History CMMI
CMMI is the successor of the CMM. The CMM was developed from 1987 until 1997. In 2002, CMMI Version 1.1 was released. Version 1.2 followed in August 2006. The goal of the CMMI project is to improve the usability of maturity models by integrating many different models into one framework. It was created by members of industry, government and the SEI. The main sponsors included the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) and the National Defense Industrial Association.
Structure CMMI
CMMI comes with two different representations: staged and continuous. The staged representation, which groups process areas into five maturity levels, was also used in the ancestor Software CMM. The continuous representation, which was used in the ancestor EIA 731, defines capability levels. The differences in the representations are solely organizational; the content is equivalent. Both can be used to achieve level ratings because of Equivalent Staging.
CMMI models use a common structure to describe process areas (PAs). A process area has 1 to 4 goals, and each goal is comprised of practices. These goals and practices are called specific goals and practices, as they describe activities that are specific to a single process area. An additional set of goals and practices applies across all of the process areas; this set is called generic goals and practices. Table 1 describes CMMI terminology in more detail.
CMMI
provides organizations with the essential elements of effective processes. It can be used to guide process improvement across a project, a division, or an entire organization. CMMI helps integrate traditionally separate organizational functions, set process improvement goals and priorities, provide guidance for quality processes, and provide a point of reference for appraising current processes.
This page points you to places where you can find more information about CMMI, and describes the worldwide adoption and benefits of CMMI.
CMMI Benefits
The CMMI Product Suite is at the forefront of process improvement because it provides the latest best practices for product and service development and maintenance. The CMMI models improve the best practices of previous models in many important ways. CMMI best practices enable organizations to do the following:
more explicitly link management and engineering activities to their business objectives
expand the scope of and visibility into the product lifecycle and engineering activities to ensure that the product or service meets customer expectations
incorporate lessons learned from additional areas of best practice (e.g., measurement, risk management, and supplier management)
implement more robust high-maturity practices
address additional organizational functions critical to their products and services
more fully comply with relevant ISO standards
