Title: Integrating Lean, Six Sigma, and CMMI

• Abstract: The CMMI approach to process improvement has become widely accepted in the software industry. However, many software producing organizations are parts of larger system and product manufacturers where the Lean and Six Sigma approaches have become established. Now, executives are pressuring their software organizations to adopt Lean and Six Sigma in addition to CMMI. These three approaches use different terminology, are promoted by different vendors, and sponsored by different professional societies facilitating conflict among the resulting initiatives.
  
  This presentation will describe the common history of the Lean, Six Sigma, and CMMI approaches and explain how they are related. In particular, it will argue that these three, typically independent initiatives can be integrated into a synergistic improvement program. Studying the underlying principles of process improvement, rather than their peculiar terminology and buzzwords, leads to a better understanding of the commonality of these superficially different approaches.

   

• Bio: David N. Card is a fellow of Q-Labs, a subsidiary of Det Norske Veritas. Previous employers include the Software Productivity Consortium, Computer Sciences Corporation, Lockheed Martin, and Litton Bionetics. Mr. Card is an internationally recognized expert in software measurement and process improvement. He has worked extensively with high maturity organizations where mastery of quantitative and statistical methods is essential to success. Mr. Card spent one year as a Resident Affiliate at the Software Engineering Institute. He worked as a member of the research team of the NASA Software Engineering Laboratory for seven years. He served as an expert advisor on software quality regulations for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
  
  Mr. Card is the author of Measuring Software Design Quality (Prentice Hall, 1990), co-author of Practical Software Measurement (Addison Wesley, 2002), and co-editor ISO/IEC Standard 15939: Software Measurement Process (International Organization for Standardization, 2002). Mr. Card also serves as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Systems and Software. He is a Senior Member of the American Society for Quality.
  
  Recent Journal Publications
  

  • D.N. Card, “Defect Analysis”, Chapter 6, Advances in Computers, vol. 65, Elsevier 2005
  • D.N. Card, “Understanding Causal Systems”, CROSSTALK, September 2004
  • D.N. Card, “Integrating PSM and the Balanced Scorecard”, Proceedings: IEEE Computer Software and Applications Conference, November 2003
  • D.N. Card, “Managing Software Quality with Defects”, CROSSTALK, March 2003, an earlier version appeared in Proceedings: IEEE Computer Software and Applications Conference, August 2002
  • D.N. Card, “Sorting Out Six Sigma and the CMM”, IEEE Software, July 2000
  • D.N. Card, “A Practical Framework for Software Measurement and Analysis”, Auerbach Software Management Strategies, June 2000
  • D.N.Card, “Learning from Our Mistakes with Defect Causal Analysis”, IEEE Software, January 1998
  • D.N. Card, “Statistical Process Control for Software Engineering?” IEEE Software, July 1995
  • D.N. Card, " Is Timing Really Everything?" IEEE Software, September 1995
  • D.N. Card and E. Comer, " Why do Re-use Programs Fail?", IEEE Software, November 1994
  
  Earlier publications appeared in IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, Journal of Systems and Software, and Information and Software Technology.