How to survive the trend of reorganizations, mergers, management changes, and corporate takeovers and continue to retain an effective process focus is a challenge that may best be met at the "grass roots" level through collegial teams working to maintain their culture. This presentation defines the use of teams from multiple projects to define and implement a strong process improvement program that provides continuity over time. Team involvement in establishment of goals, development of training to support the process, evaluation of project metrics, and sharing lessons learned, all establish a culture of sharing that helps prevent deterioration when there are changes in management and new challenges in the marketplace.

Examples from process programs in place within various organizations are included, with emphasis on the Command and Control Systems (CCS) division of Raytheon Systems Company (formerly Hughes Aircraft Company). In this division a long-established culture of planning and managing software projects has led to a shared understanding of how projects "should" be organized and managed for greater effectiveness. The ongoing use of collegial teams to discuss process issues and lessons learned, propose solutions shared between projects, and implement process initiatives has proven to be successful in obtaining buy-in and enthusiasm.

Biography: As Technical Director of the Command and Control Systems Division Engineering Process Group (EPG), Jane Moon initiated and led her division's improvement effort from SEI CMM Level 2 to its current Level 4 and 5 activities as a designated center of excellence for software engineering within Raytheon. Ms. Moon played a key role in defining the organization and focus of EPGs within Hughes Aircraft Company and the company-level process deployment approach. She has mentored process group personnel in many organizations. Jane has been a member of the CMM Integration (CMMI) Project, a key reviewer of both the software CMM and systems engineering CMM, and was a member of the SCE and CBA Advisory Boards to the SEI. She is a qualified Lead Assessor of the Internal Process Improvement (IPI) assessment method. She has been a presenter at the SEPG National Conference, SEI Symposium, SEI Risk Management Conference, and other conferences and process-related events. Ms. Moon has 30 years of software development and management experience, with the past 17 years at Raytheon. She has a BS and MS from the University of California, Irvine.

Motorola Quality Culture
Paul Dickerson, Director of Continuous Quality Improvement, Space and
                        Systems Technology Group, Motorola, p08223@email.mot.com

Motorola has for several years been synonymous with quality worldwide. After several missed opportunities beginning in the early 1970's, the corporation was transformed by the Six Sigma Quality Initiative in the 1980's. The enlargement of the Six Sigma program from it's origin in manufacturing to an enterprise wide initiative has been underway since 1994 in the Space and Systems Technology Group. The benefits, techniques, successes and mistakes of this 30 year journey are summarized including an emphasis on software and systems engineering quality.

Biography: Paul Dickerson graduated from Lamar State College with a BSME degree and obtained his MSME and MBA from Arizona State University. He has worked for Motorola Space and Systems Technology Group since 1965. He currently holds the position of Director of Continuous Quality Improvement - Space and Systems Technology Group and has also held the position of Director of Quality and Continuous Improvement - Satellite Communications Group. Paul has many awards including the Recipient of U.S. Army "Outstanding Civilian Award" for support while deployed to Kuwait Theater of Operations, February 1991, the Manager of the first program in Motorola to receive two CEO Quality Awards, and has designed an inexpensive, portable artificial kidney for the Arizona Kidney Foundation.

Coordinator: George W. O'Mary, The Boeing Company, george.w.o'mary@boeing.com

UCI Maps and Directions to meeting are available.

Next Meeting:

Date: Friday, October 30, 1998
Topic: Software Development Capability Evaluation (SDCE):
           A Customer and Contractor Perspective
Speakers: Karen Powel, The Boeing Company
                  Major Christine Bonniksen, United States Air Force
Coordinator: George W. O'Mary, The Boeing Company,
                      george.w.o'mary@boeing.com

The Irvine Research Unit in Software wishes to thank its corporate sponsors:

Sustaining:

The Boeing Company * Boeing North American, Inc. * Microsoft Corporation
Northrop Grumman Corporation * Raytheon Company * Sun Microsystems Laboratories * TRW

Supporting:

Beckman Coulter * FileNet Corporation * Printronix, Inc.*

Continuus Software Corporation * Hewlett Packard

For further information on SPIN or IRUS,