Integrated Evaluation Procedure for Software / Hardware System Development Processes Practice Section based on the Software Capability Maturity Model ( CMM ) ‡

The Software Capability Maturity Model (SW-CMM) from SEI (Software Engineering Institute) is a world-wide industrial standard for evaluating software development processes. Based on this model, Siemens is using an assessment procedure to evaluate development processes as a prerequisite for process improvement programs. The benefits of these improvements are limited by deep interactions between the hardware and system development processes and the software development process. This problem could be solved by comparable maturity levels for software, hardware and system processes. Thus, the need for an analogous evaluation method for hardware and systems was identified. The SW-CMM is analyzed to ascertain the analogous applicability to hardware development processes. Based on the results, a procedure is defined leading to a joint Siemens Process Assessment. It is now capable of evaluating all development processes (software, hardware, systems). This procedure has been applied successfully numerous times within the Siemens Groups. The findings of the joint assessments address predominantly project management functions like quality assurance, configuration management and risk management. As a consequence, several tailor-made process improvement programs have already been launched. These cover process issues irrespective of hardware or software, especially for project management functions. More benefits are identified by including a wider variety of roles in process training. Copyright  2000 John Wiley & Sons Ltd