A QA audit you can act on in fourteen working days
QAble runs a focused, time-boxed QA audit: six-dimension scorecard, risk register, quick-win plan, and leadership readout, designed for CTOs, heads of QA, and operating partners who need a defendable view of quality before the next budget, deal, or release decision.
QA audit shapes we run:
Engineering teams that rely on QAble
Why a 14-day audit beats six months of debate
Most QA improvement programmes stall at the conversation about what to do first. A focused audit replaces that conversation with a written scorecard, a risk register, and a plan leadership can fund inside a single quarter.
An audit replaces the stalled conversation
Most QA improvement programmes stall at the conversation about what to do first. A focused audit replaces that conversation with a written scorecard, a risk register, and a plan leadership can fund inside a single quarter.
Six dimensions, assessed the same way every time
Strategy, process, automation, tooling, coverage, and reporting: the same six dimensions on every engagement so findings are comparable across teams, products, and prior audits, and the scorecard reads the same way to every audience.
The output is the decision, not the starting point
The audit is intentionally not a long consulting engagement. It is the diagnostic that lets one cleanly happen, or lets you fund and execute the quick wins yourself. Everything else flows from the scorecard on day 14.
Choose a QA audit when:
Signals that quality needs a scorecard, not a longer debate
These are the patterns that most often trigger an audit: each one represents a quality decision being made without the data to make it well.
Without a documented QA baseline, leaders face
leadership wants a defendable view of QA in weeks, not quarters
Visibilityquality conversations stall on opinion because no one has the underlying scorecard
Governancean acquisition target needs a quality assessment before the deal closes
Diligencea vendor's QA reporting reads well on paper but has never been independently checked
Vendor riskthe next budget cycle will fund quality decisions, but only if the case is documented
BudgetThe QAble Solution
A 14-day audit replaces opinion with a written scorecard, a risk register, and a plan leadership can fund: everything else flows from the readout on day 14.
Time-boxed delivery
Fourteen working days from charter to leadership readout, no scope creep.
Six-dimension scope
Strategy, process, automation, tooling, coverage, and reporting assessed every time.
Evidence-led findings
Findings pulled from tooling and pipelines, not from self-reporting.
Leadership-ready output
Scorecard, risk register, and 12-month plan sized for boards and deal teams.
Six dimensions every QA audit covers
The same six dimensions on every engagement: strategy, process, automation, tooling, coverage, and reporting, so findings are comparable across teams, products, and prior audits.
Strategy
Is there a written test strategy? Does it match how the team actually ships? Are release acceptance gates documented? Are quality KPIs defined?
Process
How does work move from feature-ready to release sign-off? Where does the process stall? How is severity decided, and by whom?
Automation
Where does automation live, who owns it, and how trustworthy is it? Is the suite layered correctly, or pushed to the UI by default?
Tooling
Is the toolchain fit for purpose, or accumulated by historical preference? Are licences justified? Is the integration story coherent?
Coverage
Is coverage placed where the risk is? Are critical paths protected? Are integration boundaries tested? What is documented versus assumed?
Reporting
Can engineering, product, and leadership read quality status from the same data? Are KPIs trended over time? Are reports actually read?
The QAble 14-day QA audit method
Every audit follows the same five-phase schedule: discovery, deep dive, scoring, plan, and readout, so leadership knows exactly what is happening on which day, and the engagement cannot drift past its time-box.
Discovery
Stakeholder interviews, access provisioning, current-state inventory.
Deep dive
Six-dimension assessment: strategy, process, automation, tooling, coverage, reporting.
Scoring
Maturity scorecard, risk register, quick-win identification, prioritisation.
Plan
12-month investment roadmap and leadership readout deck.
Readout
Live readout to leadership, written report handed over, Q&A.
Inside a QAble audit engagement
A six-stage rhythm inside the 14-day window: charter, evidence gathering, synthesis, scoring, planning, and readout.
Charter and access
Document the audit scope, sponsor, and exclusions. Provision read-only access to tooling and pipelines. Schedule stakeholder interviews across engineering, product, and operations.
Evidence gathering
Pull suite metrics, pipeline telemetry, defect data, test management exports, and documentation: building an evidence pack that is independent of self-reporting.
Six-dimension synthesis
Synthesise evidence and interview signal into a per-dimension picture: strategy, process, automation, tooling, coverage, and reporting, with documented rationale per finding.
Score and risk-weight
Score each dimension against the QA Maturity Model, register findings as risks with severity and impact, and surface the quick wins worth funding inside the next 90 days.
12-month plan
Build a phased 12-month investment plan with sequencing, owners, KPIs, and dependencies, sized to leadership decisions, not to consulting renewal.
Leadership readout
Live readout to leadership on day 14: scorecard, risks, quick wins, and plan handed over in writing, with a follow-up advisory window for clarifying questions.
Frameworks and instruments we audit against
Every audit is anchored in the same set of frameworks: vendor-neutral, evidence-led, and aligned with the language audit committees and leadership already use.
QAble Maturity Model
Six-dimension assessment framework, levels 1 to 5
Risk-based audit lens
Findings prioritised by likelihood and business impact
Defect economics reference
Cost-of-quality framework that ties findings to investment cases
Tooling evaluation matrix
Vendor-neutral scoring across cost, fit, and operational risk
Pipeline forensics toolkit
CI/CD telemetry, suite stability, and runtime analysis
Charter and reporting templates
Standardised audit artefacts that auditors and boards already understand
What every audit produces
Four artefacts handed over on day 14: written, structured, and ready for engineering, product, audit, and board audiences without translation.
Scorecard
Six-dimension maturity scorecard with level-by-level rationale, benchmark against peers, and visual readout for leadership.
Risk register
Risk-weighted findings list with severity and impact rating, evidence and reproduction notes, and remediation effort estimate.
Quick wins
Quick-win shortlist with effort versus impact matrix, first-90-day plan, and owner and dependency map.
Investment plan
12-month investment plan with phased rollout sequencing, KPI targets and review cadence, and next-step engagement options.
Findings QA audits consistently surface
These are the patterns most often present at the start of an audit. None are unusual: most cost more than the audit itself, and the value of the audit is making them visible enough to fix.
Strategy on paper, not in practice
A written test strategy exists, but sprint behaviour ignores it: coverage choices, severity calls, and release gates are decided ad hoc.
UI-heavy automation pyramid
Automation pushed almost entirely to the UI layer: slow, flaky, and the first to fail when the pipeline gets serious. Lower-layer coverage missing entirely.
Coverage without a critical-path inventory
Test coverage volume is high but no one can name the ten user journeys whose failure would block a release: testing optimises for breadth, not risk concentration.
Defect severity negotiation
Severity ratings bargained between product and engineering before release, instead of decided against a documented rubric: high-impact defects silently downgraded.
Tooling sprawl and overlap
Multiple test management, automation, and reporting tools doing similar work: licences accumulating, integration drifting, and team time spent on tooling not testing.
Reports no one reads
Sprint and release reports produced on schedule but not read: engineering, product, and leadership look at different numbers, and quality conversations default to opinion.
Who commissions a QA audit
Audits are commissioned by stakeholders whose decisions need a defendable, third-party view, and whose timelines do not allow for a long consulting engagement.
CTOs and heads of engineering
Need a defendable view of QA capability and a written investment case that survives the next budget cycle.
Operating partners and investors
Need an objective, vendor-neutral assessment of a portfolio company's QA capability for diligence, post-acquisition integration, or value-creation planning.
Heads of QA
Need an independent third-party scorecard to anchor the next conversation with engineering, product, and finance, and to differentiate facts from internal opinion.
Audit and risk committees
Need an independent, evidence-based audit that aligns with the language and rigour the committee already expects from financial and security audits.
Ways to work with QAble
Three audit shapes covering the standard 14-day engagement, a focused release readiness audit, and a pre-acquisition QA diligence pack.
14 working days
14-day QA audit
A focused six-dimension audit producing a maturity scorecard, risk register, quick-win plan, and 12-month investment roadmap, handed over in a leadership readout on day 14.
Deliverables
Best for
5 to 7 working days
Release readiness audit
A focused audit ahead of a single major release: coverage, regression posture, defect register, performance smoke, and a documented release recommendation memo.
Deliverables
Best for
2 to 4 weeks
Pre-acquisition QA diligence
An independent QA diligence engagement ahead of a deal: assessing target capability, technical debt, automation footprint, and post-deal integration risk.
Deliverables
Best for
Why choose QAble
QAble brings a time-boxed, evidence-led audit methodology that produces leadership-ready output in fourteen working days, with no vendor relationships influencing the findings.
QAble QA audit expertise
Questions buyers actually ask.
Direct answers to the questions we get on the first advisor call.
How is a 14-day QA audit different from a full QA consulting engagement?
A QA audit is a focused diagnostic: it produces a scorecard, risk register, quick-win plan, and 12-month roadmap inside a fixed time-box. A full QA consulting engagement goes further, writing the documented test strategy, designing the operating model, recommending tooling, and planning the rollout. Many engagements start with the audit to decide whether the broader consulting engagement is the right next step.
What access does QAble need during the audit?
Read-only access to tooling: Jira, test management, CI/CD pipelines, automation suite, and reporting dashboards, plus calendar access for stakeholder interviews. We do not require write access at any point, and access is provisioned least-privilege under the audit charter and revoked at engagement close.
Can the audit be delivered remotely?
Yes, most audits run remotely with stakeholder interviews scheduled across two to three time zones. On-site time is offered where the engagement sponsor wants in-person interviews or facilitated workshops. The cost and timing are documented in the audit charter, not added retrospectively.
How is the audit priced?
A 14-day QA audit is a fixed-price engagement scoped to organisation size, product surface area, and stakeholder complexity. Release readiness audits and pre-acquisition diligence engagements are also fixed-price, scoped at engagement charter. Pricing covers the full team and includes the readout session and a one-week follow-up advisory window.
What happens after the readout?
The audit ends with the leadership readout on day 14. From that point, the engagement either closes with the written report, scorecard, and plan in your hands, or transitions into a follow-up engagement: implementation of quick wins, a strategic consulting project, or a managed engagement. There is no obligation to commit to follow-on work.
Will the audit findings be shared back with our team or only with the sponsor?
That is a sponsor decision documented in the audit charter. By default, the leadership readout is delivered to the engagement sponsor. Many sponsors then share findings with the broader engineering and QA team. Where the audit is intended for board, audit committee, or deal audiences, the report is routed accordingly and can be redacted for internal sharing.
A QA assessment leadership can act on
QAble runs a focused, time-boxed QA audit in fourteen working days: scorecard, risk register, quick-win plan, and leadership readout, fixed price, no scope creep.
QA audit from charter to leadership readout
QAble runs a focused, time-boxed QA audit: six-dimension scorecard, risk register, quick-win plan, and leadership readout in fourteen working days.
Talk to QA Advisor
Direct access to QAble's audit principals.
Response within 24 hours