CMMI Beneficial / Overhead ?

What is CMMI?

Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) in software engineering and organizational development is a process improvement approach, that wants to provide organizations with the essential elements of effective process improvement. It can be used to guide process improvement across a project, a division, or an entire organization.

The model identifies five levels of process maturity for an organization:

1. Initial (chaotic, ad hoc, heroic) the starting point for use of a new process.
2. Repeatable (project management, process discipline) the process is used repeatedly.
3. Defined (institutionalized) the process is defined/confirmed as a standard business process.
4. Managed (quantified) process management and measurement takes place.
5. Optimising (process improvement) process management includes deliberate process optimization/improvement.

Organizations Accomplished CMMI

LIST OF CMMI RATED COMPANIES IN PAKISTAN

SR #	Company Name	CMMI Level
1	NetSol Technologies (Pvt.) Ltd.	CMMI Level 5
2	NCR Pakistan	CMM Level 5
3	Kalsoft (Pvt.) Ltd.	CMMI Level 3
4	Systems (Pvt.) Ltd.	CMMI Level 3
5	Digital Processing Systems	CMMI Level 3
6	ZTE Pakistan, Software R & D Center	CMMI Level 2
7	Eworx Intl (Pvt.) Ltd.	CMMI Level 2
8	Techlogix Pakistan (Pvt.) Ltd.	CMMI Level 2
9	Si3 - System Innovations (Pvt.) Ltd.	CMMI Level 2
10	Abacus Consulting (Pvt.) Ltd.	CMMI Level 2
11	Descon Information Systems	CMMI Level 2
12	E-Dev Technologies	CMMI Level 2
13	Prosol Technologies	CMMI Level 2
14	Avanza Solutions	CMMI Level 2
15	Shaukat Khanum Cancer Research Hospital (IT DIV)	CMMI Level 2
16	Geopaq Technologies	CMMI Level 2
17	Advanced Computing and Engineering Solutions	CMMI Level 2
18	NADRA	CMMI Level 2
19	Technosoft Solutions (Pvt) Ltd	CMMI Level 2
20	Prislogix	CMMI Level 2
21	CARE (Center for Advanced Research in Engineering)Pvt Ltd	CMMI Level 2

There are 1306 IT companies registered with PSEB among which only 21 companies have successfully achieved any CMMI Maturity level out of which Netsol and NCR are the only two companies operating on CMMI-Level 5 which is the highest maturity level. three at Maturity Level-3 and Sixteen at Level-2. So keeping in mind these statistics CMMI is still an evolving practice in Pakistan.

CMMI being developed considering the westeren working environment where approach to complete work is very different from the local market. Locally there is complete different scenario of awarding a project and then from developing to deployment and maintenance. Most Importantly there are not seprate people for each role in the organization like a single person could be a technical lead on any particular, at the same time same person could be working as a system architect or business analyst, integrator or any other role.Another reason is the time constraint in the local industry as there is always a pressure on the Software developer to implement the solution as soon as possible. Due to un-realistic deadlines resources rather than focusing on processes do everything adhoc.

Reason for organization not focusing on CMMI implementation is not only cost of CMMI consultancy or SCAMPI-Appraisal fee but operating cost also increases as there is a need for specific resource related responsible for processes, configuration management and due to systematic approach several roles shared by an individual are distributed among different people.

Still many organization have achieved different CMMI-Level and operating efficiently as implementation of CMMI offers numerous benefits to an organization.

• A framework for improvement
• To forge a shared vision
• Establishes a common language for talking about the software process
• Supports measurement of the software process by providing a framework for performing reliable and consistent appraisals
• A “Common Sense Engineering” approach to software process improvement.
• A conceptual structure for improving the management and development of software products in a disciplined and consistent way
• Identifies practices for a mature software process and provides examples of the state-of-the-practice
• Tool to help software organizations improve their software processes

Concluding all the things, i think CMMI in Pakistan is mostly considered as a tag for better marketing their product, image building & getting offshore projects rather than real process improvement.