What’s the Difference Between Verification and Validation?
| by Chris Anderson | ||||
If you’re tasked with preparing a project management plan, one of the elements of that plan is a test plan. Your test plan should include three distinct tests that you’ll need to perform: verification, validation, and acceptance.
Verification testing ensures that the expressed user requirements, gathered in the Project Initiation phase, have been met in the Project Execution phase. One way to do this is to produce a user requirements matrix or checklist and indicate how you would test for each requirement. For example, if the product is required to weigh no more than 15 kg. (about 33 lbs.), the test could be, ”Weigh the object – does it weigh 15 kg. or less?”, and note “yes” or “no” on the matrix or checklist.
Validation testing ensures that any implied requirement has been met. It usually occurs in the Project Monitoring and Control phase of project management. Using the above product as an example, you ask the customer, “Why must it be ‘no more than 15 kg.’?” One answer is, “It must be easy to lift by hand.” You could validate that requirement by having twenty different people lift the object and asking each one, “Was the object easily to lift?” If 90% of them said it was easy, you could conclude that the object meets the requirement.
We call this an implied requirement because the answer to “Why?” was not stated: the ”easy to lift” requirement was not clearly specified or defined. Another way to validate an implied requirement is to produce some test objects, or prototypes, and have the customer evaluate them in the field.
Next comes Acceptance Testing, the official approval of your deliverables by the customer. Your customer may accept your verification and validation test results and accept the object. The customer may also have their own “easy lifting expert” on hand and use them for the acceptance test. Acceptance testing often occurs at the end of the Project Monitoring and Control phase, but it can also take place at the beginning of the Project Review and Close phase.
So what is the difference? Verification is a test performed to ensure stated requirements have been met, Validation is a test performed to ensure implied requirements have been met, and Acceptance Testing ensures the customer has received what they asked for.
Categories:
ISO Quality Standards
Tags:
acceptance • acceptance testing • project management • project plan • project planning • test plan • validate • validation • verification • verify
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Originally published in 2009 by Bizmanualz, Inc. under the title What’s the Difference Between Verification and Validation?. All rights reserved. Reproduction permitted with attribution only. www.bizmanualz.com
5 Responses to “What’s the Difference Between Verification and Validation?”
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September 28th, 2009 at 8:31 pm
You have reversed the units of measurement referenced in your article on the difference between verification and validation. 15kg is equal to 33lbs. 33kg is actually equal to 72.6lbs.
Regards
Geoff
September 29th, 2009 at 8:33 am
Geoff, thank you for pointing that out. 1 kilogram = approx. 2.2 pounds, not the reverse.
September 29th, 2009 at 11:23 am
The product weight in the example is corrected. Thank you for your help.
April 20th, 2011 at 1:45 am
Plz tell me, verification means QA and validation means QC. Whether it is correct or not?
April 23rd, 2011 at 12:40 am
QA stands for Quality Assurance, which is focused on the process. QA uses some type of process measurements to determine process capability in order to prevent defects from occurring. So, QA is associated with validation. We validate processes for capability to produce the product. But, another type of validation is related to customer requirements. Are you building the right product? When we validate a product we are ensuring the product fits the customers intended use or environment. This is the example used in the article, to understand why the product needed to weigh 15kg.
QC stands for Quality Control, which is focused on the product. QC uses some type of inspection methods to ensure the product is built right in order to detect defects. Are you building the product right? When we verify a product we are ensuring the product fits the customer’s specifications. In our example we looked at a product that weighed 15kg. This could be verified by measuring the product’s weight.
So QA should be focused on validation and QC on verification. That being said, some companies use both terms to mean quality and therefore, the terms get mixed up in practice. For example, a company may only have a Quality Assurance department that performs all quality activities.