1. ALM Basic Standardized Advanced Dynamic
Architecture Architecture not properly documented
Inconsistent or non-existent use of Modelling tools
Architecture role understood and clearly identified, combined with other roles
Tools identified, early adoption phase
Dedicated architecture team
Architectural tools take into account the deployment process
Formalized, documented architected process
Consistent inclusion of patterns and practices
& Design
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No clear process to transform business requirements into technical Some habits starting forming, some process consistency Integrated tools used across different teams across different projects Clearly defined mechanism to share or force usage of patterns and practices
requirements across projects and teams
Documentation irregularly maintained, not consistently across teams or Leverage use of practices and processes
Architecting not considering Deployment early in design projects Contributes back to the development community internally and externally
Application of practices and processes across teams and projects
through the use of published articles, whitepapers etc.
Unclear understanding of the Architect Role
Requirement Broad assumptions by development team that they know what to build
Little or no written requirements and no specific tools
Consistent quality and format to documented and store requirements
Versioning of requirements enabled and tracked
Tracking of requirements types, relationships and task traceability Institution of Product Change Control Board
Use of fully integrated tools for traceability using requirements coverage analysis Use of impact analysis reports for change requests
Engineering No use UX role defined, and UX done by coders or whoever available UX role defined, not necessarily staffed by a UX expert reports, and integrated tools produce UI/requirement/task matrix
UX Experts and User documentation specialists involved early in project
Published metrics on requirements progress and change requests
Limited or no customer feedback, and little or no validation with stakeholders Manual customer review cycle UX Experts incorporate latest and greatest UI principals
& UX Data or process driven design User center design principals understood but supported by disconnected tools User centered design tool (storyboarding) integrated with requirement and task Continual improvement of UX for subsequent use
work items
No or non-standardized, on- demand ad-hoc user documentation Some consistent user documentation Designers understand the intersection of ease of implementation vs. great UI
Software May or may not be using Source Control or do irregular check-ins
Local copies of code
Non-integrated source control tool usage
Dedicated build machine
Use of an IDE integrated source control tool
Dedicated configuration management role
Centralized, reusable build scripts
Integration of multiple internally and externally produced code modules
Configuration Manual , undocumented on-demand build process Informal undocumented build process Formal, documented build process Build outcome notification and monitoring
No traceability between build and content/work performed and requirement Branching and merging understood by lead integrators Build metrics published regularly Dedicated DevOp role for maintaining build process and infrastucture
Management Unclear understanding of branch/merge concepts Daily or regular check-ins performed Build on demand enabled
Unit tests run as BVT
Governance Projects started with limited justification
Projects funded on key influencer opinions
Informal certification for chosen compliance program
Compliance certification applied and monitored inconsistently across teams.
Formal certification for chosen compliance program Fully integrated portfolio management tools & process
Using portfolio management techniques but portfolio and project management MS Portfolio Manager integrated with project management system and
tools not necessarily integrated development system
No ROI evaluation or retrospective Semi-manual tools processes (excel lists etc)
Cross–team resources managed and time assigned Participation in creation and review process of industry standard compliance
No Portfolio review process Random use of initiative targets
Integrated with certification and compliance program programs
No compliance program or target in place
ROI and retrospective supported by metrics
No process improvement initiative in place
Deployment Little or no communication between operations and development teams
No formal help desk/bug tracking process, ad-hoc communication via mail
Stand alone Help desk incident tracking tool (training, user issues, infrastructure)
Non-integrated Bug tracking
Help desk integrated with bug management
Monitored instrumentation hooked into infrastructure and applications
Using Helpdesk quality metrics on turn around time, cost of maintenance
and identification of error prone subsystems
& Operations Infrastructure deployment issues identified and resolved at deployment time Some monitoring and deployment procedures and/or approval process Tools to deploy and validate successful build deployment (smoke tests etc.) Automated , traceable Deployment
Pro-active ongoing monitoring
No documented, segregated environments, such as development, pre- Limited automation and validation of build deployment Clear cross-functional team identified
production, test, UAT, production) Deployment Manager role identified Infrastructure architecture documented in integrated tools
Ad-hoc, unregulated Build promotion schedule Documented infrastructure, but segregated environment ownership unclear Segregated environments, ownership and promotion procedures defined
Testing & Quality No dedicated Q/A team
Ad-hoc functional testing performed by development team. Closer to
Dedicated Q/A group staffed
Test Plan process defined
Organization culture accepting of defined testing policies
Test planning begins at the requirements phase
Test Process improvement group and tools in place
Industry leadership on evaluating potential testing tools and strategies
Assurance debugging than testing.
No quality metrics
Un-integrated testing tools in place Testing is measured and quantifiable process Defect prevention practiced
Test procedures and environment informally documented Integrated tools generating publishable metrics Testing based on statistical sampling, measurement of confidence,
Long fix and deploy cycles trustworthiness and reliability
Rudimentary progress tracking
High regression bug rate
Project Planning No formal stakeholder communication plan in place
Informal or non-existent processes for estimation, planning, risk management,
Individual un-integrated non-standardized use of Project planning tooling
Tool usage dependent on strength of individual P.M.
Integrated management of bugs, tasks, change requests Portfolio Management, Project management have full integration
Use of EPM for financial and resource tracking through EPM to VSTS integration Metrics used to drive project and aide in estimation and re-estimation
& Management and scope. Gut-feel approach.
Informal team coordination and task assignment using email, or verbal
Financial manually evaluated manually by P.M. External resources, stakeholders and partners sharing project information and
have integrated tools to perform their role in the project (Sharepoint, Team Plain)
PMO in place
PM responsibility clearly assigned
Financials not evaluated by P on an ongoing basis.
.M. Dedicated Project ManagersV
No clear P defined responsibility
.M.
Development The developers have up front knowledge before they start codeing of the
frameworks that we will be using
The Developers use a framework to support webservice devlopment
The Developers have sufficent knowledge of the latest Microsoft Technologies to
The Developers use a framework to abstract presentation work away from
business logic
The Developers have mandated training of latest development technologies
The Developers have Lead Developers with clearly assigned knowledge areas
The developers use peer mentoring be able to fully utilize the investments in developer tools The Developers use a framework to assist with management of Identity
The Developers use Code Contracts and
The coders follow an agreed upon codeing standard The Developers use the Secure Development Lifecycle Developers use a state maschine engine framework Test driven development
Know where to improve! Check out the full ALM Assessment Guidance: http://vsaralmassessment.codeplex.com