The Organizational Innovation and Deployment process area enables the selection and deployment of improvements that can enhance the organization's ability to meet its quality and process-performance objectives.

The term “improvement,” as used in this process area, refers to all ideas (proven and unproven) that would change the processes and technologies to better meet the quality and process-performance objectives.

Quality and process-performance objectives might include:

• Improved product quality (e.g., functionality, performance)
• Increased productivity
• Decreased cycle time
• Greater customer and end-user satisfaction
• Shorter development or production time to change functionality, add features, or adapt to new technologies

Achievement of these objectives depends on the successful establishment of an infrastructure that enables and encourages all people in the organization to propose potential improvements to the processes and technologies. Achievement of these objectives also depends on being able to effectively evaluate and deploy proposed improvements to the processes and technologies. All members of the organization can participate in the organization's process- and technology-improvement activities. Their proposals are systematically gathered and addressed.

Pilots are conducted to evaluate significant changes involving untried, high-risk, or innovative improvements before they are broadly deployed.

Process and technology improvements that will be deployed across the organization are selected from process- and technology-improvement proposals based on criteria:

• A quantitative understanding of the current quality and process performance
• The quality and process-performance objectives
• Estimates of the improvement in quality and process performance resulting from deploying the process and technology improvements
• Estimated costs of deploying process and technology improvements, and the resources and funding available for such deployment

The expected benefits added by the process and technology improvements are weighed against the cost and impact to the organization. Change and stability must be balanced carefully. Change that is too great or too rapid can overwhelm the organization, destroying its investment in organizational learning represented by organizational process assets. Rigid stability can result in stagnation, allowing the changing business environment

Improvements are deployed, as appropriate, to new and ongoing projects.

In this process area, the term “process and technology improvements” refers to incremental and innovative improvements to processes and also to process or product technologies.

The informative material in this process area is written with the assumption that the specific practices are applied to a quantitatively managed process. The specific practices of this process area may be applicable, but with reduced value, if the assumption is not met.

The specific practices in this process area complement and extend those found in the Organizational Process Focus process area. The focus of this process area is process improvement that is based on a quantitative knowledge of the set of standard processes and technologies and their expected quality and performance in predictable situations. In the Organizational Process Focus process area, no assumptions are made about the quantitative basis of improvement.

Generic Goals

1. GG 1 Perform Base Practices

   Perform the base practices of the organizational innovation and deployment process to develop work products and provide services to achieve the specific goals of the process area.

2. GG 2-5 Institutionalize Organizational Innovation and Deployment process at a Maturity Level

   The process is institutionalized at a defined maturity level (2 through 5)

The process is institutionalized as a process at the designated Maturity Level.

Basic (Managed) Goals

Advanced Goals

Establish and maintain an organizational policy for planning and performing the organizational innovation and deployment process. This policy establishes organizational expectations for identifying and deploying process and technology improvements that contribute to meeting quality and process-performance objectives. Establish and maintain the plan for performing the process. This plan for performing the organizational innovation and deployment process differs from the deployment plans described in a specific practice in this process area. The plan called for in this generic practice would address the comprehensive planning for all of the specific practices in this process area, from collecting and analyzing improvement proposals all the way through to the measurement of improvement effects. In contrast, the deployment plans called for in the specific practice would address the planning needed for the deployment of individual process and technology improvements. Provide adequate resources for performing the process, developing the work products, and providing the services of the process. Examples of resources provided include the following tools: Simulation packages Prototyping tools Statistical packages Dynamic systems modeling Subscriptions to online technology databases Process modeling tools Assign responsibility and authority for performing the process, developing the work products, and providing the services of the organizational innovation and deployment process. Train the people performing or supporting the organizational innovation and deployment process as needed. Place designated work products of the process under appropriate levels of configuration management. Examples of work products placed under configuration management include: Documented lessons learned from pilots Revised process- and technology-improvement measures, objectives, priorities, and deployment plans Updated training material Identify and involve the relevant stakeholders. Examples of activities for stakeholder involvement include: Reviewing process- and technology-improvement proposals that may have major impacts on process performance or on customer and end-user satisfaction Providing feedback to the organization on the status and results of the process- and technology-improvement deployment activities The feedback typically involves: Informing the people who submit process- and technology improvement proposals about the disposition of their proposals Regularly informing relevant stakeholders about the plans and status for selecting and deploying process and technology improvements Preparing and distributing a summary of process- and technology improvement selection and deployment activities Monitor and control the process against the plan for performing the process and take appropriate corrective action. Objectively evaluate adherence of the process against its process description, standards, and procedures, and address noncompliance. Review the activities, status, and results of the organizational innovation and deployment process with higher level management and resolve issues.

Defined Establish and maintain the description of a defined organizational innovation and deployment process. Collect work products, measures, measurement results, and improvement information derived from planning and performing the organizational innovation and deployment process to support the future use and improvement of the processes and process assets. Quantitatively Managed Process Establish and maintain quantitative objectives for the organizational innovation and deployment process that address quality and process performance based on customer needs and business objectives. Stabilize the performance of one or more sub-processes to determine the ability of the process to achieve the established quantitative quality and process-performance objectives. Optimizing Process Ensure continuous improvement of the process in fulfilling the relevant business objectives of the organization. Identify and correct the root causes of defects and other problems in the organizational innovation and deployment process.

Specific Goals

The Causal Analysis and Resolution process area involves:

• Identifying and analyzing causes of defects and other problems
• Taking specific actions to remove the causes and prevent the occurrence of those types of defects and problems in the future

Causal analysis and resolution improves quality and productivity by ,em>preventing the introduction of defects into a product. Reliance on detecting defects after they have been introduced is not cost effective. It is more effective to prevent defects from being introduced by integrating causal analysis and resolution activities into each phase of the project.

Since defects and problems may have been previously encountered on other projects or in earlier phases or tasks of the current project, causal analysis and resolution activities are a mechanism for communicating lessons learned among projects.

The types of defects and other problems encountered are analyzed to identify any trends. Based on an understanding of the defined process and how it is implemented, the root causes of the defects and the future implications of the defects are determined.

Causal analysis may also be performed on problems unrelated to defects. For example, causal analysis may be used to improve quality attributes such as cycle time. Improvement proposals, simulations, dynamic systems models, engineering analyses, new business directives, or other items may initiate such analysis.

Sometimes it may be impractical to perform causal analysis on all defects. In these cases, tradeoffs are made between estimated investments and estimated returns in quality, productivity, and cycle time, and defect targets are selected.

A measurement process should already be in place. The defined measures can be used, though in some instances new measures may be needed to analyze the effects of the process change.

Refer to the Measurement and Analysis process area for more information about establishing objectives for measurement and analysis, specifying the measures and analyses to be performed, obtaining and analyzing measures, and reporting results.

Causal Analysis and Resolution activities provide a mechanism for projects to evaluate their processes at the local level and look for improvements that can be implemented.

When improvements are judged to be effective, the information is extended to the organizational level.

Refer to the Organizational Innovation and Deployment process area for more information about improving organizational level processes through proposed improvements and action proposals.

The informative material in this process area is written with the assumption that the specific practices are applied to a quantitatively managed process. The specific practices of this process area may be applicable, but with reduced value, if the assumption is not met.

Specific Goals

Institutionalizing the Processes

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