"I tracked, over a one year period, every single defect that made it into production that I had to correct. I did this at the inspiration of a book on continuous improvement I read."
It was "Improving Software Quality: An Insider's Guide to TQM" from Wiley. A lot of people fear the idea of formalized process, thinking that it is going to saddle them down with the useless baggage of unneeded red tape and forms. It's actually quite the opposite. It's all about keeping processes as simple as possible, even simplifying existing processes.