CMMI Guidelines for Design Engineering

Abstract

*This paper presents a structure for defining a design engineering process for the aerospace and defense industry. It was prepared by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics Design Engineering Technical Committee (DETC). The Software Engineering Institute (SEI) Program Manager has invited this paper in order to encourage further contributions by the industry building upon the Capability Maturity Model Integrated (CMMI). CMMI Version 1.2 now explicitly covers hardware development, but contains very little design engineering specific process knowledge. The DETC began working toward a process definition for design engineering in 2003. Through a series of workshops and conference paper sessions, the DETC has developed a needs statement and common life cycle model. The process is defined in the context of CMMI which is a recognized standard for product development process models. The current contributions are contained in annotations for the Technical Solutions Process Area which elaborate on the CMMI practices in terms familiar to design engineers and managers. Substantial work remains to provide similar elaborations on other critical processes such as Requirements Management, Decision Analysis and Configuration Management. The DETC expects to continue the definition of design engineering process elements in these other areas in future working sessions with other industry participants in activities hosted by the SEI.