Introductory Notes

Process performance is a measure of the actual results achieved by following a process. Process performance is characterized by both process measures (e.g., effort, cycle time, and defect removal effectiveness) and product measures (e.g., reliability and defect density).

The common measures for the organization are composed of process and product measures that can be used to summarize the actual performance of processes in individual projects in the organization. The organizational data for these measures are analyzed to establish a distribution and range of results, which characterize the expected performance of the process when used on any individual project in the organization.

In this process area, the phrase "quality and process-performance objectives" covers objectives and requirements for product quality, service quality, and process performance. As indicated above, the term "process performance" includes product quality; however, to emphasize the importance of product quality, the phrase "quality and process-performance objectives" is used rather than just "process-performance objectives."

The expected process performance can be used in establishing the project's quality and process-performance objectives and can be used as a baseline against which actual project performance can be compared. This information is used to quantitatively manage the project. Each quantitatively managed project, in turn, provides actual performance results that become a part of the baseline data for the organizational process assets.

The associated process performance models are used to represent past and current process performance and to predict future results of the process. For example, the latent defects in the delivered product can be predicted using measurements of defects identified during product-verification activities.

When the organization has measures, data, and analytical techniques for critical process and product characteristics, it is able to do the following:

• Determine whether processes are behaving consistently or have stable trends (i.e., are predictable)

• Identify processes where the performance is within natural bounds that are consistent across process implementation teams

• Establish criteria for identifying whether a process or process element should be statistically managed, and determine pertinent measures and analytical techniques to be used in such management

• Identify processes that show unusual (e.g., sporadic or unpredictable) behavior

• Identify any aspects of the processes that can be improved in the organization's set of standard processes

• Identify the implementation of a process which performs best