Abstract
Background: Software Process Improvement (SPI) is intended to improve software engineering, but can only be effective if used. To improve SPI's uptake, we should understand why organizations adopt SPI. CMM-based SPI approaches are widely known and studied. Objective: We investigated why organizations adopt CMM-based SPI approaches, and how these motivations relate to organizations' size. Method: We performed a systematic review, examining reasons reported in more than forty primary studies. Results: Reasons usually related to product quality and project performance, and less commonly, to process. Organizations reported customer reasons infrequently and employee reasons very rarely. We could not show that reasons related to size. Conclusion: Despite its origins in helping to address customer-related issues for the USAF, CMM-based SPI has mostly been adopted to help organizations improve project performance and product quality issues. This reinforces a view that the goal of SPI is not to improve process per se, but instead to provide business benefits.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 605-620 |
| Number of pages | 16 |
| Journal | Information and Software Technology |
| Volume | 50 |
| Issue number | 7-8 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Jun 2008 |
| Externally published | Yes |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:Thanks to Paul Bannerman for facilitating joint agreement on the classification of some reasons, and to anonymous referees for providing criticism and suggestions that have greatly improved the paper. National ICT Australia is funded by the Australian Government’s Department of Communications, Information Technology, and the Arts and the Australian Research Council through Backing Australia’s Ability and the ICT Research Centre of Excellence programs.
Keywords
- CMM
- CMMI
- Capability Maturity Model
- Software Process Improvement
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Software
- Information Systems
- Computer Science Applications