Omitting quality assurance practices in software development such as inspection often results in software deficiencies that have to be addressed later. To better understand the factors and processes involved in omission, the authors conducted a systematic literature review. Their initial search yielded 4833 papers. Following three rounds of evaluation, they selected 19 papers for an in-depth analysis. Figure 3 presents a framework that characterizes the influencing factors found in these 19 papers into five categories (business goals, customer requirements, project constraints, technical issues, and psychological factors) on three levels (market, organizational, and individual).

Table 8 provides descriptions of the influencing factors and reasons for omission found in the 19 selected papers. For example: under business goals, nine papers reported that quality practices were omitted to reduce the time to market. Under customer requirements, five papers reported that quality practices were omitted because of requirement changes. Under project constraints, 11 papers reported that quality practices were omitted because of lack of time. Under technical issues, two papers reported that quality practices were omitted because of technology evolution. Under psychological factors, five papers reported that quality practices were omitted because of a lack of commitment to development processes.

Almost half of the 19 selected papers are more than ten years old. Also, several empirical studies on technical debt have been published since January 2015, the month when the authors conducted their literature search. Nevertheless, the authors do succeed in describing the phenomenon of omission, and this paper is recommended to the software engineering community.