Technical Advise Week #24 - Technical Conference

We decided that we shouldn't let another moment go by without having a major conference. Max and I decided to invite our new friend Dexter to provide some invaluable input and independent insight into his world of specialization. Dexter comes to us from the practical side, and has tremedous street smarts for his age. His area of specialization is assessments.

Assessments are an important status tool, it helps companies to determine where they stand and can be used to help promote improvements going forward. The best known assessment assessment is CMMi (Capability Maturity Model Integrated) and this has been around since the late 1980s and was introduced by Watts Humphrey of SEI. At the time of introduction is was simply CMM. There is also ITMark which is of a simplier form but is sized to support small to medium sized organizations (offered by the European Software Institute http://www.esi.es/).

There are specialized assessment like V&VMMx offered by Certellus Corporation (introduced in 1988 and is the only one that places heavy review on the use of automation, agile methods and uses a 21 KPA model), TMM that is promoted by Sogeti. There are also International Standard Organization appraisals (ISO) that evaluate capability and quality of delivery.

Many companies, especially those doing outsourcing, have found these useful in promoting their businesses. It shows consumers that the company is interested in improving their 'delivery' operations and also can point to an independent appraisal (vs. self-appraisals). Unfortunately, when buying services, especially far afield, one of the first questions asked is whether the company is strong enough to continue in operations. The International Institute for Outsource Managment provides a VIABILITY assessment that measures this aspect. Originally carried out by Certellus Corporation over 100 Global Star Certification (GSC) assessment around the globe. Many of these original assessments were done for the buyer, but today we are seeing more and more outsourcers seeing value in building their business and also providing a level of certainty about this aspect. As is often said, "You may be capable of delivering but if you aren't viable, you are going to be out of business!".

Hope you enjoyed our work for the week. We (Mabel, Max & Dexter) wishing you a happy and productive week.