Getting started
How to set up a QA/QC program on a project
A quality program isn't a binder you produce for the owner and never open again. It's the system that decides what gets inspected, against what, by whom, and how you prove it happened. Set it up before the first trade mobilizes and it runs quietly in the background; bolt it on halfway through the job and you spend the rest of the project catching up.
For a project manager, QC manager, or builder standing up quality control on a new project — or trying to make a program that exists on paper actually work in the field.
Step by step
Separate assurance from control
Quality assurance is the system — the plan, procedures, and audits that give confidence the work will meet requirements. Quality control is the hands-on inspecting and testing of the actual work. Decide who owns each; conflating them is why programs drift into box-checking.
Write the quality control plan
Document the scope, the standards and specs that govern it, the roles, the inspection approach, and how nonconformances get handled. The QC plan is the spine everything else hangs on — keep it specific to this project, not a generic template with the job name swapped in.
Break the job into definable features of work
You can't inspect "the building." List the discrete, separately inspectable features — footings, underslab plumbing, framing, roofing, and so on — each with its own trade, submittals, and acceptance criteria. This list is what the whole program controls against.
Assign roles and authority
Name who inspects, who can accept work, who can stop it, and who signs off a correction. A program with no one holding stop-work authority is a suggestion, not a control.
Build the three-phase control into each feature
For every definable feature, plan a preparatory review before work starts, an initial inspection of the first run to set the standard, and follow-up inspections as it's built out. This rhythm catches problems on paper, then in the first ten feet, before they multiply.
Set the inspection and test plan and its hold points
Lay out the required inspections and tests in sequence, mark the hold and witness points, and name who releases each. This is where the program meets the schedule — the super plans the work around the stops that can't be skipped.
Define how nonconformances and corrections flow
Decide how a defect gets logged, dispositioned, corrected, and verified, and where root-cause analysis kicks in for repeat problems. A program is judged by how it closes findings, not how it finds them.
Make the record the default, not extra work
Set up the checklists, photo requirements, and daily reporting so documenting the inspection is part of doing it. If proof is a separate chore at the end of the day, it won't get done.
What gets missed
- Copying a QC plan from the last job and never tailoring it to this project's scope, specs, or team.
- Letting the person who builds the work also be the only one who accepts it, so there's no independent check.
- Naming inspections but no acceptance criteria, so "pass" means whatever the inspector felt that day.
- Skipping the preparatory phase because the crew is ready to start — then eating the rework when a bad submittal shows up in place.
- Treating the plan as a submittal to satisfy the owner rather than a tool the field actually uses.
Owner's QA vs. your QC
On many projects the owner runs their own quality assurance — a program manager, a third-party inspector, or a commissioning agent who audits your work and verifies you're doing what your plan says. That doesn't replace your quality control; it sits on top of it. Your job is to run a control program tight enough that the owner's assurance finds nothing you didn't already catch and record yourself.
Questions people ask
- What's the minimum a QA/QC program needs to have?
- At a minimum: a written QC plan tied to this project, a list of definable features of work with acceptance criteria, named roles with inspection and stop-work authority, an inspection and test plan with hold points, and a documented way to log and close nonconformances.
- Who should own quality on a small builder's crew?
- On a small team the superintendent often runs control day to day, but someone independent of the production pressure needs the authority to accept or reject work. Even a one-person QC role works if that person's sign-off is real and not overruled by the schedule.
Checklists that make this a one-tap job
Free, field-ready checklists, each with the photo every item needs before it can be submitted.
Related guides
- How to write an inspection checklist that holds upWrite an inspection checklist crews actually use: tie every item to a real acceptance criterion, make each line a clear pass or fail, and build the photo proof into it.
- How to run a construction inspectionRun a construction inspection end to end: know what you're inspecting against, walk the work in order, document what you see, and disposition every finding.
- How to write an inspection and test planBuild an inspection and test plan that lists every check and test for a feature, names who releases each, and marks the hold and witness points.
Reading the steps is one thing. Proving you walked them is the job.
RTI holds the submit button until every mandatory item is answered and the photos are attached, then chains the record so it can be proven untouched later.