Real Process Improvement Using the CMMI

Whoa! There s an assertion that s going to make a lot of people unhappy . That s too bad; it s true and here s why:

• It is the organizational unit that gets appraised, not the temporary experts or big-bat pinch hitters. By the definition of institutionalization, the organizational unit must own the change, must own the CMMI-based processes. You can no more outsource process improvement and take the maturity level claim than you can hire expert interviewees from outside the organization to sit in on the appraisal interviews, although I suspect that has also been tried. Smart appraisal teams can figure out where the processes really live.

• Having tools that create all the necessary artifacts and process assets doesn t prove people are actually doing the work.

What an organization can do is prudently subcontract expertise or purchase tools which are cost-effective in building and implementing processes, but which also ensure the knowledge and technology is transferred into the organization to the extent that it becomes indigenous.