Representation Comparison

Because CMMI supports two representations, many concepts are discussed in this chapter from capability and maturity levels, to the ordering of process areas, to base and advanced practices. Table 5.3 summarizes the differences between the two representations. However, remember that the two representations bear many similarities, which were discussed in previous chapters. Representations are merely two views into the same CMMI best practices.

Table 5.3. Comparing Continuous and Staged Representations

Continuous Representation	Staged Representation
Process areas are organized by process area categories.	Process areas are organized by maturity level.
Improvement is measured using capability levels. Capability levels measure maturity of a particular process across an organization. range from 0 through 5.	Improvement is measured using maturity levels. Maturity levels measure maturity of a set of processes across an organization. range from 1 through 5.
There are two types of specific practices: base and advanced. All specific practices appear in the continuous representation.	There is only one type of specific practice. The concepts of base and advanced practices is not used. All specific practices appear in the staged representation except when a related base-advanced pair of practices appears in the continuous representation, in which case only the advanced practice appears in the staged representation.
Capability levels are used to organize the generic practices.	Common features are used to organize generic practices.
All generic practices are included in each process area.	Only the level 2 and level 3 generic practices are included.
Equivalent staging allows determination of a maturity level from an organization's achievement profile.	There is no need for an equivalence mechanism back to the continuous representation because each organization can choose what to improve and how much to improve it using the staged representation.