Caracterización de las antenas

The PST created two separate cycles of establishing and acting. This was done for several reasons. First, the PST wanted to focus on quick, visible, high impact changes to reenergize the organization‟s belief in the improvement initiative. There was a cynicism that existed from prior SPI efforts, and we needed to combat that with immediate success. Second, our diagnosis had revealed more problems than could be adequately addressed within a four to six month period. Finally, following the CPR approach (Mathiassen 2002), we believed it was important to actively involve as many people in planning as possible – preferably those that would be responsible for implementing the new actions.

Between June 2005 and August 2005, the PST designed the first cycle of improvement teams (see Table 5: Intervention Cycle 1 Key Dates). As before, the research team took the lead in proposing project teams and prioritizing improvement areas. The research team iterated these plans with the TelSoft members of the PST who also identified resources to work on the teams. On September 1, 2005, the PST sponsored a kick-off meeting for all employees in the software development group to present the diagnosing results and describe the upcoming project teams. At the kick-off meeting, Dr. Mathiassen explained the need for a sense-and-respond approach to improvement (Haeckel 1995) and the importance of governing principles. Furthermore, all participants participated in breakout sessions to provide additional input to the proposed improvement teams.

Table 5: Intervention Cycle 1 Key Dates

Date Activity

June 1, 2005 PST meeting to plan improvement teams June 9, 2005 SC status meeting and discussion of project

continuation

Presented final Diagnostic Report [11] September 1, 2005 Intervention Cycle 1 Kick-off Meeting [13] October 7, 2005 Improvement team project plans due [14] November 3, 2005 First Software Coordination Group (SCG)

Meeting [15]

SCG assumes responsibility for managerial oversight of project

March 15, 2006 Interim status meeting for Software Development managers [17]

March 21, 2006 Interim status meeting for Software Development staff [17]

March 24, 2006 Deliverables from project teams due to PST [18, 19, 20, 21]

Date Activity

March 2006 Software Charter finalized and included on customer mailings [16, 21]

April 18, 2006 Intervention Cycle 2 begins: Kick-off meeting

The five improvement teams formed for intervention cycle 1 (also known at TelSoft as the First Wave) were software coordination, quality assurance, configuration management, customer relations, and requirements management. The VP of Software Development advised team members to spend no more than four hours every two weeks on the initiative. The PST provided each team with an initial set of objectives and suggested activities based upon the diagnosing stage. Their first task was to evaluate these suggested activities, make modifications, and create a project plan. The teams typically met every two weeks to discuss new ways of operating that would incorporate the suggested activities into TelSoft‟s processes. The VP of Software

Development directed the project managers to do the following:

Use position papers as a working document insights, ideas, and proposed decisions resulting from the groups activities.

Generate brief, high-level process documents suitable for existing and potential customers

Provide simple templates that help people follow the processes described in the process documents

In most cases, the project managers for the improvement teams created meeting minutes to document key decisions. The research team decided to split up to support the teams. I would try to attend and record all meetings for all the teams. Dr. Mathiassen would support the SCG and requirements management teams. Dr. Johnson agreed to support the configuration management and quality assurance teams. The improvement teams created a number of process documents, position papers, and templates that were reviewed and approved by the PST. The key outcomes for each of the project teams are briefly described below.

Software Coordination

The software coordination group (SCG) was established to address two improvement areas: software vision management and project portfolio management. The SCG consisted of four members: Division President, Vice President of Software Development, Software Development Manager, and Product Manager. Beginning November 2005, the group met monthly and followed a fixed agenda covering status of current projects, business opportunities, improvement initiative, and strategy review. With the inclusion of the improvement initiative on its agenda, the SCG now assumed the role of the SC. To raise awareness of customer relations issues, the SCG periodically invited account managers to provide status on the customer relationship and identify areas of improvement.

As suggested by the sense-and-respond model, the first item of business for the SCG was to clarify the mission of the organization, their targeted markets, and governing principles (Haeckel 1995; Haeckel 1999). The following three items became TelSoft‟s Software Charter [16] and

Reason for Being. The reason for being statement succinctly states the organization‟s mission. The SCG members and CEO were asked to provide a candidate for the division‟s reason for being by completing the following statement: TelSoft‟s software

division exists to……[fill in action, primary beneficiary, qualifiers, and outcome].” These inputs were collected by the research team and discussed at the second and third SCG meetings. After iteration and discussion, the SCG reached consensus.

Software Strategy. The software strategy articulates the organization‟s main customers, products, and development approach. As new business opportunities arise, the SCG can use the software strategy to evaluate how closely those opportunities match.

Policies. In general, policies are guiding principles identified by senior management to guide decision-making and drive day-to-day operations (CMMI Product Team 2002). In particular, software policies explicate the organization‟s governing principles for successful software development. The improvement teams were each asked to propose no more than 5 software policies – brief, enforceable rules stating desired practices that

TelSoft should adopt. These policies were consolidated by the PST, debated by software development employees, and approved by the SCG.

Quality Assurance

The quality assurance team was designed to address the software quality assurance improvement area. This team wrote position papers on desired standard operating procedures for certification, regression, and acceptance testing. The team also developed a workflow that detailed the internal testing process and produced templates for regression testing [18].

Configuration Management

The configuration management team was designed to address the software configuration management improvement area. This team focused on improving the software release process by ensuring the integrity of the software product which was built and delivered to customers. A key decision here was that responsibility for building the software product would shift to the quality assurance group; quality assurance would become the designated “gatekeeper” for products that got sent to clients. The configuration management team developed a software release specification template [20] for capturing information needed by the software quality assurance department to create the final end product.

Customer Relations

The customer relations team was designed to address four improvement areas: customer relations management, software quality assurance, software configuration management, and end-user interaction. This team started with a lot of energy and ideas, but the project manager got distracted with other work activities, leaving many of the initial plans for the group incomplete. By February 2005, the decision was made to reduce the scope of the project and change project managers. The key activity of the customer relations team was to communicate information about the improvement initiative to the customers that participated in the diagnosing phase and more broadly to TelSoft‟s customer base. This was accomplished through a letter sent by the

Division President which also included TelSoft‟s newly developed software charterSoftware

Charter. The group also responded directly to one of the specific customer comments from the diagnosing phase by reinstituting weekly status reports to that client [16, 21].

Requirements Management

The requirements management team was designed to improve requirements management, customer relations management, and configuration management. This team was also challenged by problems with the project manager who was temporarily disabled from a car accident early during the project. A replacement was not made, and the team‟s performance was negatively impacted. This team simplified the functional specification to reduce the number of required sections and created a change control template to be used for all changes to requirements [19].

By February 2006, the PST also recognized the need to better communicate status to the software development group. Although the September 2005 kick-off meeting had engaged the larger group, there had been no further communication about the improvement teams‟ progress, the Software Charter, or existence of the SCG. To remedy this, I provided a 45-minute status update [17] at the software development manager‟s meeting on March 15, 2006 and at the software development staff meeting on March 21, 2006.

Lessons Learned

The PST produced the First Wave Summary Report [23] documenting accomplishments from the first intervention cycle. The improvement teams had been asked to provide suggestions for what should be focused on in the second intervention cycle and to provide implementation plans for initiating the proposed actions. These reports made the members reflect upon how they could improve going forward. The PST met on March 30, 2006 to finalize this report and plan the second intervention cycle. The TelSoft members of the PST assessed the overall mood regarding improvement to be positive for the employees that were actively involved. Some lessons learned and decisions made:

TelSoft‟s website would be updated with the software charterSoftware Charter as well as

a few high-level process documents [22].

The PST needed to ensure there was a mechanism in place for monitoring and changing the newly created templates and associated process documents.

The SCG needed to focus more on executing the work outlined in the fixed agenda and less on the mechanics of running the meeting (e.g. metrics provided by project managers). A possible goal could be 90% execution and 10% mechanics. GSU involvement in those meetings would continue for the next several months until such a goal was met.

The next intervention cycle would have fewer than five improvement teams to economize on TelSoft‟s limited resources. During Intervention Cycle 1, increased coordination costs

were associated with having more teams. For instance, there was some overlap between the work of the quality assurance and configuration management teams that required a joint team meeting and several rounds of email to resolve.

By February 2006, the PST also recognized the need to better communicate status to the software development group. Although the September 2005 kick-off meeting had engaged the larger group, there had been no further communication about the improvement teams‟ progress, the Software Charter, or existence of the SCG. To remedy this, I provided a 45-minute status update [17] at the software development manager‟s meeting on March 15, 2006 and at the software development staff meeting on March 21, 2006.

By the end of Intervention Cycle 1, the composition of the PST changed. Dr. Roy Johnson left the research team and the PST to accept a Fulbright Fellowship in South Africa. One of the

TelSoft managers on the PST had resigned while another had been fired. The VP of Software Development appointed one of his direct reports to serve on the PST.