Process Improvement and CMMI Maturity Level 3: In the UltraSmall

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Process Improvement and CMMI Maturity Level 3 In
the Ultra-Small

• March 13, 2009
• JFR Consulting
• jfryskowski_at_yahoo.com

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Feeling Ancient?

• Ancient Egyptians realized the need for
  middle-management when they buried 401 shabtis
  with their royalty 365 to perform daily tasks,
  and 36 to manage those 365. How many shabtis
  should be buried if there were only 10 days in a
  year?
• This is the story of a 12 person company that
  achieved maturity level 3.

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Table of Contents

• The Organization (company)
• The Defined Process (OSP)
• The Appraisal

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the Organization (Company) 1

• Physically
• 12 person company
• Geographically disparate personnel
• Incorporated 20 October 2000
• Based in Mesa, Arizona
• Software Systems engineering company
• Specializing in software architectures
• Bleeding edge technologies
• Target Domains
• Government
• Commercial

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the Organization (Company) 2

• Values
• Have fun ?
• Control our own time / control our own destiny
• Work with bleeding edge technologies
• Build good products from which others can benefit
• Have fun ?
• Say what youll do, do what you say
• Make sure it makes sense
• Paid for every hour worked
• Insurance / Medical package
• 401k

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the Organization (Company) 3

• Cultural Results
• Communicative, intimate
• Transparency- standing communication events and
  associated tools
• Social amplification- no time or opportunity for
  hidden agendas manipulating the system or hiding
  out
• As well, if you are not of an open and
  cooperative spirit, and not a top performer, you
  will never work for this company to begin with

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Making Lemonade

• Personnel conditions detrimental to success
• Geographically distributed
• Working out of homes
• Primarily responsible for their own time
• Very limited face-to-face contact

Lemons

• Personnel conditions- keys to success
• Geographically distributed
• Working out of homes
• Primarily responsible for their own time
• Very limited face-to-face contact

Lemonade
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Communication- Virtual Office

• Use of Bridgit and Skype key tools
• Asynchronous sending files over Skype. Also
  standard external and secure internal email.
• Semi-Asynchronous Skype chat, notes pop up on
  your screen, like someone popping by your office.
  Even men can multi-task. Can see when people are
  on or off-line.
• Synchronous
• Skype VTC, used occasionally for 1 on 1 meetings
• Skype telecom, a teleconference used extensively
• With the addition of Bridgit (where participants
  can view the discussion leaders desktop, and do
  whiteboarding), you are virtually in the
  conference room during the discussion.

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Extreme Tipping Point

• In typical organizations there can be various
  levels of buy in, and still the entire
  organization is level 3.
• In the ultra-small environment this is not
  possible. Either everyone is a liar, diluted, or
  actually doing it there is no in between.

try not do, or do not, there is no try - Yoda
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Because you have personality

• Little Rascals- Darla to Alfalfa
• GM and CTO set the tone of open and frank
• They are the process leads, trash pickup

• Tasks well outside the job description
• The task of giving employees reasons to love
  working for the company is taken seriously

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Good Process Genes

• OR- They cheated, they have good DNA- Process
  background of company principals
• Both are process wonks
• Both had significant roles in defining and
  establishing software processes for a level 5
  company
• Both managed Quality Assurance/Design teams
• Both are trained assessors (CMM / CMMI)
• Both participated in multiple assessments
  (including Level 5)

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Table of Contents

• The Organization (company)
• The Defined Process (OSP)
• The Appraisal

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OSP Approach

• Basic precepts
• Maximize the work that can be accomplished by
  focusing people on the artifacts that need to be
  generated
• Minimize the number of things that must be
  touched to perform an activity
• The process is embedded in the templates, forms,
  and checklists

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OSP Architecture
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OSP Breakdown

• Policies
• Provide the authorization
• 4 Manuals
• Describe what to do
• Grouping of topics is based on the CMMI
• Builds on the millions invested in the SEI models
• Handbooks
• Describe some of what to do
• Capture how to do it
• Templates / forms / additional materials
• Provide the bulk of the record
• Facilitate execution (more of how to do it)
• Provide consistency and support deployment of
  improvements
• Include instructions

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Reviews Milestone

• Milestone Reviews
• Project Kick-off (PK)
• Software Requirements Review (SRR)
• System Design Review (SDR)
• Integration Readiness Review (IRR)
• System Test Readiness Review (STRR)
• Release Readiness Review (RRR)
• Post Mortem
• Characteristics
• May overlap customer reviews (in addition to OR
  pre-empt)
• SRR, SDR, and IRR are not gating, but must be
  completed successfully to exit the phase
• STRR or RRR must completed successfully prior to
  delivery

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Reviews Internal

• Most Engineering artifacts are reviewed
• Requirements
• Use Cases
• DAR
• Vignettes
• Code
• Test Plan
• Test Cases
• Test report
• SVD
• Activity record containing list of participants,
  review status, action items, decisions, and
  checklist

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Checklists

• Highlight / ensure
• Participation
• Preparation
• Compliance to key elements of applicable
  processes
• Associated with
• Reviews (Internal / Milestone)
• Checklists customized to the artifact or activity
• Meetings
• Senior Staff
• Program Management Reviews
• CCBs

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Templates and Forms

• Majority of defined artifacts have supporting
  templates, activities have associated templates
  or forms
• Provide the bulk of the record
• Facilitate execution
• Provide consistency, support deployment of
  improvements
• Normally contain guidance on how to use them
  (limited training materials)

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Table of Contents

• The Organization (company)
• The Defined Process (OSP)
• The Appraisal

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Institutionalization

• a moot point or instantaneous you be the judge
• The GM only allows process changes that are
  common sense and truly help his company perform.
• As such process updates are instantaneous, why
  wouldnt the company want to adopt them?
• Example the GM agreed to a priority column for
  the risk list template it was drafted,
  reviewed, updated, rolled out, and adopted by
  projects in one week.

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Quandary Becomes Reality

• This small, intimate setting poses some
  challenges for some appraisal guidance topics.
• One of which is that no superior-subordinate
  relationships can exists in the appraisal room
  within the team and during interviews.
• This simply cannot be achieved the appraisal
  team consisted of the lead, a process consultant,
  the GM and CTO (who are the process principals).
• The QA lead/lead SE took care of the sponsor
  role, there are simply no other choices.

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Interesting Process Math

• GP 2.3 GP 3.1
• FlySpray (CM tool) Manual describes the CM tool
  which also contains some process definition.
• OSPPDPGP 2.2
• The organizations standard process is the
  projects defined process, which also constitutes
  some of the planned activities that all projects
  must follow.
• GP 2.8 GP 2.10
• The weekly senior staff meeting includes detailed
  project status, it is a working meeting, not just
  a reporting meeting.

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Interesting Appraisal Algebra
Transitive Property of Equality The following
property If a b and b c, then a c.
Applying this property to services
appraisals If CMMI Manuals/Templates/Handboo
ks and Manuals/Templates/Handbooks
Project Activities then CMMI
Project Activities
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Interesting Appraisal Algebra
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Thank You