Author: Tracy Ragan

There has been much discussion about the many benefits of "moving testing left," and our experts will tell you that doing so by having automated testing (Quality Gates) integrated into your build pipelines is a critical success factor for the rapid build and deploy process automation necessary to truly reap the benefits of Agile. That said, there are significant costs to the organization for implementing automated Quality Gates, which must be weighed carefully and optimized to retain positive Return On Investment (ROI) for the implementation.

Quality Gates are based upon the stage-gate system initially presented in 1986 and originally applied to quality control processes in the automotive industry. The concept is simple: you have tests, or gates, that validate each step in your overall process. If the step passes the test, the process proceeds to the next step. Upon failure, the process is stopped and corrective actions are initiated to identify and resolve the issue. Cost savings are increased if defects are found and corrected earlier in the process. Note: It is not necessary for the gates to be serial, and in fact you will likely need to run parallel processes to remain within time constraints for the overall process (more on this idea later).