Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
6.16 Using the CMMI Framework as a Process Roadmap
at NANO
In developing this guidance, I was sensitive to the work they had already
done and the existing political risks. I advised them not to update all their
processes all at once. If existing process assets met the intent of certain CMMI
practices, we would leave the asset in its legacy form and location and create
additional documentation clearly identifying its purpose. I referred to this
additional documentation as a process “roadmap” that could help new peo-
ple understand the existing process assets at NANO.
CAUTION
Beware of efforts that could lead to just copying CMMI practices, rather
than developing your own.
NANO decided to use the CMMI framework as the roadmap for their
process assets. At first I resisted this approach for fear it could be perceived
that we were just copying practices from the CMMI model. I didn't want
people at NANO to get the wrong impression, thinking we were forcing
everyone in the organization to learn the CMMI model. However, given
where this organization was I eventually agreed because I felt the advan-
tages of this approach outweighed the disadvantages.
The advantages of using the CMMI Process Areas and practices as a top-level
structure were that it made it easier for us to track our progress in moving
toward CMMI level 3. It would also be beneficial when explaining processes
at NANO to a formal CMMI appraisal team.
I did, however, caution NANO personnel that by taking this approach we
would need to teach the people in the organization that the CMMI was
merely a framework to define and help manage the NANO processes. We
were not using the CMMI practices as NANO's practices.
This distinction is important and fundamental to the CMMI model. That is,
the CMMI is not a set of dictated practices. It is a model from which we rea-
son about our processes. At NANO, we used the CMMI to
reason
about their
processes, and to
help manage
and evolve the process assets.
An example of using the CMMI model as a roadmap to help organizations
with existing legacy process assets is provided here.
