Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) is a process level improvement training and appraisal program. It is administered by the CMMI Institute, a subsidiary of ISACA, developed at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU). CMMI was developed by a group from industry, government, and the Software Engineering Institute (SEI) at CMU. CMU claims CMMI can be used to guide process improvements across a project, division, or an entire organization.
The CMMI is designed to help improve performance by providing businesses with everything they need to consistently develop better products and services. But the CMMI is more than a process model; it’s also a behavioural model. Businesses can use the CMMI to tackle the logistics of improving performance by developing measurable benchmarks, but CMMI can also help create a structure for encouraging productive and efficient behaviour throughout the organization.
The CMMI model breaks down organizational maturity into five levels. For businesses that embrace CMMI, the goal is to raise the organization to Level 5, the “optimizing” maturity level. Once businesses reach this level, they aren’t done with the CMMI. Instead, they focus on maintenance and regular improvements.
?CMMI’s Maturity Levels are:
- ?Maturity Level 0 – Incomplete: At this stage work “may or may not get completed.” Goals have not been established at this point and processes are only partly formed or do not meet the organizational needs.
- Maturity Level 1 – Initial: Processes are viewed as unpredictable and reactive. At this stage, “work gets completed but it’s often delayed and over budget.” This is the worst stage a business can find itself in — an unpredictable environment that increases risk and inefficiency.
- Maturity Level 2 – Managed: There’s a level of project management achieved. Projects are “planned, performed, measured and controlled” at this level, but there are still a lot of issues to address.
- Maturity Level 3 – Defined: At this stage, organizations are more proactive than reactive. There’s a set of “organization-wide standards” to “provide guidance across projects, programs and portfolios.” Businesses understand their shortcomings, how to address them and what the goal is for improvement.
- Maturity Level 4 – Quantitatively managed: This stage is more measured and controlled. The organization is working off quantitative data to determine predictable processes that align with stakeholder needs. The business is ahead of risks, with more data-driven insight into process deficiencies.
- Maturity Level 5 – Optimizing: Here, an organization’s processes are stable and flexible. At this final stage, an organization will be in a constant state of improving and responding to changes or other opportunities. The organization is stable, which allows for more “agility and innovation,” in a predictable environment.
?Once organizations hit Levels 4 and 5, they are considered high maturity, where they are “continuously evolving, adapting and growing to meet the needs of stakeholders and customers.” That is the goal of the CMMI: To create reliable environments where products, services, and departments are proactive, efficient, and productive.
The CMMI also has capability levels that are used to appraise an organization’s performance and process improvement as it applies to an individual practice area outlined in the CMMI model. It can help bring structure to process and performance improvement and each level builds on the last, like the maturity levels for appraising an organization.
?The capability levels are:
- ?Capability Level 0 – Incomplete: Inconsistent performance and an “incomplete approach to meeting the intent of the practice area.”
- Capability Level 1 – Initial: The phase where organizations start to address performance issues in a specific practice area, but there is not a complete set of practices in place.
- Capability Level 2 – Managed: Progress is starting to show and there is a full set of practices in place that specifically address improvement in the practice area.
- Capability Level 3 – Defined: There’s a focus on achieving project and organizational performance objectives and there are clear organizational standards in place for addressing projects in that practice area.
The CMMI contains 22 process areas indicating the aspects of product development that are to be covered by company processes. The CMMI Process Areas (PAs) can be grouped into the following four categories to understand their interactions and links with one another regardless of their defined levels: Process Management, Project Management, Engineering and Support:
- ?Project Planning - The purpose of Project Planning (PP) is to establish and maintain plans that define project activities.
- Project Monitoring and Control - The purpose of Project Monitoring and Control (PMC) is to provide an understanding of the project's progress so that appropriate corrective actions can be taken when the project's performance deviates significantly from the plan.???????
- Supplier Agreement Management - The purpose of Supplier Agreement Management (SAM) is to manage the acquisition of products from suppliers for which there is a formal agreement.
- Integrated Project Management - The purpose of Integrated Project Management (IPM) is to establish and manage the project and the involvement of the relevant stakeholders according to an integrated and defined process that is tailored from the organization's set of standard processes.
- Risk Management - The purpose of Risk Management (RM) is to identify potential problems before they occur so that risk-handling activities can be planned and invoked as needed across the life of the product or project to mitigate adverse impacts on achieving objectives.?????
- Quantitative Project Management - The purpose of the Quantitative Project Management (QPM) process area is to quantitatively manage the project's defined process to achieve the project's established quality and process performance objectives.
- ?Configuration Management - The purpose of Configuration Management (CM) is to establish and maintain the integrity of work products using configuration identification, configuration control, configuration status accounting, and configuration audits.???????
- Process and Product Quality Assurance - The purpose of Process and Product Quality Assurance (PPQA) is to provide staff and management with objective insight into processes and associated work products.
- Measurement and Analysis - The purpose of Measurement and Analysis (MA) is to develop and sustain a measurement capability that is used to support management information needs.
- Decision Analysis and Resolution - The purpose of Decision Analysis and Resolution (DAR) is to analyze possible decisions using a formal evaluation process that evaluates identified alternatives against established criteria.
- Causal Analysis and Resolution - The purpose of Causal Analysis and Resolution (CAR) is to identify causes of defects and other problems and take action to prevent them from occurring in the future.?
- ?Requirements Development - The purpose of Requirements Development (RD) is to produce and analyze customer, product, and product component requirements.
- Requirements Management - The purpose of Requirements Management (REQM) is to manage the requirements of the project's products and product components and to identify inconsistencies between those requirements and the project's plans and work products.
- Product Integration - The purpose of Product Integration (PI) is to assemble the product from the product components and ensure that the product is integrated, functions properly, and delivers the product.
- Technical Solution - The purpose of Technical Solution (TS) is to design, develop, and implement solutions to requirements. Solutions, designs, and implementations encompass products, product components, and product-related life-cycle processes either singly or in combination as appropriate.
- Validation - The purpose of Validation (VAL) is to demonstrate that a product or product component fulfils its intended use when placed in its intended environment.
- Verification - The purpose of Verification (VER) is to ensure that selected work products meet their specified requirements.
- ?Organizational Process Definition - The purpose of Organizational Process Definition (OPD) is to establish and maintain a usable set of organizational process assets.??
- Organizational Process Focus - The purpose of Organizational Process Focus (OPF) is to plan and implement organizational process improvement based on a thorough understanding of the current strengths and weaknesses of the organization's processes and process assets.
- Organizational Training - The purpose of Organizational Training (OT) is to develop the skills and knowledge of people so they can perform their roles effectively and efficiently.??
- Organizational Process Performance - The purpose of Organizational Process Performance (OPP) is to establish and maintain a quantitative understanding of the performance of the organization's set of standard processes in support of quality and process-performance objectives, and to provide the process performance data, baselines, and models to quantitatively manage the organization's projects.
- Organizational Innovation and Deployment - The purpose of Organizational Innovation and Deployment (OID) is to select and deploy incremental and innovative improvements that measurably improve the organization's processes and technologies. The improvements support the organization's quality and process-performance objectives as derived from the organization's business objectives.
CMMI certifications are offered directly through the CMMI Institute, which certifies individuals, appraisers, instructors, and practitioners. The CMMI Institute offers the following certifications:
- ?CMMI Associate: The CMMI Associate Certification demonstrates your commitment and abilities when it comes to capability and performance improvement. The certification validates that you have the skills and knowledge to connect the CMMI model to business value and to participate as an Appraisal Team Member (ATM).
- CMMI Professional: The next level of certification is the CMMI Professional certification, which demonstrates your ability to apply the CMMI model in an organization structure through road maps for performance, team coaching, organizational change management and fostering a culture of improvement.
- Certified CMMI Lead Appraiser: As a certified CMMI Lead Appraiser, you will be qualified to appraise organizations to determine their capability or maturity level as outlined in the CMMI model. Applications are reviewed by the ISACA Appraiser Application Review committee, which will evaluate your qualifications for the certification.
- Certified CMMI Instructor: The Certified CMMI Instructor certification enables you to lead instructional courses on CMMI. You’ll need a sponsoring organization that also is an ISACA partner and that is licensed for use of the CMMI product suite to qualify for the exam.
Process improvement requires continuous development. We can never reach perfection. CMM is a continuously evolving and improving model where the focus is always on doing better. Our reach should always exceed our grasp. CMMI is utilized to improve business and their overall performance. CMMI provides five components to improve businesses with a clear path to achieve their objectives. The five components are training and certification, an appraisal, a simplified model for performance improvements, adoption guidance, and redesigned systems for online resources and tools.
CMMI helps to identify and achieve measurable business goals, build better products, keep customers happier, and ensure that organisation is working efficiently as possible. CMMI is a set of “Process Areas.” Each Process Area is adapted to the culture and behaviour of the company. The CMMI defines what behaviour is to be selected as a “behavioural model”.
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