Gluu Glossary

PDCA cycle

The PDCA cycle (Plan-Do-Check-Act) is a four-step framework for testing a change, learning from the result, and improving a process in a structured, repeatable way rather than through one-off fixes.

Popularized by W. Edwards Deming, PDCA turns improvement into a habit: plan what you’ll change and why, do it on a small scale, check whether the result matched the goal, then act – standardize it if it worked, or adjust and run the cycle again if it didn’t. That loop is what makes it iterative rather than a one-time project.

It’s widely used across quality management and Lean because it reduces the risk of big changes based on assumptions – a team tests on a small scale first, so a bad idea costs a week, not a quarter.