Most developers agree that quality of software is important, and not an afterthought. However, quality is usually one of the first things to get axed when budgets (time, money, ...) start to run out.

Many developers probably have tried to explain to management why you should not skim on investing is quality, but have failed to convince them.

Instead of cutting features from the next release, quality investments are reduced. Investments like:

• unit tests
• refactoring code
• design documentation
• etc.

I could also try to explain why you should invest in creating high quality software. But I will probably not do a good job either. At least, not better than Martin Fowler already did.

In his recent article Is High Quality Software Worth the Cost? Martin Fowler properly explains why you should invest in creating high quality software. He also discusses that the cost of creating high quality software is actually negative. It saves you time and money in the end.

It is an article management should also be able to understand. Next time you need to explain to management why you need to spend time on quality improvements. Hand them this article, or in fact, do it right now. If they are not convinced, you should consider that a red flag.