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1993-10-19
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Reuse Capability Assessment: Case Study Results
Ted Davis
Software Productivity Consortium
SPC Building
2214 Rock Hill Road
Herndon, Virginia 22070
Tel: (703) 742-7335, fax: (703) 742-7200
Email: davis@software.org
Abstract
This paper provides preliminary results of case studies conducted by the Software Produc-
tivity Consortium on the validity and usefulness of its Reuse Capability Mo del (RCM) and
assessment process. The Consortium conducted the case studieswith organizations who have
successfully instituted software reuse. The objective was to evaluate the RCMagainst the expe-
rience of these organizations. Questions p osed by the case studies and presented in this paper
include: Does the RCM capture the factors critical to improving an organization's reuse prac-
tice? Does the RCM assessment process accurately identify an organization's reuse strengths
and improvement opportunities? Is the RCM assessment process cost-effective?
Keywords: Reuse adoption, reuse capability, reuse process, assessment, case study
Workshop Goals: Promote discussion on issues critical to instituting software reuse in an
organization.
Working Groups: Reuse management, organization, and economics; reuse maturity models;
reuse process models
Copyright fcl1993,Software Productivity Consortium Services Corporation. All rights reserved.
This material is based in part upon work sponsored by the Advanced Research Projects Agency
under Grant # MDA972-92-J-1018. The content does not necessarily reflect the position or the
policy of the U.S. Government, and no official endorsement should be inferred.
Produced by the Software Productivity Consortium under contract to the Virginia Center of
Excellence for Software Reuse and Technology Transfer.
Davis_T- 1
1 Background
In 1992 the Software Productivity Consortium released the first version of its Reuse Adoption Guide-
book [1]. The guidebook provides a comprehensive approach to institutionalizing and improving
an organization's software reuse practice. This approach includes three major elements: the Reuse
Adoption Process, Domain Assessment Guidelines, and Reuse Capability Model. The Reuse Adop-
tion Process provides step-by-step guidance on initiating, planning, and implementing a program
to institutionalize software reuse practices. The Domain Assessment Guidelines provide guidance
on qualitatively estimating the potential for reuse in an organization's business area. The Reuse
Capability Model is a self-assessment and planning aid used to gain a comprehensive understanding
of an organization's process with respect to reuse and to establish priorities for improvement.
The Consortium developed the Reuse Adoption Guidebook by leveraging industry, government,
and academic work in reuse, and through an evolutionary development approach including many
internal and external expert reviews. In 1993 the Consortium is continuing to evolve its reuse
technologies by applying them in:
fflReuse adoption case studies. Collaborative efforts to evaluate the reuse adoption tech-
nologies against the experience of organizations who have successfully instituted reuse.
fflReuse adoption pilot projects. Collaborative efforts with organizations seeking to initiate
and implement a reuse program to improve their reuse practice.
The Consortium plans to conduct three case studies and three pilot projects in 1993. This paper
presents some preliminary results of the three case studies on the RCM and its associated assessment
process.
2 Position
Institutionalizing software reuse in an organization requires that many technical, organizational,
economic, and cultural issues be addressed. As attention on reuse has increased in the past several
years many issues have been raised. However, without a managed approach for addressing these
issues, software engineers and managerswill have difficulty in devising appropriate reuse strategies
for their organizations, thereby increasing their risk of stalled, misguided, or failed reuse programs.
The Reuse Adoption Process, Domain Assessment Guidelines, and Reuse Capability Model provide
a managed approach to help engineers and managers address themany technical and nontechnical
issues and implement reuse programs that reduce risk and increase the benefits the organizations
realize from reuse.
The Consortium's key concerns in developing the reuse adoption technologies are whether these
technologies are valid and effective. The Reuse Adoption Case Study is one step the Consortium
is taking to begin to establish and improve the validity and effectiveness of its reuse adoption
technologies. This paper focuses on the case study results for the RCMand its associated assessment
process. The specific questions addressed here include:
fflDoes the RCM capture the factors critical to improving an organization's reuse practice?
fflDoes the RCM assessment process accurately identify an organization's reuse strengths and
improvement opportunities?
Davis_T- 2
fflIs the RCM assessment process cost-effective?
The following subsections characterize the case study participants, describe the case study approach,
and present the preliminary case study results.
2.1 Case Study Participants
For the case studies, the Consortium sought organizations who have successfully institutionalized
reuse. The motive for seeking these organizations was to get feedback on the reuse adoption
technologies from people who have "been there." Each of the case study organizations has been
practicing reuse for at least five years in the development and/or maintenance of customer prod-
ucts. The case studies included organizations that developed systems for the Department ofDefense
(DoD) and organizations that developed commercial products; they included both small organiza-
tions (< 50 staff) and large organizations (> 1000 staff); and they included organizations in the
embedded systems business as well as organizations in the information systems business.
Due to confidentiality agreements, specific attributes of the case study participants and specific
data resulting from an organization's assessment are not disclosed in this paper.
2.2 Case Study Approach
For the case studies,the Consortium took the approach of applying the RCM assessment process in
conducting actual assessments of the organizations' reuse capabilities. In addition,the Consortium
also conducted structured interviews to understand how the organizations' reuse practices evolved
and administered post-assessment questionnaires to obtain additional feedback.
The assessment process is similar to a focus group format. A group of individuals from the orga-
nization review and discuss the factors in the RCM, then reach consensus on their strengths and
improvement opportunities. Consortium staff actedas facilitators. The steps in the assessment
process are as follows:
fflForm the Team. A team of four to eight individuals is formed representing the major
functions of the organization. Team members should be knowledgeable in the organization's
process, policies, procedures, and products.
fflTrain the Team. Facilitators provide a half-day training on the adoption process, models,
and assessment for the assessment team.
fflDevelop Organizational Profile. The organizational profile is a rough sketch of the orga-
nization, its process, products, and business. It serves as a context for the assessment.
fflAssess the Critical Success Factors. The RCM is defined by 21 critical success factors
organized into four groups (application development, asset development, management, and
process & technology). Each factor is defined in terms of one or more goals (see [1] for a
complete description of the factors and goals). The team assesses their organization against
each goal on:
- The extent the organization meets the specified goal on a scale of 1-not satisfied, 2-
partially satisfied, 3-fully satisfied.
Davis_T- 3
- The expected impact on the organization's reuse capability from fully satisfying the
stated goal on a scale of 1-no positive impact, 2-low positive impact, 3-moderate positive
impact, 4-high positive impact.
fflDevelop Findings. Based on the discussions resulting from the previous step, the group
identifies its strengths and improvement opportunities through consensus.
2.3 Case Study Results
The results presented in this section are the statistical averages computed from the team member
assessment responses and post-assessment questionnaires (25 team memb ers from 3 case studies).
Figure 1 illustrates the computed average per critical success factor for the expected impact on the
organization's reuse capability from fully satisfying the asso ciated goals. Nearly all of the factors
were judged as having a moderate to high impact on an organizations reuse capability. This result
is one indicator as to whether the RCM captures the factors critical to improving an organization's
reuse capability.
In addition, the post-assessment questionnaire asked the participants to rate the following state-
ments on a scale of 1-strongly disagree, 2-disagree, 3-neutral, 4-agree, 5-strongly agree. The average
response is indicated.
fflThe Reuse Capability Model covers the process issues most critical to effective software reuse.
Aver age response = 4:3
fflThe reuse capability assessment accurately identified my organization's reuse pro cess strengths
and improvement opportunities. Averag e response = 4:4
fflThe reuse capability assessment is a cost-effective technique for understanding an organiza-
tion's reuse process and planning improvements. Average response = 3:8
Two case study groups had also suggested the addition of a critical success factor addressing
intergroup coordination and communication. Some participants rated the effectiveness somewhat
lower because they believed they already had a good understanding of their pro cess. However,
they indicated the assessment would be more effective for organizations who are just beginning to
implement a reuse program.
Although the Consortium does not view these results as proof of validity, it is encouraged that these
results indicate its reuse adoption technologies are a step in the right direction. Further study will
be conducted primarily through reuse adoption pilot projects. The lessons learned from the case
studies and pilot projects will be worked into the next version of the Reuse Adoption Guidebook.
3 Comparison
Technologies similar to theConsortium's reuse adoption technologies include the Central Archive for
Reusable Defense Software (CARDS)Franchise Plan [2] and the Software Technology for Adaptable,
Reliable Systems (STARS) Reuse StrategyMo del (RSM) [3 ]. The CARDS Franchise Plan includes
a series of handbooks designed to support the implementation of domain specific reuse in DoD
Davis_T- 4
software procurements. The Consortium's reuse adoption technologyis designed to support business
organizations in general (DoD and commercial) and it is not tied to a specific reuse technology.
The purpose of the STARS RSM is to identify areas in which organization objectives, p olicies,
procedures, and process definitions can be applied in furthering a cost-effective reuse strategy. It is
specifically designed to support the STARS vision of "doing reuse." The RSM is primarily intended
to support project planning for reuse, whereas the RCMis primarily intended to support capability
improvement planning for product-line organizations.
References
[1] S. P. Consortium, "Reuse Adoption Guidebook," Tech. Rep. SPC-92051-CMC, Software Pro-
ductivity Consortium, November 1992.
[2] CARDS, "Franchise Plan, Central Archive for ReusableDefense Software," Tech. Rep. STARS-
AC-04116/000/00, Paramax Systems Corporation, March 1993.
[3] STARS, "Draft Reuse Maturity Model: Reuse Strategy Model Prototyp e," Tech. Rep. D613-
55159, Advanced Research Projects Agency, November 1992.
4 Biography
Ted Davis is the technical lead for the Software Productivity Consortium's reuse adoption project
and is responsible for developing the Reuse Capability Model and Reuse Adoption Process. Previ-
ously Ted has supported the development and validation of the Consortium's Evolutionary Spiral
Process for software development and the Synthesis process for reuse-oriented software production.
Prior to that, Ted was an officerin the U.S. Air Force for eight years where he developed and ac-
quired command and control systems. Ted has a M.S. in Computer Science from Purdue University
and a M.S. in Systems Management from the University of Southern California.
Davis_T- 5
Figure 1: Critical Success Factor Impact Data
Davis_T- 6