[Dear Readers,
for the past several months, our good friend Pat O’Toole, CMMI expert and
seasoned consultant, has been collaborating with us on a monthly series of
CMMI-related posts, "Just the FAQs." Our goal with these posts is to
provide answers to the most frequently asked questions about the CMMI, SCAMPI,
engineering strategy and software process improvement. This month Jeff reveals whether SCAMPI appraisals are too expensive. Take it away, Jeff! ~ the CMMI Appraiser]
I love a
good game of “bunchball.”
I mean, who doesn’t? You know, a dozen little Pele’s
chasing a soccer ball down the field trying to score a goal and win one for the
team. Finally, one fast kid breaks out
for the big kick, and ’’yippeeee!” the hero saves the day with that single goal
of the game. Not bad, but hardly the stuff of league championships.
Meanwhile, far removed from the action, there is always
one kid who decides not to chase glory that day but to stay back, just in
case the ball were to make its way back down to their end of the
field. Call it good coaching, training, or just pure talent, but that kid is
going places. He plays his position, and he plays to win.
At the last few CMMI events I have attended there has
been a lot of talk about how expensive appraisals have become, and that SOMETHING MUST BE DONE! Stories are
told of the thousands of hours of work required to “prepare” for an appraisal, and
that, in some cases, the cost far exceeds the benefits. If that’s true, then they’re
right – we should do something.
But are some of these organizations just playing bunchball
while attempting to win the league championship? Is their difficulty in achieving
“goals” a signal that the game is too complex, or is it a signal of their level of capability?
I’m
a visual thinker and anyone that has worked with me knows how much I love to draw
on a whiteboard. Pictures help me think through an idea that I may not otherwise
be able to convey using only words. My artwork won’t be fetching any top bids at
Sothebeys, but my absolute favorite drawing is of a cliff with a set of (poorly
drawn) stick figures.
One
set of stick figures is clawing their way up the cliff, hanging off the edge by
their fingernails while yelling “whooo hoooo, we MADE Level Three!” The other set is standing ON TOP of the cliff,
lifting barbells over their head, stretching, and quietly saying to themselves “we
ARE Level Three.” Which appraisal do you think was “too expensive?”
The
antidote to expensive appraisals is for organizations to actually be performing at the target level before they even start working on them! If a team is spending
too much time and money locating evidence of process performance, working on PIIDs,
and creating “artifacts” to “fill the gaps,” (the expensive part) then perhaps they’re
not quite ready for the appraisal that the boss wants to have by Tuesday. That doesn’t
mean they’re not doing great things, it just means they are not quite ready for
the league championship.
If
a bunchball coach were tasked by a school principal to “win the league championship
before the end of fiscal year 2014,” what would he do? Well, he might:
- bring in consultants to tell them how they won the last game and teach them that
one technique they used
- hire ringers to kick the ball, QA the team, and serve in important roles (like goalie
for instance)
- have the consultant follow each player around and question every move he makes,
“writing him up” in red‐pen on a clipboard if he or she does something wrong
- lobby the league’s governing body to use referees that are known to be friendly
to their team
You
get the idea.
The
team might actually win some games, but after it was over they would just be the
same bunchball team.
On
the other hand, a wiser (and braver) coach might:
- advise the principal that his request was not possible, but you COULD have a winning
season this year if we:
- trained and practiced with the team regularly
- coached the players to play positions, thereby transforming
the team from a bunchball team to a soccer team
- brought in some expert help to assist the team in improving
their game, not just advice on winning the league championship
- evaluated each player for their skills and put them in the
right positions
- made sure we were getting honest feedback from unbiased
referees
In
other words, we’ll win when we’re ready to win. And we’ll do it by being a great
team.
And
that’s the point. Appraisals, like league championships, should be challenging but
they don’t have to be really expensive. The CMMI is an international benchmark for
great performance and if we want the “stamp” to mean something, we should aspire
keep them that way. However, an organization that is ML3 will have
little trouble proving that they are, and one that isn’t will have tremendous difficulty
(and have tremendous costs) doing the same.
“But
what about PIIDs ("Process Implementation Indicator Documents") and document inventories?” asked a new Lead Appraiser at the conference. “Don’t they take a lot of time and effort to complete?”
Hmmmm….
Do they?
PIIDs
and document inventories are interesting indicators of appraisal readiness, and
might even be useful sometimes. But an ML2‐worthy organization will demonstrate
strong, positive control over their work products (“evidence”) through solid Configuration
Management and Data Management behaviors. These behaviors make locating artifacts
pretty easy, reducing (or eliminating) the overhead associated with an inventory
altogether. And THAT makes appraisals a whole lot less costly.
As
I’m fond of saying to prospective clients:
“it’s cheaper to be great than it is to fake it!”
©Copyright
2014: Process Assessment, Consulting & Training and Broadsword Solutions
“Just
the FAQs” is written/edited by Pat O’Toole and Jeff Dalton. Please contact the authors at
pact.otoole@att.net and jeff@broadswordsolutions.com to suggest enhancements to their answers,
or to provide an alternative response to the question posed. New questions are also
welcomed!
