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Requirements Engineering and Management Effects on Downstream Developer Performance in a Small Business Findings from a Case Study in a CMMI/CMM Context

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gellert_chantelle.pdf (7.36 MB)

Date

2021-12-17

Authors

Gellert, Chantelle

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University of Waterloo

Abstract

Abstract— This thesis is a case study explaining how I tried to improve the requirements engineering process at company X (not its real name), a small software development company in Waterloo, ON, Canada. I assessed X’s practices and standards using the Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) and the Requirements Definition and Management (RDM) Maturity Model (RDMMM). I chose CMMI because it defines and measures a company to assess its maturity as an organization. Higher levels of CMMI have been found to have a correlation with the better success of projects, with regards to delivering the product on-time, on-budget, and on function. For analysis, initial measurements of the company’s performance were gathered to compare results in order to measure X’s process improvements. Six common performance metrics were analyzed: error density, software development productivity, percentage of rework, cycle time for the completion of a typical software project, schedule fidelity, and error detection effectiveness. In addition, I gave a questionnaire to X’s employees based on Ellis’s RDM which is a process for defining, documenting, and maintaining documents that take its reference point from empirical studies on the effectiveness of CMMI. [19] This case study’s survey questions were used to elicit the data necessary to answer whether higher levels of the RDMMM in strategic projects lead to the success of projects at X. The different levels of RDMMM within the company were measured by comparing the questionnaire results taken in 2017 and 2019. Many of the conclusions and the results of this paper are based on the interviews and personal statements from employees at X about their experience in software development.

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Keywords

CMM, CMMI, RDM, RE

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http://hdl.handle.net/10012/17777

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Computer Science