Active Risk Management is also a key component of successful software projects. As Tom Gilb says, if you do not actively attack the risks on your project, they will actively attack you. A Quality Assurance Plan is the software project's first aid kit. The first priority in first aid is avoiding doing anything that will require you to use the first aid kit. But even the most careful hikers sometimes get hurt, and in such a case a first aid kit is essential.
Many software projects perform the moral equivalent of leaving the first aid kit in the car.
By the time problems become too obvious to ignore, much of the damage has been done. Defects have been inserted into the product and not corrected during requirements and design activities. All that can be done at that point is to correct the defects at great cost during construction and system testing. A good quality assurance plan will orient the project toward detecting defects early, close to the point of insertion and not allow defects to infect work later in the project. For longer hikes, hikers have to file an itinerary.