CMMI Crash Course™- Everything you wanted to know about CMMI that the SEI won't teach you.

This course has proven informative for: people who know very little about CMMI and even less about appraisals, all the way to people with extensive, high maturity knowledge and experience with CMMI. It is designed to address frequently asked -- but seldomly answered -- questions about CMMI and SCAMPI appraisals. All-too-often these questions do not get answered until well into or past the decision to pursue CMMI. In effect, many people are pursuing process improvement using CMMI before they have answers to important questions.

With a sub-title of Everything You Wanted to Know About CMMI that the SEI Won't Teach You! does it sound like it's official?

This course is NOT designed as an alternative to "Introduction to CMMI". If you need Introduction to CMMI to be on a SCAMPI appraisal team, you can't take this instead.

The Crash Course™ answers many questions people who come to (or are thinking of taking) the "Intro" course have when they arrive, but leave without ever learning. It's for people who want to begin with the end in mind. Unfortunately, to really answer some of those "end game" questions properly, a good bit of context *is* required.

The Crash Course™ provides the context that people need in order to make informed decisions about whether or not to pursue CMMI, with whom, how to go about doing so, and establishes a proper mindset for making strategic decisions about CMMI.

Some of the Crash Course™ material is a high-altitute abstraction of appraisal team training amalgamated with bits that will seem familiar to "Intro" participants. Some parts are simply a walk through of the model's structure -- because without it much of the model, the appraisal, and strategic decisions don't make sense. There's also a generous helping of practical, experienced advice on what works and what doesn't.

All of the material is original and uses no SEI content. Any material taken from other sources are given proper credit.

The course provides insights and no-nonsense information on:

A brief history of the SEI and CMMI.
What the CMMI is and isn’t.
What the appraisal is and isn’t.
How the appraisal works.
How you need to qualify and prepare for having an appraisal performed or have people on the appraisal.
Typical Process Improvement Plan.
Different macro-level ways to get everything set-up. And,
How to implement CMMI and appraisals in Agile/Small organizations.

People (especially executives) who are still investigating CMMI as a process improvement approach alternative, or, who are pursuing CMMI due to "market forces" may be doing so not fully knowledgeable of how it really works. They are not familiar with the model, its constellations and representations, or about the differences between Maturity Levels and Capability Levels. In some cases, the Intro course only confuses them more... especially when they have SW-CMM experience. This is also common for companies that have been through a CBA-IPI, and don't know enough about the SCAMPI appraisal method to make the necessary shift in execution of the model or preparations for appraisal.

Whether it's because the instructor isn't qualified or prepared to answer these questions, or whether it's the materials that don't provide answers, the results are the same. Too many people start their CMMI journey without all the information they should be armed with.
(We should point out that when Entinex runs the Introduction to CMMI, most of the Crash Course™ content is covered.) :-)

The course addresses all that in a fun, self-deprecating and interactive way and DOESN'T knock the SEI or CMMI. In fact, it helps explain CMMI to folks often otherwise too pre-occupied to take the time to understand the model!

No, actually. Not just that, they've had representatives ATTEND the course! You see, the challenge for SEI as well as for CMMI users/prospects is how to better educate people about the model and ratings so they can make informed desicions. There are so many ways to go about it and there's so much information and disinformation about it that cutting through the hype as well as the chaff is challenging. This leaves both SEI and prospective CMMI users trying to find each other in the dark while being chained to an unknown, unseen anchor.

The Entinex CMMI® Crash Course is based on "CMMI® for Development, CMMI-DEV, V.1.2", CMU/SEI-2006-TR-008, ESC-TR-2006-008 ®2006 by Carnegie Mellon University; however, neither Carnegie Mellon University nor the Software Engineering Institute have reviewed this course and accordingly do not directly or indirectly endorse it.

This course is not a Software Engineering Institute course and does not qualify attendees for any Software Engineering Institute course credit.

®CMMI is a registered trademark of Carnegie Mellon University.

The origins of the Crash Course™ began rather organically in our observation that we were routinely answering the same questions from one prospective process improvement client to the next. After noticing the pattern, Entinex has made the course available during the marketing cycle and always at the start of any CMMI-related engagement. Even among companies experienced in CMMI, the response has been that the course delivers information the organization had previously not known, or at last had delivered the information in a way that makes the material accessible and easily digested.

Here are some of the questions we answer... many of them were news to the ears of even people who've been working with CMMI for years!

We've done some back-of-the-napkin calculations and determined that the Crash Course™ is valued at over US$30,000! And easily can require three or more years of well-timed experience!

We arrived at this figure by adding up conservative estimates for the cost of the following activities:

and this doesn't include the time-value of being in class for nearly 4 weeks, opportunity costs, and the effort required to qualify to be an appraiser! Let alone the pre-requisite experience, and timing required to qualify to become an instructor or an appraiser.

(If you think finding 2 appraisals to be on before going to appraiser training, and another appraisal to actually conduct so you can be observed, or an Intro class to conduct to be observed is easy to do in a short period of time, think again!)

For more information about the costs of SEI courses and costs of official SEI observations, please visit the SEI's page on that.

That's the tough part. In 2008 we have plans to produce a packaged set that will include a DVD and transcript of the course being delivered to a live audience, and the course slides. The package will ship with a condensed CMMI booklet, our CMMIFAQ in book form, and a deck of our Planning Poker cards.

Meanwhile, we can "ship" you a trained instructor to deliver the course for about US$3500 plus travel (except in certain markets where we can spare you the travel costs).

Anyone buying a Crash Course™ service for in-house delivery will receive a DVD package (when it's available) at a deep discount off the list price... our current thinking is... FREE!

Also... in-house Crash Course™ clients will get a US$2000 discount on the Gap Analysis, or other future consulting if they choose to go that route. (By the way, the Crash Course™ cost is fully included in the Gap Analysis when a Gap Analysis is contracted from the outset.)

Folks who buy the Crash Course™ either as the DVD package or live receive an exclusive "priority code" means to contact us with any questions about CMMI.

Please contact us and let us know you'd like the benefit and value of Crash Course™ before you get too deep with CMMI. We'll be glad to work something out for you.

CMM, CMMI, and SCAMPI are registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office by Carnegie Mellon University.

CMMI Crash Course™

Everything You Wanted to Know About CMMI that the SEI Won't Teach You! (OK. OK. They would... and do... but it's not their style.)

Everything You Wanted to Know About CMMI that the SEI Won't Teach You!
(OK. OK. They would... and do... but it's not their style.)