Patching Defects at the End? You’re Already Too Late
Let’s be honest: if you’re finding problems during UAT, staging, or—worse still—after release, you’ve already lost. Every defect that slips through to the latest stages of your process costs you more time, more money, and more reputation than it ever should. And here’s the kicker: most of these issues could have been caught much, much earlier.
I’ve seen this play out time and again. Teams firefighting at the end, scrambling to patch up what should have been prevented in the first place. It’s a cycle that drains morale and erodes trust, both within the team and with your stakeholders. The truth is, patching defects at the end is simply too late.
Why Do Defects Cost More the Later You Find Them?
- Time: Fixing a bug in production often means unpicking a tangled web of dependencies, rolling back changes, and retesting everything. It’s never just a quick fix.
- Money: Every hour spent on late-stage fixes is an hour not spent delivering value. Multiply that by the number of people involved, and the costs skyrocket.
- Reputation: Nothing undermines confidence faster than a production issue. Customers remember outages and broken features far longer than they remember smooth releases.
The Solution? Shift Left
This is where the concept of “shifting left” comes in. Instead of waiting for problems to surface at the end, we move our quality checks, validation, and security measures as early as possible in the development process.
Here’s how we help teams make this shift:
- Strengthen the Definition of Done: We don’t just tick boxes. We embed quality checks right into the heart of our process, ensuring that every increment meets a higher standard before it moves forward.
- Early Validation: Automated tests, code reviews, and static analysis aren’t afterthoughts—they’re the first line of defence. We validate during deployment, not after.
- Security Built-In: Security isn’t a gate at the end; it’s woven into the pipeline. Vulnerabilities are caught before they ever see the light of day.
- Telemetry Ready Before Go-Live: We don’t wait for users to report issues. With telemetry in place from the start, we can see what’s happening in real time and respond proactively.
The Benefits of Shifting Left
When you move quality to the front, you stop firefighting at the back. The benefits are immediate and tangible:
- Save Time: Early detection means faster, simpler fixes.
- Save Face: Fewer production surprises means more trust from your customers and stakeholders.
- Deliver with Confidence: Each increment is something you can actually trust, not just hope will work.
My Advice: Don’t Wait for the Fire Alarm
If you’re tired of production surprises, it’s time to shift left. Catch issues earlier, embed quality into every step, and transform your delivery from a mad dash at the end to a steady, reliable flow.
Let’s stop patching at the end and start building quality in from the very beginning. Your team—and your customers—will thank you.
