Why Choose a CMMI Certified Outsourcing Vendor.

TEAM International provides a brief overview of Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) and tries to answer the question why it is better for IT outsourcing services buyers to partner with a CMMI appraised vendor.
What is CMMI?
Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) is a specific guidance derived from the Capability Maturity Model (CMM) methodology that has been developed by Software Engineering Institute (SEI) of Carnegie Mellon University from the late 1990s. Initially the methodology was designed as a tool to objectively measure the ability of government and military contractors to properly use their processes for effective performance of contracted software projects. CMM was fully funded by the US Air Force through the military research. In 1989 it was gradually adapted for commercial organizations’ certification.
SEI defines CMMI as a model providing “guidance to use when developing processes”. Based on this definition it becomes clear that the CMMI models are, in fact, not the processes, as misunderstood by many organizations, nor are they the process descriptions. They are guidelines that contain criteria of the processes’ quality assessment and methods of their improvement. The actual processes used within the organization depend on such factors as application domain, organization’s structure, size and many others. The process areas of a CMMI model do not map one to one with the processes used within the organization.
There are five CMMI levels:
Level 1 - Ad-Hoc: The processes are undefined and unstructured. There is chaos in each organization’s process area.
Level 2 – Managed: The processes are defined at the project level. The solutions are very reactive.
Level 3 - Defined: The processes are defined at the organizational level. It is one of the most important levels, since it suggests that the company has learnt how to put the processes to the project level and how to make them work in each certain case.
Level 4 - Quantitatively Managed: All the key processes are properly managed and controlled. The project metrics are gathered and analyzed.
Level 5 - Optimizing: The processes are improved based on the gathered metrics.

Key benefits of outsourcing to CMMI certified vendor
- Higher quality of a product due to constant quality control on each of the development steps
- Lower costs due to a more productive and efficient way of creating a product
- Better communication between client and vendor due to established rules and procedures
- Better visibility of the product life cycle and development activities due to better organized documentation
- Higher quality and lower costs due to use of the newest technologies and tools

What TEAM guaranties as a CMMI Level 3 outsourcing vendor
TEAM International Services, Inc. is CMMI Level 3 Certified since July 2008.

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