Technology Today Volumn 3 Issue 1 - Raytheon

Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI)
ACCOMPLISHMENTS
Two Raytheon Company
businesses in North Texas have
attained Capability Maturity
Model Integration (CMMI®)
Level 5 certification for software
engineering from the Software
Engineering Institute (SEI SM ).
Raytheon Network Centric Systems
and Space and Airborne Systems
share this recognition at several locations
within North Texas. The Level 5 rating was
the result of a two-year effort culminating
in a 3-week appraisal led by John
Ryskowski, an outside independent
appraiser. In addition to over 4000 pieces
of objective evidence collected from the
four focus programs, the appraisal team
interviewed representatives from 39 of the
43 active programs in the region.
Ryskowski remarked on the breadth of
involvement: “This is exceptional. This
made for a really solid appraisal.” In the
end, only two minor weaknesses were
reported. “North Texas is no place for
wimps,” Ryskowski said. “The strengths
are too numerous to mention.” One of
the strengths identified was the Behavior
Change Management technique developed
by the organization to facilitate rapid
deployment. “I’ve never seen anyone who’s
been able to roll things out as quickly as
you do here,” Ryskowski said.
The concept for Behavior Change
Management is to identify and sequence a
set of discrete, “bite-size” behavior
changes needed to achieve business and
organization objectives (such as CMMI
process maturity). The behavior changes
are then deployed to the organization in a
constant flow over time, rather than in a
big-bang effect. Each behavior change
package is an integrated set of process
methods, tools, training, enablers and
subject matter expertise, designed to
reduce the cost required for engineers
to adopt the change.
Another identified strength was the integration
of Raytheon Six Sigma with the
CMMI Level 5 organizational improvement
requirements. Elements of the process were
statistically characterized and placed under
statistical process control. Raytheon Six
Sigma processes were executed to improve
process performance with an emphasis on
process variability reduction.
A process architecture was developed that
would enable many of the organization’s
improvements. The process architecture is
tiered in order to allow strong integration
into IPDS, as well as other disciplines and
business processes. The architecture is
designed to balance the consistency
“Texas is no place for
wimps…the strengths
are too numerous to
mention…I’ve never
seen anyone who’s been
able to roll things out as
quickly as you do here.”
needed at Level 3 with the agility and
innovation needed for Level 5. One of the
key elements is that the process provides
work-instruction level information that will
drastically reduce program start-up time
and process variability.
Other strengths specifically noted included
the use of iPlan (a web-based project
planning and tailoring tool), the use of
subject matter experts, integrating software
quality engineers into software
teams, incremental planning and the
strong integration of process, methods and
tools.
“All of us should be very proud of this outstanding
achievement by a dedicated and
extremely competent group of Raytheon
employees,” said Jack Kelble, president of
SAS. “Their effort distinguishes Raytheon
as a leader in developing and implementing
the best technology solutions for our
customers. It also attests to our ability to
produce quality products on time and within
budget. These are factors that will help
carry us to our ultimate objective — solid,
dependable growth.”
“The assessment provides us a unique platform
for gaining a greater share of the
Software and Systems Integration marketplace
in coming years,” commented Colin
Schottlaender, NCS president. “This success
today is an important milestone in another
commitment we have made: to achieve
customer satisfaction through superior
program execution. There is no higher
illustration of customer focus than this
level of excellence.”
Steve Allo
®CMMI is registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark
Office by Carnegie Mellon University.
SM SEI is a service mark of Carnegie Mellon University.
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