Promotion of an ISO9001-based quality system using the WWW in a software organisation and its experience
Atsuo HAZEYAMA Client-server Software Laboratories, NEC Corporation, Tokyo, Japan
Katsumi HONDA Software Design Laboratories, NEC Corporation, Tokyo, Japan
NEC Corporation not only is a manufacturer of communications, computers, and electron devices but also deals with software business. Software business plays a very important role in NEC in recent years; Around 10 thousands of system engineers (at the end of March 1998) belong to the C&C system business unit where provides total solutions to wide varieties of customers by the system integration which combine hardware with software. The non-hardware sales of computer business in NEC in fiscal ending March 31, 1998 was around 565 billion yen (around US$ 39 million) (increased 13 percent from the previous fiscal year). The ratio of non-hardware business (including SI business, program products sales, maintenance, etc.) of all the computer business becomes 31.6% (increased 2.3 percent from the previous fiscal year) at the end of 1998 fiscal year. The importance of software process improvement, therefore, has been recognised.
Based on the background, NEC developed a methodology of software process innovation. It is consisted of three steps. The first step of the framework is to build an improvement basis based on the ISO9001 quality system. This step is therefore important for effective and efficient improvement, especially with respect to establishing processes based on the ISO9001 requirements, and managing documents and quality records. This paper describes a methodology of software process innovation in NEC and a case study of a software development organisation in NEC for promotion of an ISO9001-based quality system, using the Web computing especially documents and quality records management and their sharing.
NEC has applied Total Quality Control (TQC) activities to software divisions since 1981[4][5] (we call these activities Software Quality Control (SWQC)) and some achievements have obtained. However, as these activities were carried out independently in each business division, the results varied depending on the improvement approach of each division.
In the last decade, several software process improvement methods such as CMM (Capability Maturity Model) [6], ISO9001 [3] were proposed.
NEC considers it possible to make effective process improvement by regarding the above three approaches as having different characteristics respectively and organically associating their characteristics.
The steps toward process innovation by using the ISO9001-based quality system, the process maturity model, and the QC techniques are shown as follows.
A case study of a software division in this stage is shown in the next section.
The improvement management cycle is used to comprehend the current situation, to extract problems, to decide the priority levels, to make well-planned improvements, and to evaluate the results.
In implementing this improvement management cycle, the ISO9001 quality system, the process maturity model and the QC techniques are utilised. This ensures real results including productivity and quality. The improvement activities are carried out based on analysis not only of problems discovered but also of examples of success.
The organisation has several relatively large projects. Projects in the organisation are traditionally operated by using electronic media and computer network (E-mail, the WWW, etc.). Most artefacts are created using computers, and various kinds of communication (reporting, notification, discussion, review and inspection, document distribution, etc.) are done using E-mail. Such characteristics were taken into account in constructing the ISO9001-based quality system.
Before the ISO9001-based quality system was introduced in the organisation, each project established some procedures for its own project: procedures such as rules for naming variables and constants in source codes, rules for document control, and guidance for manual writing. A document control rule of a large software project which specified document identification number and the storage directory, was adopted as the basis of the document control standard in the organisation’s quality system. But because the document control rule of the project did not explicitly define what documents should be created and managed, the decisions about which documents were to be recorded was left to each of the project / sub-projects. As a result, some important documents were not recorded (they remained in E-mail spools or they were stored only on papers). Some documents were even lost because their authors moved. As a result, problems have occurred that design rationales could not be found out.
In building the ISO9001-based quality system, a document control standard was established which specified the process from document creation, inspection, approval, registration, distribution, till invalidation, document structure, document identification number, the storage directories, as well as a document and quality record list to be created and maintained through the quality system. Here quality records are things which are required to maintain by the ISO9001 standard `4.16 Control of quality records'. On the other hand, documents are things except the quality records of all the things which are required to maintain by the ISO9001 standard.
This list contains around 50 documents and quality records, and for each the following attributes are specified: creator, inspector, approver, distribution, whether or not it is a quality record, the directory within which it is stored, how long it should be stored, the name of the standard specifying the details about the document and quality record, and whether or not there exists a template for the document and quality record (one example is shown in Table HAZEYAMA1).
Table HAZEYAMA 1: Example attributes and their value of a document
Controlled under the quality system (development planning document)
Inspector
Approver
Distribution
Quality record or not
Storage directory
Storage duration
Standard name
Existence of template
project leader
top management
the whole project
N/A
project directory
five years
planning standard
existence
Since the ISO9001-based quality system was applying, the amount of documents and quality records recorded by projects/sub-projects increased rapidly. Table HAZEYAMA2 shows the changes in the number of documents and quality records created and stored during the development of a large project within the organisation.
Table HAZEYAMA 2: The changes in the number of documents and quality
Records created and stored within a large software project
quality records
development
V2.0
V3.0
V4.0
V4.1
V5.0
77
79
1022
461
821
Minor version-up
Porting to another
platform and bug fix
Major version-up.
Start applying the quality
system to the organisation.
1st survey was performed.
Some enhancement and
bug fix.
Received the examination.
2nd survey was performed.
This table shows that the introduction of the ISO9001-based quality system (at the time of V4.0 development in this table. 1022 documents and quality records were created in this development.) resulted in a five-fold increase in the number of recorded documents and quality records over the numbers recorded when the first version was developed (190 documents and quality records were created in V1.0 development.)
This increase in the number of documents and quality records resulted in increased retrieval cost, too, therefore to systematize information sharing was required. Considering this background, we proposed an information sharing system called electronic binder system using the WWW and deployed it in the organisation so that people can share information for software development and can prepare the internal quality audits and certifications effectively and efficiently.
Fig. HAZEYAMA1 shows the configuration of the electronic binder system. It is a very simple configuration in that persons register documents and quality records in a centre file directory and responsible persons create and maintain an electronic binder by using a template. We can view the electronic binders by using a Web browser.
The electronic binders provide various viewpoints because a lot of entries in a lot of electronic binders (HTML files) can link to a single document and quality record regardless of where they are registered.
It is particularly useful in a large software project because such a project is composed
of several sub-projects which have their own sub-project document directory, and the electronic binder of the whole project can be created by aggregating the binders of its sub-projects. The electronic binder of each product version can also be created very easily. Furthermore the construction cost of the electronic binders is very low because of the use of the WWW.
Fig. HAZEYAMA1 shows the configuration of the electronic binder of a large project which is composed of several sub-projects. This figure shows that the binder of the overall project is composed of documents and quality records which are created for the overall project, and the binders of its sub-projects. This figure also shows the binders for multiple product version of the project (version N development and version N+1 development). Using the electronic binder system, documents which are shared among several product version such as file-a, file-c, file-e in this figure can be easily accessed from the binder for each product version.
(1) Documents and quality records to be managed according to ISO9001 requirements were extracted and defined by an ISO9001 promotion team (The list of these documents and quality records forms a part of the quality system). These documents and quality records were divided into two categories:
Documents and quality records created and maintained by the organisation.
Documents: contract documents, internal quality audit plans, training plans, etc.
Quality records: internal quality audit reports, each personnel’s training records, and management review reports, etc.
Documents and quality records created and maintained by the projects and/or sub-projects.).
Documents: development plans, design specifications, test specifications, production specifications, final inspection and testing specifications, etc.
Quality records: test reports, various review reports, final inspection and testing reports, corrective / preventive action reports, etc.
Templates of the electronic binder for the organisation and for the projects / sub-projects were prepared by the ISO9001 promotion team.
(3) A procedure for the application of the electronic binder system was documented by the ISO9001 promotion team and approved by the top management. This procedure defined who should create and maintain each electronic binder and where each electronic binder should be placed. It also defined the file name conventions of electronic binders. This document was distributed to the whole organisation. The organisation and projects / sub-projects are required to create and maintain their own electronic binders by using corresponding templates.
When the survey was performed, internal quality audits, and management reviews had not been performed yet.
The organisation received the ISO9001 formal examination July 1997 and received the certification September 1997. The 2nd survey was performed September 1997, soon after having received the certification.
(1) their affiliation
(2) whether they had accessed the electronic binders
(3) the frequency with which they had accessed the electronic binders
(4) which electronic binders they had accessed
(5) what documents and quality records in the electronic binders they accessed
(6) how useful they had found the electronic binders
(7) reasons that the electronic binders are useful
(8) reasons that the electronic binders are not useful
(9) key success factors of software process improvement via ISO9001
(9) is an item which was asked only in the second survey.
In the 1st survey, sixty-three percent responded and seventy-three percent of those responding had referred to the electronic binders. In the 2nd survey, fifty-six percent responded and eighty-three percent of those responding had referred to the electronic binders. The following results came from the data which people who had accessed to the electronic binder responded.
In the 1st survey, half of the respondents who had ever accessed the electronic binders evaluated the electronic binders positively. The other half, however, did not. But in the 2nd survey, 90 % people evaluated the electronic binders positively.
We think this result come from permeation of the quality system and acquisition of the ISO9001 certification.
Of those who evaluated the electronic binders positively, we asked why they found the electronic binders useful. We did this by asking them to select from the following six choices (A) - (F)(multiple choices were permitted). Item (E) was enumerated in the 2nd survey only.
(A) documents and quality records of projects or sub-projects that a respondent belongs to have been ordered by the electronic binders and can be shared/accessed easily.
(B) documents and quality records of other projects or sub-projects have been ordered by the electronic binders and can be shared/accessed easily.
(C) understanding of the ISO9001 standard has been facilitated.
(D) preparing for internal quality audits or ISO9001 formal examinations could be done efficiently.
(E) internal quality audits and ISO9001 formal examinations could be done smoothly.
(F) the other (the reason can be described free)
In both surveys, (A) `documents and quality records of projects or sub-projects that a respondent belongs to have been ordered by the electronic binders and can be shared/accessed easily' was the most answer (around 75 %), and then (B) `documents and quality records of other projects or sub-projects have been ordered by the electronic binders and can be shared/accessed easily' was the second most answer (around 65 %). The percentage is also almost same in both surveys.
We also asked those who had evaluated the electronic binders negatively why they had evaluated them that way by selecting from the following four choices (multiple choices were permitted).
In the 1st survey, the most common answer was that the benefit was not worth the effort. The main reason was that almost all documents and quality records registered in the electronic binders had been distributed to the appropriate members by E-mail or that the members had been able to access those documents and quality records by other means (for example, by book-marking necessary documents and quality records/pages of their own on a WWW browser). Therefore it turned out that the members have not necessarily accessed such documents and quality records via the electronic binders (each person manages his/her necessary documents and quality records for him / herself). But as the number of documents and quality records increases, they are used to access documents and quality records via the electronic binder system.
The organisation in this case study has got the ISO9001 certification and therefore accomplished the first stage of the innovation methodology and now stands in the improvement stage. The organisation is improving the quality system based on the corrective actions and quality goal setting and its follow-up. Some actions are taken as follows:
Improvement of SI (System Integration) and configuration management processes: these processes are very important, in general, especially for large-scale projects.
Collecting a variety of quality data, its analysis (drawing trend curve of faults, root cause analysis of faults, etc.), and feedback to quality goals and management process.
Writing post mortem report after project completion.
For the evaluation of projects from the viewpoint of business (cf. ISO9001 clause 4.1), the organisation now starts to use a framework of the Quality Award.
Such information can be seen from the electronic binder system. The electronic binder system is therefore evolving as an information infrastructure for software projects.
The first author would like to thank Mr. H. Oka and Mr. T. Fujimura for support of this work. The authors also would like to thank the anonymous referees for their useful comments to improve this paper.
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