Understanding CMMI with bird-eye view.

This is the fourth of a series of How to be Software Quality Professional, and we will look two major frameworks that are widely implemented by thousands of organization. As a Software Quality newbie you don’t need to be certified in CMMI or ISO, you only need to know the basics of these standards and process improvement framework. The subsequent posts will talk over in greater detail.

As the Software Industry is growing around the globe and companies are willing to remain intact with their clientele by providing quality software solutions to them. By this willingness there comes an idea of Standards and Best Practices to win the customers or at least sustain them. In order to lower the threats of organization losing their customers some international organization produces some standards and best practices which are widely accepted and practiced around the world in every software development organization to a minimum to maximum extent. This post will describe high level overview of some common quality standards which help in implementing robust Quality Management Systems – QMS

CMMI

CMMI –Capability Maturity Model Integration, one of the robust and widely implemented process improvement standards developed by Software Engineering Institute, Carnegie Mellon University. This process improvement framework provides a five step ladder to achieve the unmatched maturity in software development industry and most of the time CMMI becomes the competitive advantage for the organizations in question. CMMI Levels and their definitions are as follows.

            Level 5:            Continuous Improvement OR Optimized

            Level 4:            Quantitatively Manage

            Level 3:            Defined

            Level 2:            Managed

            Level 1:            Initial OR Performed

In order to achieve any of the above level any organization must implement the corresponding process areas also known as Key Process Areas (KPAs). For instance, If an organization willing to achieve Level 2 maturity it should implement all the applicable process areas correspond to Level 2 (i.e. Managed). All of the levels have some specific goals and generic goals. Specific Goals are related to each process area while Generic Goals are related to individual Maturity Level.

For example, Project Planning is one of the process area belongs to Level 2; it has 3 Specific Goals namely:

1. Establish estimates
2. Develop a Project Plan
3. Obtain commitment to the plan

The generic goals of each maturity levels are as follows:

1. Achieve Specific Goals
2. Institutionalize a managed process
3. Institutionalize a defined process
4. Institutionalize a quantitatively managed process
5. Institutionalize an optimizing process

Mark C. Paulk, Ph.D (http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~mcp/) has rightly defined the need of process improvement and common misunderstanding about process framework implementation he say, “Much of the software crisis is self-inflicted, as when a CIO says, “I would rather have it wrong than have it late, we can always fix it later”.

Implementing processes standards doesn’t make you late on the project; it takes you well on the project with estimated cost, effort and quality.

Working With Passion

With Valentine’s Day just passed, love and passion were and are still in the air. Unfortunately, many people spend more than half their waking hours doing work for which they feel no passion, living a work life gloom and misery.

The passion has to be spontaneous and cannot be forced is an unfortunate myth in our culture; people think you can either love your job or not. However, in reality, passion can be created by tweaking the activities and pursuits you engage in. All it takes is a bit of patience and an open mind.

The process of seeking what you love and turning it into a successful career is possible.

Here are some ways to fire your enthusiasm and passion:

• Be curious

Curiosity is the basis of passion; keep things interesting by taking fresh perspective and a novel approach to your work.

• Break the frustration barrier

You can do this by tweaking the challenge. For example, if an activity is too difficult for you to become enthusiastic about it, worry less about results and concentrate on experimenting and building up skills.

• Remove the chains

Feeling forced into an activity is a sure way to kill passion. Resisting the flow of work and the given tasks will only make you more miserable. Keep In mind that there are consequences for not taking action and remember, you always have a choice.

• Focus on the present

When you find a task overwhelming, don not stress about what needs to be done next month or next year, focus on the immediate action needed. Focus on each step of the marathon, not on how many miles you have left.

No one can be in ‘a state of passion’ all the time. Inevitably, there will be boring and uninteresting routine administrative tasks that you dread. The key is to recognize when you are in one of these bored phases and figure out how to improve the situation and get those passion juices flowing again.

How to get most out of the feedback session?

Empowering Feedback

One of the hardest challenges you may face as a manager is giving constructive feedback to your employees. However, if you follow some simple guidelines, you can make feedback sessions useful rather than stressful.

Effective feedback comprises five key elements:

1. Deliver feedback immediately

Instant feedback will allow the employee to modify his/her behavior immediately. If there was an incident that prompted the feedback, it will fresh in everyone’s mind.

2. Praise and then provide suggestions for improvement

It is critical to begin each feedback session by praising the employee’s accomplishments. Then, make a conscious effort to give constructive feedback and suggestions that will help your employee(s) improve their quality of work, rather than just criticizing their work.

3. Be specific and make positive statements

Specific feedback is more likely to resonate with employees instead of vague allusions or accusations. Instead of saying, “You make too many mistakes” or “Costs are too high” rephrase your statements to say, “I would like you to reduce your error rate,” or “Let’s aim to reduce costs by 25%”.

4. Focus on Improvement

Remember to focus on Improvement instead of just criticizing. Talk about how you would like to see things done instead of focusing on the things you don’t like. Let your employees know that you have confidence in their ability to improve.

5. Invite employee response

After you deliver feedback, invite the employee to respond. Listen to what he/she has to say. There may be circumstances you were unaware of. You may need to investigate resource problems or process issues. You can learn a lot if you give the employee a chance to talk openly.

  

Remember, effective feedback can build employee confidence and help improve quality of output. When appropriate feedback is delivered at the right time, employees have timely and specific information about how to change the way they work. If done in the right manner, feedback can be empowering rather than demoralizing.