Overview

Ever since Mr. Watts Humphrey ^[1] started the Process Program at the Software Engineering Institute (SEI) in 1986, he has emphasized having an organizational focus on developing processes. He also stressed the need to have process improvement champions at all levels while making the statement, "Process improvement is not going to happen by itself." As early as 1988, when a handful of people at the SEI and I were learning about assessments from Mr. Humphrey, he would recommend to any organization that they establish a process group who would facilitate the process improvement program for that organization. Looking at CMM for Software or CMMI shows us that the Organizational Process Focus process area is at Maturity Level 3. Yet Mr. Humphrey recommended that an organization establish their Software/Systems Engineering Process Group (SEPG) as one of the first actions that they took even if the organization was assessed at Maturity Level 1. His thinking was that the SEPG would not only facilitate the development of the necessary processes but also serve as an example by acting or behaving at a maturity level at least one above where their organization was assessed. Thus, an organization would not only have champions who kept a constant vigil on the process improvement activities but also have champions who would serve as an example for other projects on how it should be done.