Capability Maturity Model Level Research Articles

SPECIAL FEATURE: KNOW YOUR COLLEAGUES—ROBERT DAMELIO AND CARL BINDER

SPECIAL FEATURE: KNOW YOUR COLLEAGUES—ROBERT DAMELIO AND CARL BINDER

Team Characteristics Moderating Effect on Software Project Completion Time

This study highlights the importance of human factors in software projects developed in capability maturity model (CMM) level software development environments. While software process initiatives help streamline the development process, people factors can influence project outcomes. Using data procured from the International Software Benchmarking Standard Group, the effects of team turnover, team heterogeneity, and team member work experience were examined as they moderate project elapsed time for software projects developed in CMM level software development environments. Team member work experience and team functional heterogeneity were found to have significant moderating effects on project elapsed time to completion. The turnover of members on the team did not have a significant moderating effect on project elapsed time to completion. Previous studies have examined the benefits of raising the level of maturity as identified by the capability maturity model. This study identifies the importance of human factors as they moderate project success.

A METHODOLOGY FOR QUANTITATIVELY MANAGING THE CODING PHASE OF SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT PROCESS

Many organizations use information technology to gain competitive advantage. As a result the demand for software products increased tremendously and the information technology industry has grown rapidly. As demand increased, the competition among information technology firms also increased. The information technology companies can no longer survive by just delivering the products but has to ensure the quality of products as well as the products have to be delivered on time without cost or effort overrun. Hence it is imperative for information technology companies to quantitatively manage the software development process. In fact quantitative project management is one of the requirements for achieving higher levels of capability maturity model. Lots of research has been carried out in the past to develop models to quantitatively manage the software development process. Most of these studies focussed on methodologies to quantitatively manage only one of the performance characteristics namely quality or schedule or effort. But to deliver the good quality software on time within the budgeted cost, all the critical performance parameters of software development process namely quality, productivity, effort, cost, etc need to be managed simultaneously. Many of these characteristics are related to each other and many cases the correlation is such that improving the performance of one characteristic will adversely affect the performance of other performance characteristics. Moreover all these performance characteristics need to be managed by controlling a common set of control parameters. Hence it is required to identify the best values of the control parameters which would simultaneously optimise all the performance characteristics. In this paper, the authors suggest a methodology to simultaneously optimize the performance characteristics of coding phase of the software development process. The same methodology can be used to simultaneously manage the different performance characteristics at other phases as well as the overall software development process. In this study the authors have taken two performance characteristics namely coding productivity and quality (measured in terms of defect density). The approach is to develop separate process performance models to estimate the coding productivity and defect density using the process parameters namely programmer skill, reviewer skill, review type, preparation time, module complexity and code review rate. Then the values of these process parameters which would simultaneously optimize the coding productivity and defect density are identified using Taguchi’s loss function. The proposed approach has been implemented on seven software development projects and the results are very encouraging. Moreover the optimum obtained by the proposed method is much better than that of optimizing the coding productivity and defect density separately. The project managers also agreed that a common setting for process parameters which would optimize both performance characteristics simultaneously is much easier to implement than methods for managing different performance characteristics independently.

Application and development of the people capability maturity model level of an organisation

In the knowledge economy era, a human resources system is crucial for corporate management. Questions on how to fully present workforce capability, how to integrate organisational systems and practices, and how to develop workforce capability and achieve organisational goals have yet to be answered. The people capability maturity model (P-CMM) is based on the concept of process and presents five maturity levels to guide an organisation and progressively improve the workforce capability of the organisation. The purpose of this study was to apply the people capability maturity level to the organisational management of a case company and developed strategies to enhance the people capability maturity level of the case company. This qualitative study included document analysis and semi-structured interviews to determine the goals of organisational ability and management performance. Finally, the researchers proposed a feasible method for improving the people capability maturity level of the case company to the third level defined by the P-CMM and the establishment of key process areas.

The impact of software process consistency on residual defects

AbstractResidual defects at the time of delivery are an important concern for safety critical software systems. Suppliers and customers are urged to get evidence for what they can do to reduce residual defects. Thus, it is meaningful to learn from historical data concerning the kinds of defects that have escaped from the existing quality assurance approaches and the factors that lead to the residual defects. A total of 3747 defects from 70 software systems developed by 29 Chinese aviation organizations were collected from acceptance tests during the last 5 years. For all these organizations, 38 domain experts from the industry assessed the process consistency to the standard built in the framework of Capability Maturity Model (CMM). Results demonstrate that the process improvement in the range of high consistency is effective in reducing total defects, as well as the minor and severe defects. The high consistency adoption of the practices in CMM Level 1 to Level 3 is more effective in reducing minor defects than severe defects. Causal analysis was performed to investigate the underlying mechanisms. Results reveal that individual cognitive failures cause 87% of severe defects. More approaches to help software developers manage their interior cognitive process are needed for improving software quality in the future. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

A Case Study of CMM Deployment at SBC Communications

Recently, SBC Communications (SBC) initiated a project to improve the software development processes of its Information Technology (IT) group. The project was named EXPRESS (Excellence in Process for Enterprise Software Solutions), and the goal was to transform the IT function to a Capability Maturity Model (CMM) Level 3 operation. SBC’s management hopes that achieving CMM level 3 will result in improved delivery of IT services and products through greater efficiency by having a standardized means to initiate and perform IT work. This paper provides a case study that describes the EXPRESS project. This will include comparing SBC’s former project management strategy with the goals of the new CMM strategy and how CMM Level 3 and EXPRESS are being implemented at SBC. Several lessons learned that resulted from the rollout of the EXPRESS project are discussed as well.

Is employee attitudes and perceptions at varying levels of software process maturity

Taking a control theory view of software process innovation, we tested prevalent beliefs regarding software process maturity and Information Systems employee attitudes and perceptions by surveying 736 IS professionals in 10 organizations at varying levels of the CMM (capability maturity model). Although anecdotal reports and the scant empirical studies to date suggest job attitudes and perceptions are more positive for employees in organizations at higher levels of software process maturity, we found evidence of a more complex picture. While our data supported expectations that role conflict and perceived work overload were lower for IS professionals in organizations at a level of maturity where software process behavioral controls are implemented, other results were not fully in line with prevalent beliefs. Most notably, IS workers reported significantly lower professional efficacy and lower job satisfaction in organizations at CMM Level 3, where behavioral controls are the dominant form of formal control, than in organizations at Level 1, which is relatively free of formal controls. Some anticipated positive attitudes and perceptions surfaced in organizations at the highest rungs of software process maturity (CMM Levels 4/5), where the established behavioral controls are supplemented by substantial outcome controls, as IS professionals reported lower role ambiguity and higher job satisfaction than did their counterparts in organizations at CMM Level 3.

IS Employee Attitudes and Perceptions at Varying Levels of Software Process Maturity

Taking a control theory view of software process innovation, we tested prevalent beliefs regarding software process maturity and Information Systems employee attitudes and perceptions by surveying 736 IS professionals in 10 organizations at varying levels of the CMM (capability maturity model). Although anecdotal reports and the scant empirical studies to date suggest job attitudes and perceptions are more positive for employees in organizations at higher levels of software process maturity, we found evidence of a more complex picture. While our data supported expectations that role conflict and perceived work overload were lower for IS professionals in organizations at a level of maturity where software process behavioral controls are implemented, other results were not fully in line with prevalent beliefs. Most notably, IS workers reported significantly lower professional efficacy and lower job satisfaction in organizations at CMM Level 3, where behavioral controls are the dominant form of formal control, than in organizations at Level 1, which is relatively free of formal controls. Some anticipated positive attitudes and perceptions surfaced in organizations at the highest rungs of software process maturity (CMM Levels 4/5), where the established behavioral controls are supplemented by substantial outcome controls, as IS professionals reported lower role ambiguity and higher job satisfaction than did their counterparts in organizations at CMM Level 3.

Developing the framework of level diagnosis for green data center

The data center has become an increasingly important part of most business operations. An increasing demand for computation has led to increasing industry energy consumption. Therefore, higher-than-normal rates of energy efficiency have become a core issue in the life cycle of data center. In this paper, we proposed the framework of level diagnosis for green data centre that can be used to diagnose the levels of capability maturity model. This framework contains the 5 key areas such as construction, air-conditioning, electricity, information technology, organization and indicators that can be applied as basic level diagnosis guide for green data center.

조직성과에 미치는 SPI 영향요인에 관한 연구 :조직 성숙도의 조절효과 관점에서

Software Process Improvement(SPI) has been a challenging issue to software organizations. The factors affecting SPI were analysed for improving software development processes. Numerous studies suggested influencing factors, and assessment models were utilized for software improvement. This research suggested that SPI factors affecting on an organizational performance may vary according to the CMM(Capability Maturity Model) level. The moderating effects of organizational maturity level between the SPI factors and the organizational performance were empirically tested. This research found that all six SPI factors except for the resistance to change affected the organizational performance. The moderating effects of management support, goal alliances, participation, and effect analyses were empirically supported. These results can provide several implications or a practical guidance to academic and industry professionals.

Software Effort, Quality, and Cycle Time: A Study of CMM Level 5 Projects

The Capability Maturity Model (CMM) has become a popular methodology for improving software development processes with the goal of developing high-quality software within budget and planned cycle time. Prior research literature, while not exclusively focusing on CMM level 5 projects, has identified a host of factors as determinants of software development effort, quality, and cycle time. In this study, we focus exclusively on CMM level 5 projects from multiple organizations to study the impacts of highly mature processes on effort, quality, and cycle time. Using a linear regression model based on data collected from 37 CMM level 5 projects of four organizations, we find that high levels of process maturity, as indicated by CMM level 5 rating, reduce the effects of most factors that were previously believed to impact software development effort, quality, and cycle time. The only factor found to be significant in determining effort, cycle time, and quality was software size. On the average, the developed models predicted effort and cycle time around 12 percent and defects to about 49 percent of the actuals, across organizations. Overall, the results in this paper indicate that some of the biggest rewards from high levels of process maturity come from the reduction in variance of software development outcomes that were caused by factors other than software size

Targets, drivers and metrics in software process improvement: Results of a survey in a multinational organization

This paper reports on a survey amongst software groups in a multinational organization. The survey was initiated by the Software Process Improvement (SPI) Steering Committee of Philips, a committee that monitors the status and quality of software process improvement in the global organization. The paper presents and discusses improvement targets, improvement drivers, and metrics, and the degree to that they are being recognized in the software groups. The improvement targets `increase predictability' and `reduce defects' are being recognized as specifically important, joined for Capability Maturity Model (CMM) level three groups by `increase productivity' and `reduce lead time'. The set of improvement drivers that was used in the survey appears to be valid. Three improvement drivers that were rated highest were: `commitment of engineering management', `commitment of development staff, and `sense of urgency'. Finally, it could be seen that metrics activity, both in size and in quality, increases significantly for CMM level three groups. However, no consensus regarding what metrics should be used can be seen.

Software quality and IS project performance improvements from software development process maturity and IS implementation strategies

The capability maturity model (CMM) is part of several software process improvement (SPI), six sigma, and total quality management (TQM) initiatives in organizations. SPI and continuous quality improvements are associated with better return on investment (ROI) for organizations. The purpose of this empirical research is to study the impact of the CMM on certain critical factors in information systems implementation strategy, software quality and software project performance. Our findings are that CMM levels do associate with IS implementation strategies and higher CMM levels relate to higher software quality and project performance. We also conclude that information systems (IS) implementation strategies have a significant impact on software quality and project performance. While certain IS implementation strategies – executive commitment and prototyping – have a significant impact on both software quality and project performance, training had a significant effect only on software quality and simplicity has a significant effect only on project performance.

Managing and Organizing Concurrent Processes According to the CMM Levels

Research for reduced lead time and cost in concurrent process development (CPD) becomes crucial in new work organizations. Today, the concurrent processes involve more and more activities and work groups which must be efficiently coordinated. In this article, the authors propose a framework for structuring concurrent activities in order to improve the global performance (lead time, workload, risks, etc.). Many research works aim at proposing methods for management and control of concurrent development activities, but these methods are often ‘isolated’ and specific to an activity. There is no global solution that covers the entire development process and the set of related management and organizational activities. In this article, the authors used the SEI’s (Software Engineering Institute) CMM (Capability Maturity Model) as a guideline to define an approach for the management and the control of a set of concurrent development activities. According to the CMM levels, the proposed approach is decomposed into four improvement steps that direct the organization’s focus to manage its organizational development process. The first step applies basic project management methods to decompose and to schedule a process into several work groups. The second step addresses activities such as controlling the size of the obtained work groups, and characterizing each actor in a group. In the third step, a model based on the work transformation matrix (WTM) is proposed for the performance estimation of an organization. The last level aims at continually optimizing the organizational processes. For this purpose, models for sequential and parallel execution of processes are proposed and compared.

Methodological issues in a CMM Level 4 implementation

AbstractThe Capability Maturity Model (CMM) developed by the Software Engineering Institute is an improvement paradigm. It provides a framework for assessing the maturity of software processes on a five‐level scale and guidelines that help improve software process and artifact quality. Moving toward CMM Level 4 and Level 5 is a very demanding task even for large software companies already accustomed to the CMM and ISO certifications. It requires, for example, quality monitoring, control, feedback, and process optimization. In fact, going beyond CMM Level 3 requires a radical change in the way projects are carried out and managed. It involves quantitative and statistical techniques to control software processes and quality, and it entails substantial changes in the way the organization approaches software life cycle activities.In this article, we describe the process changes, adaptation, integration, and tailoring, and we report lessons learned while preparing an Italian solution centre of EDS for the Level 4 internal assessment. The solution centre has about 350 people and carries out about 40 software development and maintenance projects each year. We describe how Level 4 Key Process Areas have been implemented, building a methodological framework, which leverages both existing available methodologies and practices already in place (e.g. derived form ISO compliance). We discuss how methodologies have been adapted to the company's internal and external situations and what are the underlining assumptions for the methodology adaptation. Furthermore, we discuss cultural and organizational changes required to obtain a CMM Level 4 certification. The steps and the process improvement we have carried out, and the challenges we have faced were most likely those with the highest risk and cost‐driving factor common to all organizations aiming at achieving CMM Level 4. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

An Insider's view of CMM Level 5

Many organizations in the software industry have adopted the Software Engineering Institute's Capability Maturity Model (CMM). However, only recently have enough organizations reached Level 5 to enable a coherent discussion of Level 5 issues. To facilitate such a discussion, the editors of Quality Time solicited questions about what it means to be a Level 5 organization from academic, industry, and government representatives.

Identifying extensions required by rup (rational unified process) to comply with CMM (capability maturity model) levels 2 and 3

This paper describes an assessment of the rational unified process (RUP) based on the capability maturity model (CMM). For each key practice (KP) identified in each key process area (KPA) of CMM levels 2 and 3, the Rational Unified Process was assessed to determine whether it satisfied the KP or not. For each KPA, the percentage of the key practices supported was calculated, and the results were tabulated. The report includes considerations about the coverage of each key process area, describing the highlights of the RUP regarding its support for CMM levels 2 and 3, and suggests where an organization using it will need to complement it to conform to CMM. The assessment resulted in the elaboration of proposals to enhance the RUP in order to satisfy the key process areas of CMM. Some of these are briefly described in this article.

An Evaluation of the Need for Software Process Improvement by Analytic Hierarchy Process

Software engineering organizations now tend to improve their processes according to such standards as CMM (Capability Maturity Model), a process evaluation model, in addition to improving their software products. This is because it is believed that mature engineering processes can bring high-quality products within the original schedule. It is reported, however, that the result of the improvement activities is strongly related with engineer satisfaction for the process, that is, effective improvement can be expected on the phases where engineers have not been satisfied with. This paper proposes a method to evaluate how much engineers feel the current engineering process needs to be improved, with Descriptive AHP (Descriptive Analytic Hierarchy Process), one of decision making tools. Our method, based on the idea that the necessity evaluation can be related with engineers satisfaction, evaluates four engineering phases under six criteria defined at CMM Level 2, determining which phases should be improved first. As a result of having system engineers use this method, we found that quality assurance activities in the manufacturing and examination phases need to be superior for improvement to other phases.

Attaining Level 5 in CMM process maturity

In November 1998, the CSC SEAS Center became the sixth organization in the world ever to have attained the rating of Capability Maturity Model (CMM) CMM Level 5.This achievement was the culmination of an aggressive process improvement initiative which began in mid-1994. The Software Engineering Institute (SEI) CMM(Reference 1) is a worldwide recognized benchmark for software organizations, used to assess the maturity and quality of an organization's software process. The SEAS Center has twice reaffirmed its high maturity performance by independent assessments. Since the start of the focused improvement program in 1994, detailed records of cost, impacts, activities and overall approach have been captured, tracked, and analyzed so that other CSC programs could capitalize on the SEAS efforts and experiences. This paper is a direct result of the collection and analysis of that process experience data.After a brief overview of the SEAS organization and its aggressive process improvement approach, this paper describes the coordination of improvement initiatives, the role of goals and industry benchmarks, the organizational strategy, and the use of key documents in measuring improvements. Additional discussion covers the investment and benefits of an improvement program. Finally, based on the SEAS experience, the paper presents seven key recommendations for any organization planning to initiate a process improvement program.

Producing reliable software: an experiment

A customer of high assurance software recently sponsored a software engineering experiment in which a small real-time software system was developed concurrently by two popular software development methodologies. One company specialized in the state-of-the-practice waterfall method rated at a Capability Maturity Model Level 4. A second developer employed his mathematically based formal method with automatic code generation. As specified in separate contracts, C++ code plus development documentation and process and product metrics (errors) were to be delivered. Both companies were given identical functional specifications and agreed to a generous and equal cost, schedule, and explicit functional reliability objectives. At conclusion of the experiment an independent third party determined through extensive statistical testing that neither methodology was able to meet the user's reliability objectives within cost and schedule constraints. The metrics collected revealed the strengths and weaknesses of each methodology and why they were not able to reach customer reliability objectives. This paper will explore the specification for the system under development, the two development processes, the products and metrics captured during development, the analysis tools and testing techniques used by the third party, and the results of a reliability and process analysis.