do have to be intentional about it. Here are some key steps you need to cover when you are managing quality during a project.
Define the requirements
Start by defining the requirements. What is this project actually supposed to deliver? What problem is it solving? What does the client, sponsor, or end user need this to do?
This matters because quality is impossible to manage if you have not defined what the work is expected to achieve. If the requirement is unclear, the standard will be unclear. And if the standard is unclear, the team can work hard and still end up with a deliverable that misses the mark.
Define the acceptance criteria
Next, define the acceptance criteria. What actually needs to be true for this work to be considered complete and successful?
Acceptance criteria help remove guesswork. They give the team, sponsor, client, or end user a clearer way to evaluate whether the deliverable meets the agreed requirement. This is especially important when different stakeholders have different opinions about what “done” or “successful” means. Without clear acceptance criteria, the project manager can end up trying to manage quality against a moving target.
Build in quality checkpoints
You also want to build in quality checkpoints throughout the project. Do not wait until the very end to find out whether the work is meeting the standard. Review it early. Test it early. Ask for feedback early.
Quality checkpoints help you catch problems while there is still time to fix them. They also help the team stay aligned with the requirements, standards, approvals, and expectations that were defined earlier in the project.
Document quality decisions
This part is also key: as the project manager, document quality decisions as they happen. If a requirement changes, write it down. If the acceptance criteria changes, write it down. If a stakeholder approves a different standard, write it down.
Quality is very hard to manage when the target keeps moving and nobody has a record of what changed. Documentation protects the team, the project, the company, and the decision-making process.
These steps do not need to make the project more complicated. They simply make quality visible, so the team knows what standard they are working toward, how that standard will be checked, and what needs to happen before the work can be approved.
Related: How to Create a Project Quality Management Plan
When You Need A Formal Quality Management Plan
Not every project needs the same level of project quality management. Let’s consider a couple of examples.
Let’s say your project is to help launch a new MRI wing in a hospital. That is exactly the kind of project where a formal project quality management plan would make sense.
Why? Because there are serious standards and regulations involved. The equipment has to be installed properly. It has to function the way it is supposed to function. It has to meet healthcare requirements, safety standards, technical specifications, and operational needs. The right people need to inspect it, test it, approve it, and confirm that it is safe and ready to use.
This is not a project where you can get to the end and say, “Well, the room looks good, the equipment arrived, and we opened on time, so we’re done.” Absolutely not.
Quality has to be managed very intentionally from project start to finish, with quality planning to define the standards, quality assurance to check the processes, and quality control to check the work. That is project quality management in action.
When You Can Build Quality Into The Project Plan
Now compare that to something like a basic website launch. Does quality still matter? Of course it does. You still want the website to load properly, the forms to work, the pages to be accurate, and the final site to match what was approved.
But for a lower-risk project like that, you may not need a separate formal project quality management plan. You can capture those quality requirements in your charter or other project documents without creating a separate quality management plan.
That is the key distinction. Project quality management has its place and value, especially when the project is high-risk, highly regulated, or has serious consequences if something is missed. But for smaller or lower-risk projects, you may be able to manage quality by building clear requirements, acceptance criteria, review points, and approvals into your existing project plan and project documents.
A Simple Quality Check Before You Approve Work
Before you approve work, send it to the client, or call something finished, ask yourself this: Does this meet the agreed requirement, and would the stakeholder define this as successful?
That may sound simple, but it is one of the most important questions you can ask near the end of a project or before a major deliverable moves forward. It forces you to pause and compare the work against the requirement, not just the timeline, the task list, or the fact that people are ready to move on. Because in project management, “done” does not simply mean the work was completed. It means the work meets the standard that was agreed to.
If the answer is no, or even “I’m not sure,” then you are not ready to call it done. You may need to go back to the requirement, confirm the acceptance criteria, get the right stakeholder feedback, or document a decision before the work is approved.
As the project manager, this is where your role in protecting quality becomes real. You are not just there to move work across the finish line. You are there to make sure the work actually meets the requirement, aligns with stakeholder expectations, and delivers the outcome the project was meant to achieve before it gets there.
Related: Closing Your Project: The Steps You Need to Take
Project Quality Management Helps Protect The Outcome
Project quality management is not about making everything perfect, and it is not about adding extra paperwork to every single project. It is about knowing when a project needs a more formal approach to quality.
For high-risk or highly regulated projects, quality cannot be vague. It has to be planned, managed, checked, and documented throughout the project.
If you want help building a project management process that supports that, that is exactly what we do inside the SLAY Project Management program. It gives you a practical, step-by-step guide to managing projects, 25+ downloadable templates for key project documents, and a custom-built AI tool to help you fill them out.
But the real value is Ask Adriana, my live weekly coaching where you can bring your real project questions and get guidance from me while you apply what you’re learning, because you should not have to figure all of this out alone.
So if you want to manage your projects with more clarity, confidence, and support, check out SLAY Project Management 2.0
New to running projects? Stop guessing. Get started with the SLAY Project Management program today.
