The Diagnosing Phase

The primary output of this phase is the Final Findings and Recommendations Report, which is produced as a result of the baselining activities. Secondary outputs may be revi-sions to the organization’s vision and business plan, A recommended minimum set of baselines includes

• organization process maturity baseline (See Appendix C.0 on page 203).

Overview The management steering group (MSG) must understand the organization’s current software process baseline so that it can develop a plan that will achieve the business changes specified in the organization’s software process improve-ment (SPI) goals. The baselining activities performed in the Diagnosing phase will provide this information into the SPI planning and prioritization process.

The SPI strategic action plan, which will be developed after the baselining activities are complete, is critical: it is need-ed to provide clear guidance for the various process im-provement actions that will be taken over the next few years. It should provide clear business reasons for conduct-ing the SPI program and should be clearly and measurably linked to the organization’s business plan and vision.

The baselines will provide information on how and how well the organization currently performs its software activ-ities. The knowledge of the strengths and opportunities for improvement is an essential prerequisite for identifying and prioritizing an effective and efficient SPI program.

For each baseline, many effective methods of gathering in-formation are available. For the process maturity baseline, an authorized lead appraiser can conduct a Capability Ma-turity Model (CMM) -based appraisal for internal process improvement (CBA IPI), or the organization’s own person-nel can be trained to appraise their process maturity. Ap-praisals that are based on the CMM use a set of common re-quirements that are described in the CMM Appraisal Framework, Version 1.0.¹

The MSG must choose the number and type of baselines that best achieve the objectives it has set so that a findings and recommendations report can be obtained from each.

Information about the current state of the organization flows to the MSG by means of the Baseline Findings and Recommendations Reports. Because the baseline reports will not necessarily coincide in time, information will flow irregularly. As information is available, the MSG incorpo-rates it into the improvement plans. Baselines do not deter-mine the strategy, however. The strategy for improvement must be based on business goals and needs. The baselines can help determine the current state of the organization with respect to achieving those goals or being capable of achieving them.

Information on the current state will also be used by the technical working groups (TWGs) during the Acting phase (page 93) to develop process improvement solutions. Keep-ing the momentum of process improvement between base-lining and deployment is very important.

Baselines are intended to be iterative; the major baselines conducted at this point provide a snapshot of the organiza-tion’s various capabilities, processes, and measures at a certain point in time. Subsequent cycles through the IDE-AL model will require repeated baselining to show what progress or changes have taken hold in the organization.

Software maturity baselines should be repeated every

eigh-1. Masters, Steve; & Bothwell, Carol. CMM Appraisal Framework, Version eigh-1.0 (CMU/SEI-95-TR-001).

Pittsburgh, Pa.: Software Engineering Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, 1995.

teen months to three years. Metrics baselines should prob-ably be taken more often, depending on the business cycle of the organization (if the organization goes through a full cycle only every two years, more frequent metrics baselines would probably not be useful. On the other hand, if the or-ganization goes through a product cycle every three

months, metrics baselines could be taken annually.)

• Gather information on the current strengths and oppor-tunities for improvement in the organization for input to the SPI strategic action planning process.

• Build involvement, from the senior management team down to the practitioners, for process improvement tasks that will make the work of the organization more Purpose ^• Determine what baselines are required

• Perform baselining activities

• Produce Findings and Recommendations report

The purpose of this phase is to perform the baselining ac-tivity to get a picture of the organizations current strengths and weaknesses. This information gathered from the base-lines will then be used to initiate development of the SPI strategic action plan that will provide guidance and direc-tion to the SPI program in the years to come.

The baselining activities must be self-verifying. The credi-bility of the baselines depends on their perceived acredi-bility to extract real, meaningful information from the organization and present it back to the organization in a coherent, ac-tionable form.

Objectives • Understand the working of the current processes and the organizational interactions and how they contribute to the organization’s business.

• Resources are available to perform the baselines

• The MSG has decided that the SPI strategic action plan needs to be updated.

Education/Skills MSG SEPG TWG Appraisal

Team Practitioners

Interviewing skills X X X

Data reduction skills X X

Business knowledge X X X

Baselining method X X

Team skills X X X

Change management X X X

Commitment The commitment that senior management makes for the Diagnosing phase is the time, resources and training re-quired to complete the phase.

All members of the organization are also making a commit-ment that the baselines will be conducted under an agree-ment of confidentiality and that no attempt to find out the source of any piece of information will be tolerated.

Communication Each of the baselining activities will have specific commu-nication needs. In addition, getting the organization ready for baselining will require considerable communication, es-tablishing dialogue between various levels and areas in the organization to maximize the effectiveness of the baselin-ing teams.

Communicating the results of the baselining activities will have several positive effects on the SPI program. It will demonstrate that there are no secrets regarding the SPI program; and it will give everybody a clear understanding of the strengths and opportunities for improvement that the organization faces.

Entry Criteria • SPI infrastructure, particularly MSG and software en-gineering process group (SEPG), is in place and operat-ing.

• The organization’s vision, business plan, and SPI goals are synergistic.

See Figure 2-1 on page 58 for a pictorial representation of the tasks associated with the Diagnosing phase of the IDE-AL model.

Exit Criteria ^• Baseline Findings and Recommendation Report deliv-ered to the MSG and accepted.

• The draft of the SPI strategic action plan is initiated.

2.1

Determine What Baseline(s) are Needed

Figure 2-1: Process Flow for Diagnosing Phase

2.2 Plan for the Baseline(s)

2.5

Develop Final Findings and Recommendations Report

2.4 Present Findings

2.3 Conduct Baseline(s)

2.6

Communicate Findings and Recommendations to

Organization

Tasks The tasks for the Diagnosing phase are shown in the table below.

Tasks Page

2.1: Determine What Baseline(s) Are Needed 60

2.2: Plan for the Baseline(s) 62

2.3: Conduct Baseline(s) 63

2.4: Present Findings 64

2.5: Develop Final Findings and Recommendations Report 65 2.6: Communicate Findings and Recommendations to Organization 66