With this artic­le we begin a series of publi­ca­ti­ons in which we reve­al some secrets of what a care­er path in Code­lab can look like. Let’s start with the depart­ment that is mista­ken­ly per­cei­ved as very calm. Not­hing more mis­lea­ding, just take a look.

As Qua­li­ty Team mem­bers we are often asked what we actual­ly do and why we love our job.

We would like to take this oppor­tu­ni­ty to pre­sent our perspective.

JOB TITLE
Qua­li­ty Part­ner / Qua­li­ty Specialist
DIVI­SI­ON / DEPARTMENT
Qua­li­ty
WORKING HOURS
❌ Part time
✔️ Full time
ESSEN­TI­AL DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES
Essen­ti­al Duties and Respon­si­bi­li­ties:
What we do:
- we pro­vi­de expert sup­port in qua­li­ty rela­ted aspects
- we imple­ment qua­li­ty goals defi­ned and appro­ved by the manage­ment board
- we imple­ment busi­ness rele­vant norms / sys­tems / stan­dards
- we co-crea­te pro­ces­ses, pro­ce­du­res, and ins­truc­tions
- we sup­port the imple­men­ta­ti­on and main­ten­an­ce of Auto­mo­ti­ve SPI­CE
- we are refe­rees hel­ping in pro­cess‘ and stan­dards‘ com­pli­ance
- we help to deve­lop an orga­niza­ti­on (based on inde­pen­dent / objec­ti­ve obser­va­tions)
- we help pro­ject teams under­stand qua­li­ty requi­re­ments and work accor­din­gly (e.g. Auto­mo­ti­ve SPI­CE)
- we sup­port pro­jects in fin­ding and using tech­ni­ques or methods nee­ded to sol­ve pro­blems
- we sup­port the imple­men­ta­ti­on of impro­ve­ment and repair pro­grams
- we faci­li­ta­te work­shops
- we con­duct qua­li­ty-rela­ted trai­nings
- we care about employees‘ awa­re­ness of qua­li­ty requi­re­ments

What we don’t do:
- we are not Pro­ces­ses Poli­ce
- we do not ana­ly­se source code
- we do not review source code or tech­ni­cal work pro­ducts
- we are not tes­ters
- we are not a Bar Charts Gene­ra­ting Team (or so we think 😊 )
- we do not crea­te pro­ces­ses for pro­ces­ses sake only
- we are not pro­fes­sio­nal­ly invol­ved in drin­king cof­fee 😊. This is not our core business.
EDU­CA­TI­ON AND/OR WORK EXPE­RI­ENCE REQUIREMENTS
Useful pro­fes­sio­nal back­ground:
- tech­ni­cal in the field of soft­ware deve­lo­p­ment
- know­ledge about Pro­ject Manage­ment metho­do­lo­gies, espe­ci­al­ly – valuable when sup­port­ed by own expe­ri­ence
- Jack of all trades 😊
- psy­cho­lo­gist or may­be even pre­school tea­cher 😊

Useful com­pe­tence:
On pur­po­se we don’t use the word “requi­red”. The com­pe­tence nee­ded for this role may be lear­ned on the job. Some of the skills you will be acquain­ted with are, for exam­p­le:
- norms and stan­dards like ISO 9001 (Qua­li­ty Manage­ment), ISO 14001 (Envi­ron­men­tal Manage­ment), ISO 27001 (Infor­ma­ti­on Safe­ty), ISO 21434 (Cyber­se­cu­ri­ty)
- Auto­mo­ti­ve SPI­CE model
- faci­li­ta­ti­on skills
- audi­ting skills

Fur­ther deve­lo­p­ment pro­s­pects:
Based on our and our for­mer co-workers expe­ri­ence we may assu­re you that gai­ning qua­li­ty expe­ri­ence may equip you with com­pe­ten­ci­es for posi­ti­ons such as:
- Pro­ject Mana­ger
- Scrum Mas­ter
- Team Mana­ger
- Mana­ging Direc­tor (yes, we know one or two with Qua­li­ty expe­ri­ence 😊)
- Exter­nal Busi­ness Con­sul­tant

The­re is a small chan­ce that, like our Head of Qua­li­ty, you will get addic­ted to Qua­li­ty and beco­me Qua­li­ty Part­ner for life (also known as Dead End 😊).
PHY­SI­CAL REQUIREMENTS
A gre­at sen­se of humour
SKILLS AND ABILITIES
- to faci­li­ta­te work­shop ses­si­ons and mee­tings
- to influence others wit­hout having the aut­ho­ri­ty
- to resol­ve con­flicts
- to con­trol the crowd 😊
- to lis­ten and hear
- to sepa­ra­te cri­ti­cism from impro­ve­ment pro­po­sal
- not to take the mon­key (acc. to the wis­dom from “The One Minu­te Mana­ger meets the Mon­key” book)
- to absorb count­less amounts of cof­fee (during mee­tings and workshops) 😊
ADDI­TIO­NAL INFORMATION
Qua­li­ty role advan­ta­ges:
- You may play smart and say how others should work
- You may theo­ri­ze
- You may work out solu­ti­ons in a group of experts
-You can always get to know a new norm or stan­dard
- You will have many oppor­tu­ni­ties of trai­ning and deve­lo­p­ment during working hours
- Major chall­enge in this role:
- How to get the job done so that others think they came up with the idea 😊

Qua­li­ty role dis­ad­van­ta­ges:
the­re is none 😊
INSPI­RA­TIO­NAL QUOTE
Our role in the orga­niza­ti­on can be sum­ma­ri­zed by para­phra­sing the words of Lao Tzu:

„A qua­li­ty spe­cia­list / part­ner is best when peo­p­le bare­ly know he exists when his work is done, his aim ful­fil­led, they will say: we did it ourselves“
Ver­si­onDateAut­horReview­ed byAppro­ved byChan­ge history
1.012.04.2021Anna Michel-Makuch, Ada Olszews­ka,
Krzy­sz­tof Musiał		Jan Tecker SiegelJan Zabo­row­skiInspi­ring sto­ry about care­er in Qua­li­ty Team @ Codelab