This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
How Can CMMI Benefit You?
Today, CMMI is an application of the principles introduced almost a century ago to achieve an enduring cycle of process improvement. The value of this process improvement approach has been confirmed over time. Organizations have experienced increased productivity and quality, improved cycle time, and more accurate and predictable schedules and budgets [Gibson 2006].
The benefits of CMMI have been published for years and will continue to be published in the future. (See the SEI website for more information about performance results.)
The cost of CMMI adoption is highly variable depending on many factors (e.g., organization size, culture, structure, current processes). Regardless of the investment, history demonstrates a respectable return on investment (ROI).
Example returns on investment at various organizations using CMMI-DEV include those shown in Table 1.1.
Table 1.1. Benefits Resulting from the Use of CMMI-DEV
|
ROI |
Focus of Process Improvement Program |
Organization |
|
5:1 |
Quality activities |
Accenture |
|
13:1 |
Defects avoided per hour spent in training and defect prevention |
Northrop Grumman |
|
2:1 |
Overall process improvement over three years |
Siemens Information Systems Ltd., India |
Since the CMMI-SVC model was first released only two short years ago (2009), data on the results of its use are not yet available. We will be collecting ROI data as organizations adopt the CMMISVC model and experience the benefits.
See the CMMI website (www.sei.cmu.edu/cmmi/) for the latest information about CMMI adoption, including presentations by those who have adopted CMMI and want to share how they did it.
A Capability Maturity Model (CMM), including CMMI, is a simplified representation of the world. CMMs contain the essential elements of effective processes. These elements are based on the concepts developed by Crosby, Deming, Juran, and Humphrey.
In the 1930s, Walter Shewhart began work in process improvement with his principles of statistical quality control [Shewhart 1931]. These principles were refined by W. Edwards Deming [Deming 1986], Phillip Crosby [Crosby 1979], and Joseph Juran [Juran 1988].
Watts Humphrey, Ron Radice, and others extended these principles further and began applying them to software in their work at IBM and the SEI [Humphrey 1989]. Humphrey's book, Managing the Software Process, provides a description of the basic principles and concepts on which many of the CMMs are based.
The SEI has taken the process management premise, "the quality of a system or product is highly influenced by the quality of the process used to develop and maintain it," and defined CMMs that embody this premise. The belief in this premise is seen worldwide in quality movements, as evidenced by the ISO/IEC body of standards.
CMMs focus on improving processes in an organization. They contain the essential elements of effective processes for one or more disciplines and describe an evolutionary improvement path from ad hoc, immature processes to disciplined, mature processes with improved quality and effectiveness.
Like other CMMs, CMMI models provide guidance to use when developing processes. CMMI models are not processes or process descriptions. The actual processes used in an organization depend on many factors, including application domains and organization structure and size. In particular, the process areas of a CMMI model typically do not map one to one with the processes used in your organization.
The SEI created the first CMM designed for software organizations and published it in a book, The Capability Maturity Model: Guidelines for Improving the Software Process [SEI 1995].
Today, CMMI is an application of the principles introduced almost a century ago to this never-ending cycle of process improvement. The value of this process improvement approach has been confirmed over time. Organizations have experienced increased productivity and quality, improved cycle time, and more accurate and predictable schedules and budgets [Gibson 2006].