Level 5 - The Optimising Level

At the Optimising Level, the entire organization is focused on continuous process improvement. The organization has the means to identify weaknesses and strengthen the process proactively, with the goal of preventing the occurrence of defects. Data on the effectiveness of the software process is used to perform cost benefit analyses of new technologies and proposed changes to the organization's software process. Innovations that exploit the best software engineering practices are identified and transferred throughout the organization.

Software project teams in Level 5 organizations analyse defects to determine their causes. Software processes are evaluated to prevent known types of defects from recurring, and lessons learned are disseminated to other projects.

The software process capability of Level 5 organizations can be characterized as continuously improving because Level 5 organizations are continuously striving to improve the range of their process capability, thereby improving the process performance of their projects. Improvement occurs both by incremental advancements in the existing process and by innovations using new technologies and methods.

Level Five Processes

Defect Prevention

The purpose of Defect Prevention is to identify the causes of defects and prevent them from recurring.  Each project develops a plan for defect prevention activities.  At the beginning of each software task a meeting is held to identify defect prevention activities for that task.  Causes of defects are identified.  Casual analysis meetings are held etc.

Technology Change Management

A group is established to manage the incorporation of new technologies.  A plan is developed for the incorporation of new technoligies describing areas to apply the new technologies to, life span of the new development, purchase of develop in house, and how technology will be assessed etc.

Process Change Management

The purpose of Process Change Management is to continually improve the software processes used in the organization with the intent of improving software quality, increasing productivity, and decreasing the cycle time for product development. Process Change Management takes the incremental improvements of Defect Prevention and the innovative improvements of Technology Change Management and makes them available to the entire organization.