Cmmi: an Introduction to Capability Maturity Model Integration

The Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) is a model that helps organizations to:

• Effectuate process improvement
• Develop behaviors that decrease risks in service, product, and software development

While CMMI was originally tailored towards software, the latest version is much less specific. Today, you can apply CMMI to hardware, software, and service development across all industries. The model enables organizations to measure, build, and improve capabilities—to improve overall performance.

Let’s take a look at CMMI.

CMMI goals

A primary goal of CMMI is the creation of “reliable environments where products, services and departments are proactive, efficient and productive.”

More specifically, CMMI’s objectives for businesses include enabling your organization to:

• Pproduce quality services or products
• Improve customer satisfaction
• Increase value for stockholders
• Achieve industry-wide recognition for excellence
• Grow market share

According to the Carnegie Mellon Software Engineering Institute, which was integral in its development, CMMI is intended to:

Help “integrate traditionally separate organizational functions, set process improvement goals and priorities, provide guidance for quality processes, and provide a point of reference for appraising current processes.”

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History of CMMI

CMMI was developed by Carnegie Mellon University as part of the CMMI project. Its goal was to make maturity models—which measure the ability of organizations to have ongoing improvement in a particular area—more effective and usable by integrating a number of models into a single framework.

(Learn about digital maturity models.)

The project, whose main sponsors were the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the National Defense Industrial Association, included members of industry, government, and the Carnegie Mellon Software Engineering Institute (SEI). Models were initially created for the Department of Defense to assess the expertise and quality of software contractors.

The first version of the CMMI was released in 2002 and built upon the Capability Maturity Model (CMM), which was developed from 1987 to 1997. In 2002, version 1.1 was released, in 2006 version 1.2 was released, and in 2010 version 1.3 was released. Version 2.0 launched in 2018 with some notable changes that make the model more accessible and effective for businesses in any industry.

The CMMI is administered by the CMMI Institute, which was bought by ISACA in 2016. (Today known only by its acronym, ISACA was formerly known as the Information Systems Audit and Control Association. ISACA also owns the COBIT framework and a variety of certifications.)