Testing Maturity Model Project

Testing is a vital components of the software development process, and provides strong support for the production of quality software. Many organizations have not realized the full potential of their testing processes, because these processes are very often immature. Process improvement models that are currently available like the Capability Maturity Model (CMM), ISO-9000 and Bootstrap have not adequately addressed testing issues. For these reasons our group is developing a Testing Maturity Model. The purpose of the TMM is to assist software organizations with assessing and improving their software testing processes. The TMM is:

• A compliment to the Capability Maturity Model.
• Based on the historical evolution of the testing process.
• Based on best industry practices.

The TMM has two major components:

1. A set of 5 levels that define testing capability. Each level is composed of:
   • Maturity Goals
   • Maturity Subgoals Activities
   • Tasks and Responsibilities
2. An Assessment Model. This consists of:
   • A Maturity Questionnaire (has a web based component)
   • An Assessment Procedure
   • Team Selection and Training Guidelines

Current research efforts are focused on:

• Moving the TMM towards compliance with SW-CMM.
• Field testing the assessment model
• Testers Workbench - tools for each level of the TMM.
• Developing a framework for building and integrating Development Maturity Models (DMMs) across software development sub domains.

Faculty contacts: Dr. Ilene Burnstein, Dr. Robert Carlson

SM: Testing Maturity Model and TMM are service marks of the Illinois Institute of Technology.