Measuring Capability Improvement - A Rational Perspective
IBM is in the middle of what may be the world's largest agile transformation, with 35,000 of its own software developers making the move toward agile methods over the past few years. As teams adopt new ways of working, they ask questions like: How do we know how agile we are? How do we know how well the adoption of agile or non-agile practices is going, so we can adjust and take corrective actions as needed? How do we actively involve developers in our change effort? How can we effectively share what worked, and what did not, so we can accelerate adoption? We wanted to give them a simple way to answer those questions. So we considered two common approaches: assessments and metrics. Traditional assessments can help answer the two first questions, but they often backfire when perceived as a "big brother is watching you" approach. Metrics can be powerful, but are often made too complex to be useful. There must be other ways to answer these questions, we decided.
At IBM, we've tried different ways to improve on traditional assessment and metric techniques. We have found that a brief set of questions answered regularly by a small team, leading to one or two initial improvements, followed by more as the comfort level rises, will set organizations on the right path toward overall team health. We have also found that a team doing its own self assessment, rather than being assessed by those outside the team, is highly effective. It gets team members involved, and leads them to higher levels of regular involvement as opposed to the usual lack of interest that sooner or later plagues most change efforts.
To allow our customers to benefit from an approach that has served IBM well in its agile transformation, we are launching a service called the IBM Rational Self Check for Software Teams™, or "Self Check" for short. It can be used with a broad variety of practices, whether agile or less agile, and it can be used to support a broad variety of methods, including RUP, Scrum, XP, OpenUP, and home-grown varieties.
This service is part of a broader initiative, Measured Capability Improvement Framework™ (MCIF), which provides a systematic approach to software excellence, which is supported through a variety of services offerings and products. Self Check, however, can be used as a stand-alone offering, either independently of MCIF or as a first step toward fuller MCIF adoption.
IBM ultimately sees the MCIF programme and initiatives such as Self-Check as providing direct support for those organisations who are striving towards the higher levels of CMMI® certification, especially to assist with the requirements for CMMI® levels 4 and 5. The presentation will provide more information on the MCIF work done to date and its goals for supporting the aims of levels 4 & 5.
Speakers
Dr.Laurence James , UKI Rational Brand Architect IBM
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