All presentations are in Powerpoint 97 format except 'HR Best Practices - Word97'.

1st QAI-QSM IT Benchmarking Consortium Report

The traditional definition of quality had its origin in defect prevention. However, in the emerging dynamic business scenario, quality is the art and science of understanding your customers’ needs & expectations and adapting systems & processes so that they consistently meet or exceed the customers’ expectations. Benchmarking is a validated practice across the world (in 1991, 85% of Fortune 500 cos. were using Benchmarking), which can help companies achieve these quality goals.

In its constant endeavor to make the Indian IT industry more focussed on performance, QAI facilitated a Benchmarking Conference from 31^st Jan-1^st Feb 2000 in New Delhi. Eminent speakers from the industry and academia shared Benchmarking concepts, theories, experiences, applications and benefits.

Dr. Pankaj Jalote, Head of the Department of Computer Science, IIT Kanpur, delivered an address on the Role of Benchmarking in Software Quality Management and Mr. Vinit Taneja, Senior Vice President of IQL, spoke on the ‘Balanced Scorecard’.

Mr. Bhaskar Chavali, SEPG^SMSM^SM Head of NIIT, shared the organization’s fascinating quality journey from CMM® Level 3 to Level 5.

One of the highlights of the day was a presentation by QAI, ‘Story the Indian Numbers Tell’ - on the QAI-QSM Consortium's quick benchmarking findings on over 65 Indian projects already received.

Other notable highlights were the talks by QAI on ‘Customer Loyalty Management’ and Mr. Sanjeev Narang of Innovation Systems on HR Best Practices.

The second day of the meet was marked by a Consortium Members’ roundtable, where the consortium members shared organizational best practices.

The Benchmarking meet evoked considerable interest and the participant feedback extremely positive. In its endeavor to make the Indian IT industry more competitive and performance focussed, QAI shall continue to facilitate such meets in the future and we look forward to your active support in these initiatives.

Software organizations in India are doing great in instituting process (as is evident by the high number of ISO certified and SEI^SM CMM® assessed organizations). While Process is critical, finally it is performance that counts. It is for the first time that performance benchmarking is being made available in India through this Consortium.

• The member organizations of the consortium will benefit from benchmarking their performance against domestic as well as international software projects, monitoring organizational parameters like performance, productivity and profitability, and getting feedback from the Consortium

• The Consortium has Dr. Pankaj Jalote as its advisor. Dr. Jalote is the professor and head of the Dept of Computer Science and Engineering at IIT Kanpur; a widely known and respected name in the software industry, and a thought leader of international repute.

• Regular meetings, get-togethers, videoconferences with international gurus, experience sharing sessions etc. will be an important feature of the Consortium.

• Country Assessment: The Consortium will bring out an annual India Competitive Assessment Report, analyzing Indian software industry vs. the world. This macro level assessment will not only help the Indian companies strategize but also the Indian software industry in its march towards becoming a software superpower.

• 4800 Projects data: The consortium boasts of a current repository of data from over 4800 international projects spread over as many as 9 application domains. In addition to this, the special Indian repository would also feed into the Consortium database.

Each member organization submits to Consortium the data from representative projects it wants to benchmark. These projects are then entered into the repository (already populated with data from over 4800 international projects) using the QSM tool called SLIM (Software Lifecycle Management).

The tool computes the Productivity Index (PI) for projects and the entire organization. This single figure is a reflection of project's performance on Size, Effort & Cost and Schedule. The PI can also be mapped on to CMM® Maturity Level. Empirical data shows that a change of one point in PI can lead to change in schedule by 10% and effort by 30%.

The QSM tool then generates several custom reports (using PI and other parameters) for each organization, that are analyzed by QAI consultant. QAI would also do a management briefing for each member organization on their own performance vis-à-vis others.

During the course of the year, members can also avail other benefits like video conferencing, events, experience sharing sessions, members meet, India assessment etc.

Members of the Consortium include Motorola India Electronics Ltd. (a CMM® level 5 organization), ICIL (a CMM® level 5 organization), Citicorp Overseas Software Limited (COSL), Mahindra British Telecom (MBT), NIIT, ST Micoroelectronics, Digital, BFL Software, TCS, Tata Infotech, Philips, iDLX Technology, Patni Computer Systems.

QSM (Quantitative Software Management) Inc. was founded in 1978 by Mr. Lawrence H. Putnam as a software consulting and tools firm. The company has its principal offices in Virginia USA with branches in Phoenix, AZ; Pittsfield, MA; London, UK; Paris, France; and Amsterdam, Netherlands.

QSM helps software organizations worldwide to effectively estimate, measure and control their software development and maintenance activities.

Mr. Putnam is renowned authority on software estimation and measurement. He is a well-known author, researcher and consultant in the field of software estimation and measurements. Mr. Putnam was the first recipient of " Freiman" award for sustained superior performance in parametric estimating covering a ten-year period. Over the past 20 years, Larry has conducted extensive research into software cost estimating techniques using operations research modeling techniques to determine significant cost, schedule and reliability drivers. He has extensive experience in data collection and analysis techniques. Besides publishing several (over 30) papers on the subject of software estimation and measurement, Mr. Putnam has authored/co-authored following books.

For more details on the consortium, contact Neeraj Garg, QAI Ltd., email: cutomer_relations@qaiasia.com.

You can also visit the Benchmarking page on the QAI WebSite at: http://www.qaiindia.com/Benchmarking/benchmarking.html