Blog: Dan E. Linstedt

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Standards, Compliance, and Successes

I've been asked about standards, and what they contribute to the success of a project within business. Particularly from the entry on Architecture, Standards, and Business. Standards contribute quite a bit actually. But standards can also be overkill. There are some neat comments on Agile Modeling forum regarding the use of standards, and I've spoken with Scott Ambler about some of these things (but not yet in detail). Grady Booch and I have discussed the nature of useful standards in brief conversations, of which we still have to draw some conclusions - with that let me continue my entry.

http://www.MyersHolum.comWhat kinds of standards do we have in industry?
There are hundreds, if not thousands of standards all over mature industries. Some of the ones I can think of right now include: ISO, HIPPA, BASIL II, ANSI, SEI/CMM, PMBOK, ASCII, RS-232C, FireWire, Encryption, Security, and so on.

When an industry or business is NEW or yet-undefined, there are no real standards or accepted methodologies for build out. Take Data Warehousing for example: when it was first discussed (in the early 70’s) there were no best practices, no standards, no suggested ways of completing projects. However as time went on and practitioners built data warehouses, they discovered that when best practices and standards were applied, the businesses reaped significantly more benefits (lower cost, reduced risk, easier implementation, faster build-out) and so on.

Now I can tell you some hairy stories about standards and over-kill. When we first introduced SEI/CMM standards (lock stock and barrel) to our manufacturing organization, we had severe trouble implementing CMM Level 3 – too many standards for tiny little projects which had small impacts on the state of business. In other words, the standards were too thick, too heavy to implement. Then we applied “standards thinners” (like paint thinners) which didn’t destroy the quality of the standards, but rather reduced them to a working plan. The project still followed standards and best practices, only less of them.

Of course SEI was first proposing CMM as a level of software engineering, as they still do. What we did was apply SEI and CMM best practices to a blend of data warehousing best practices and standards. We wanted a system that was repeatable (in architecture and design), easy to build, consistent, with reduced risk and rapid build out. We quickly reached CMM Level 5 with our organization and our data warehouse as we followed this hybrid paradigm.

We combined Spiral methodologies with Waterfall checkpoints at major steps to reduce risk, we trained individuals before engaging them on projects, we undertook versioning, and centralized store of documentation, we also put together risk analysis spreadsheets and project size estimates by using FUNCTION POINTS. We also continued to label and number ALL requirements, refocusing the requirements as needed to be specific reachable, and measurable goals (using RUPP processes). Finally we attached the project plan numbered items to each specific requirement, so we could produce business process metrics and answer user questions on progress and risk at any given point. We had a team of 3 people working on this project at any given time.

So you see, even with small projects, a certain level of standards help the team achieve what they need to do – with quality. We helped befriend the business users, upon completion they threw MORE work at us than we could handle. We helped turn the business belief from: IT can’t deliver; we’ll build it ourselves, TO: IT has done a tremendous job AND saved us tons of money and time.

By the way, here’s something I want you to walk away with (I teach this in my VLDW class at TDWI): The larger the data set, OR the larger the project, the less likely you are to produce a success WITHOUT standards! In other words: The larger the project, the larger the data set – the more likely you are to succeed with standards and best practices. Without standards and best practices – your project will fall into chaos and disarray and quickly succumb to unforeseen / unmitigated risks.

I created something called The Matrix Methodology for data warehousing, now I’m creating a new methodology much more advanced and incorporating ideas like Agile Data Modeling (process wise), Data Vault Data Modeling (physical), Master Data Management, and SEI/CMM components for the market place. My current company puts these principles to work in the projects, and RFI’s that we assist with.

By the way, while I didn’t focus on it very much, standards certainly assist those in need of compliant projects, and compliant data stores – get to where they need to go, but that’s an entry for another time.

Hope this helps,
Dan Linstedt

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