Capability Maturity Model is a methodology that is used for measuring the maturity of an organization’s software process. Developing and refining of an organization’s software development process is achieved through this process.

CMM basically features five maturity levels based on certain key process areas (KPA) and is commonly used to assess an organization’s performance. It determines the maturity of a company based upon the project and the clients the company is currently handling. Each level of CMM ranks the organization according to its standardization of processes based on the subject area that is being assessed.

A Capability Maturity Model for an organization provides the following key points

  • A place to start
  • The benefit of a community’s prior experience
  • A common language and a shared vision
  • A framework for prioritizing actions
  • A method to define the improvements that can be done in an organization

As mentioned before, the CMM model features five maturity levels. These maturity levels are given below in an ascending order of ranks, i.e. from 1 to 5

  • Initial
  • Managed
  • Defined
  • Quantitatively Managed
  • Optimizing

These maturity levels primarily consist of a predefined set of process areas based on which it ranks the organization. These maturity levels are then measured depending on the specific and generic goals achieved, where these target goals apply to each predefined set of process areas.

Given below are the explanations for each maturity level in a CMM model that is necessary to understand the whole concept of CMM better.

Maturity Level 1 – Initial

“Company has no standard process for software development, nor does it have a project-tracking system that enables developers to predict costs or finish dates with any accuracy.”

From the statement given above for the first maturity level, we can conclude the following points

  • At maturity level 1, the organization’s processes are usually nor properly organized and are unplanned
  • There is no stable environment for the clients provided by the organization, in these cases success of the projects handled by the organization solely depends on the competence and genuine efforts put by the people in organization and not on the use of proven processes
  • Organizations at Initial maturity level often develop products and services that usually work, but the organization or company itself does not have a standard process for software development, nor does it have a proper project tracking system that can be used by the clients or developers to predict the cost or finish dates of the project with any accuracy
  • Moreover, organizations at this level are normally motivated to over commit, abandon projects during the time of crisis and are also unable to repeat the success they have achieved in the past

Maturity Level 2 – Managed

“Company has installed basic software management processes and controls. But there is no consistency or coordination among different groups.”

From the statement given above for the second maturity level, we can conclude the following points

  • Organizations at maturity level 2 have already achieved the specific and generic goals of the maturity level 2 key process areas, in layman terms, the projects currently being handled by the organization have ensured that the all the specified requirements are managed and the processes are planned, performed, measured and controlled
  • Moreover, at maturity level 2, organizations ensure that the project is not abandoned and existing practices are continued even during the times of stress, which means when these practices are in place, projects are performed and managed according to their documented plans
  • Organizations at level 2, manages the requirements, processes, work products and services, the status of the work products and the delivery of the services are transparent to the management at defined points
  • At this level, commitments are established among the relevant stakeholders and can be revised as needed, moreover, the work products are reviewed and controlled with the presence of stakeholders
  • The work products and services developed by the organization satisfy the specified requirements, standards and objectives

Maturity Level 3 – Defined

”Company has pulled together a standard set of processes and controls for the entire organization so that developers can move between projects more easily and customers can begin to get consistency from different groups.”

From the statement given above for the third maturity level, we can conclude the following points

  • Organizations at maturity level 3 have achieved all the specific and generic goals of the maturity level 3 key process areas
  • At level 3 of maturity model, processes in the organization are well characterized and understood, these process are described in standards, procedures, tools and methods
  • The major difference between the capability of an organization at maturity level 2 and at maturity level 3 is the scope of standards, process descriptions and procedures; at maturity level 2, the scope of standards, process descriptions and procedures may be different at each specific instance of the process, while at maturity level 3, these are crafted from the organization’s set of standard processes in order to suit a particular project or organizational unit
  • The set of standard processes of an organization includes the processes mentioned at maturity level 2 and maturity level 3; as a result, the processes that are performed across the organization are consistent except for the differences present in the guidelines crafted by the organization
  • Another major difference between the two levels is that at maturity level 3, processes are typically described in more detail and more rigorously when compared to the processes at maturity level 2
  • Also, at maturity level 3, processes are managed more comfortably due to the understanding of the inter-relationships of the process activities and detailed measures of the process, its work products and its services

Maturity Level 4 – Quantitatively Managed

“In addition to implementing standard processes, company has installed systems to measure the quality of those processes across all projects.”

From the statement given above for the fourth maturity level, we can conclude the following points

  • Organizations at maturity level 4 have already achieved all the specific goals for the key process areas addressed to maturity levels 2, 3 and 4 and have also achieved the generic goals addressed to maturity levels 2 and 3
  • At maturity level 4, the organization’s sub processes are so selected that they significantly contribute to the overall process performance, moreover, these selected sub processes are managed using statistical and other quantitative techniques
  • At this level, organizations establish quantitative objectives for quality and process performance, which are then used as a criteria in managing processes; here, the quantitative objectives depend on the requirements of customer, end users, organization and process implementers, also the quality and process performance of the product are understood in statistical terms and are managed throughout the life of processes
  • For these processes mentioned above, detailed report of process performance is recorded and is statistically analysed, moreover, special causes of process variation are identified and wherever appropriate, these special cases sources are corrected and improvised in order to prevent any further problems in future
  • Quality and process performance reports are added to the organization’s measurement repository so that it can support fact based decision making whenever required in future
  • The major difference between the maturity level 3 and 4 is the predictability of process performance of an organization; at level 4, the performance of the processes is controlled using statistical and other quantitative techniques, and is predictable quantitatively, however at level 3, process are predictable only qualitatively

Maturity Level 5 – Optimizing

“Company has accomplished all of the above and can now begin to see patterns in performance over time, so it can tweak its processes in order to improve productivity and reduce defects in software development across the entire organization.”

From the statement give above for the fifth maturity level, we can conclude the following points

  • Organizations at maturity level 5 have achieved all the specific goals of the key process areas assigned to maturity levels 2,3,4, and 5 and have also achieved the generic goals assigned to maturity levels 2 and 3
  • At this level, the organization’s process are continuously improved depending on the quantitative understanding of the common cause of change in characteristic in processes
  • At maturity level 5, organizations focus on continuously improving their process performance through both incremental and innovative improvements in technology
  • Organizations at the level establishes the quantitative process improvement objectives and continuously revises it to match with the objectives of changing business and is used as a criteria in managing process improvement
  • The effects of improvements in deployed process are measured and evaluated against the objectives of the quantitative process improvements; both of these defined processes along with the set of standard processes of an organization are targets of activities for measurable improvement
  • Optimizing agile and innovative processes completely depends on the empowered workforce of the organization aligned with the business values and objectives of the organization
  • At this level, the organization’s capability of quickly responding to the changes and opportunities is highly enhanced, this is done by finding ways to improve the working speed of organization and sharing knowledge; improvement of the processes is characteristically a role of every working person in the organization, which ultimately results in a cycle of continual improvement
  • The major difference between the maturity level 4 and 5 is the type of process variation addressed; at level 4, processes are focused on addressing special causes of process variation and providing statistical prediction of the results; though this process may produce predictable results, it still may be not enough to achieve the established objectives, however at maturity level 5, processes are focused on common causes of process variations and revising the processes in order to improve the performance of the processes so that it is possible to achieve the established objectives of quantitative process-improvement

Hence, these are the five levels of Capability Maturity Model (CMM) which define an organization’s capability of working, handling and delivering the projects. Organizations are ranked according to the objectives they have achieved on different levels of maturity, where the lowest rank is 1 (Initial) and the highest is 5 (Optimizing).