Implementing usability methods into CMMI-compliant software development process

Usability methods are described in many books, online articles and well-known standards as ISO (International Organization for Standardization) and CMMI (Capability of Maturity Model Improvements). Nevertheless there are not that many organizations in Russia and the rest of the World where the whole process is based on the human-centered design principles. As the result we have plenty of products which do not serve us as they should and many projects which overrun their budgets dramatically or fail. We keep losing money, making the same mistakes over and over again. This is true not just for some small and inexperienced companies but also for the medium and large organizations. In our presentation we examine the reasons why it is happening, and suggest some one of the way to deal with these problems. We took the CMMI for Developers as the most popular, open and well-known source of the process improvements' knowledge and compare its validation methods with the commonly known usability practices. Behind the curtains of terminology we discovered that these methods were very similar and also that they served the single purpose of helping to create products which fulfil our needs better. Besides comparing the terminology, we suggest the ways of practical application of CMMI to a development process. We describe the steps which can be made to start the improvements in usability/validation area, show some examples of the human-centered design methods applicable for each phase of the project, the result of each step and approximate efforts involved. We want to help organizations similar to ours to understand that: "User-centred design is not a step in the process - it is the process. It is not just about usability - it is about value. It is not expensive - it is flexible. It is not the role of one person or department - it is a culture. It is not a choice, it is a means of survival", as it was said by a usability guru Whitney Hess. We also hope to influence the new version CMMI for Developers which are coming in the end of 2010. We wish it to become more clear and closer to the common user-centered design terminology. We think that it will make it easier for people to understand CMMI recommendations, and what is most important, to apply these recommendations on practice. We think that our work will help others to start their way to a more user-friendly world today.