Software quality and the Capability Maturity Model
James D. Herbsleb, David Zubrow, Dennis R. Goldenson, Will Hayes, Mark C. Paulk · Communications of the ACM · 1997
A bout the time Fred Brooks was warning us there was not likely to be a single, "silver bullet" solution to the essential difficulties of developing software [3], Watts Humphrey and others at the Software Engineering Institute (SEI) were busy putting together the set of ideas that was to become the Capability Maturity Model (CMM) for Software. 1 The CMM adopted the opposite of the quick-fix silver bullet philosophy.It was intended to be a coherent, ordered set of incremental improvements, all having experienced success in the field, packaged into a roadmap that showed how effective practices could be built on one another in a logical progression (see "The Capability Maturity Model for Software" sidebar).Far from a quick fix, it was 1 CMM and Capability Maturity Model are service marks of Carnegie Mellon University.