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Accelerating Grassroots Adoption of IT Quality TransformationBy embracing our proven six-step model, IT organizations can transcend their centralized, audit-driven and reactive quality-checking approaches and deliver sustainable business impact by adopting a philosophy that makes quality ‘a way of life.’
Executive SummaryIs your organization experiencing low customer satisfaction levels due to missed milestones? Are production issues keeping decision-makers up at night? Are you spending more on keeping the lights on?
If you answered yes to any of the above, your organization would likely benefit from a quality improvement initiative. Because of their inherent complexity, however, many of these programs quickly lose momentum without any sustainable gains. It takes planning, perseverance and col-laboration to overcome the inherent challenges of quality management initiatives, which include incremental phases, multiple focus areas and the involvement of numerous stakeholder groups.
This white paper highlights the critical success factors, solution options and strategies for sustain-ing business impact through a quality transforma-tion initiative. We present a path for accelerating the organization-wide grassroots adoption of a quality initiative though a proven six-step approach: evalu-ate, communicate, mobilize, pilot, adopt and sustain.
This six-step framework has enabled IT leaders at numerous banking and financial services com-
panies with global operations to successfully navigate the quality transformation journey while meeting critical business and compliance needs.
The Need for Quality TransformationCIOs across industries face numerous quality issues, including a high number of production incidents, delays in meeting crucial client com-mitments and exceptionally high expenditures on business-as-usual activities. Many technology organizations make use of waterfall-type software development lifecycle (SDLC) approaches that rely on documentation and audits. However, because of factors such as inconsistent and unrepeatable pro-cesses, weak project management, a lack of tools and irrelevant metrics, actual implementations vary widely and lead to poor business outcomes.
In our experience, the missing ingredient is the integration of quality into the “day-in-the-life” of practitioners. For a quality improvement initiative to be successful, it is necessary to:
• Involve all teams or business units of the IT organization.
• Engage the IT associates who perform the day-to-day activities.
cognizant 20-20 insights | december 2015
• Cognizant 20-20 Insights
EVALUATE
11
22
33
44
55
66
COMMUNICATE
MOBILIZE
PILOT
ADOPT
SUSTAIN
Determine Current State,Shape and Fitness
Create Awareness and Urgency;y;Set Targets and Engage Stakeholdolders
Roll out Proofs of Concept; Incentivize Early Adoption
Enable Broad-Based Adoption by by bSimplifying and Automating Procescesses
Integrate Quality into the Day-in-the-Life of Practitionerers
and Demonstrate Executive e Sponsorship to Sustain Chahange
Build the Right Team
2cognizant 20-20 insights
Six-Step Recipe for a Successful Quality Transformation Initiative Our six-step methodology can help IT organiza-tions navigate the quality transformation journey. This methodology is premised on sustained part-nerships with all related stakeholders from the
get-go rather than as a management mandate. Figure 1 defines and explain the six steps of quality transformation.
Building Blocks for Quality Transformation
Figure 1
EVALUATE
COMMUNICATEAssess current state of IT process and compare this with best-in-class industry standards. Create awareness and
urgency, set targets and engage stakeholders.
11
22
MOBILIZE
Build team of thought leaders, influencers, decision-makers, change agents, practitioners.
33
44
PILOT
Roll out pilots and incentivize early adopters to ensure quick wins to build momentum.
55
66
ADOPT
Enable broad-based adoption by simplifying and automating processes.
SUSTAIN
Integrate “quality” into the day-in-the-life of practitioners and measure improvements.
Organizations should begin their quality trans-formation initiative by evaluating the perfor-mance of current systems and conducting a due diligence exercise to determine existing vulnera-bilities. This exercise can help identify and assess gaps that exist between the current state and the achievement of organizational goals and industry standards.
Key considerations for assessing the current state include:
• Conducting a maturity assessment. Rather than engaging in an overall process maturity audit, it is more effective to conduct a custom
assessment, leveraging various industry stan-dards for specific process areas (see Figure 2, next page).
• Choosing a self-assessment rather than an external audit. By allowing grassroots teams to assess themselves, organizations can encourage these stakeholders to feel a sense of ownership for the initiative and its outcomes. A self-assessment-based approach is often broader-based than an external audit and can help spread awareness about the program.
• Assessing across the organization. An orga-nization-wide assessment helps identify hidden best practices that are used by different pockets of the enterprise, as well as key areas of concern. In-house best practices can potentially fuel the first wave of quality standardization.
cognizant 20-20 insights 3
Code Quality
Service Delivery
Testing Program and Projects
Requirements & Scope Management
Information Management
Build and Deployment Organizational Architecture and Talent
Vendor Management
The COBIT framework from ISACA provides a set of generally accepted measures, indicators, processes and best practices, to assist in maximizing the benefits derived through the use of information technology, and developing appropriate IT governance and control in a company.
• Service desk • Incident management • Problem management • Configuration management • Change management • Release management
ITIL is a group of methods that are focused on managing and handling different aspects of information technology, such as operations, infrastructure, and development.
CMMI is a collection of capability maturity models from Software Engineering Institute and Carnegie Mellon University that are used as an approach to improve business processes within an organization.
• Project monitoring and control • Project planning • Requirements management • Supplier agreement management • Measurement and analysis • Product & process quality assurance • Configuration management
• Planning and organization • Delivery and support • Monitoring and evaluation
CAPABILITY MATURITY MODEL INTEGRATION (CMMI)
CONTROL OBJECTIVES FOR INFORMATION AND RELATED TECHNOLOGY (COBIT)
INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY INFRASTRUCTURE LIBRARY (ITIL)
Organizations need to set the right targets, communicate these goals and convey a sense of urgency for the need to transform. Targets should be easy to communicate, relevant and time-bound. Examples include:
• A 15% to 20% reduction in testing effort through early detection of defects in the devel-opment phase over the next 24 months.
• A 50% to 60% reduction in the impact of outages on customers through improved regression testing, release risk impact analysis and proactive monitoring over the next 12 months.
• A 70% to 80% increase in on-time delivery through standardized estimation, toll gates and project management over the next six months.
These targets are highly functional because they help spark motivation, improve alignment between ongoing and upcoming initiatives across the orga-nization, provide a filter to evaluate how the orga-nization is doing, and create a rationale for the changes the organization will have to navigate.
Awareness and communication are required not just at the start of an initiative, but also at every step of the way. Figure 3 illustrates ways to ensure a closed feedback loop and stakehold-er engagement throughout the transformation journey.
Custom Assessments Leveraging Industry Standards
Collaboration Techniques
Figure 2
Figure 3
COLLABORATION
Monthly newsletter
Progress review sessions
Social collaboration portals with blogs, polls
Lunch-and-learn sessions
EVALUATE
11
22
33
44
55
66
COMMUNICATE
MOBILIZE
PILOT
ADOPT
SUSTAIN
Determine Current State,Shape and Fitness
Create Awareness and Urgency;y;Set Targets and Engage Stakeholdolders
Roll out Proofs of Concept; Incentivize Early Adoption
Enable Broad-Based Adoption by by bSimplifying and Automating Procescesses
Integrate Quality into the Day-in-the-Life of Practitionerers
and Demonstrate Executive e Sponsorship to Sustain Chahange
Build the Right Team
(ITIL is a registered trademark of Axelos Ltd., which licenses the use of ITIL intel-lectual property and manages updates to the framework.)
(CMMI is a registered trademark of Carnegie Mellon University.)
(COBIT is a registered trademark of ISACA.)
cognizant 20-20 insights 4
EVALUATE
11
22
33
44
55
66
COMMUNICATE
MOBILIZE
PILOT
ADOPT
SUSTAIN
Determine Current State,Shape and Fitness
Create Awareness and Urgency;y;Set Targets and Engage Stakeholdolders
Roll out Proofs of Concept; Incentivize Early Adoption
Enable Broad-Based Adoption by by bSimplifying and Automating Procescesses
Integrate Quality into the Day-in-the-Life of Practitionerers
and Demonstrate Executive e Sponsorship to Sustain Chahange
Build the Right Team
EVALUATE
11
22
33
44
55
66
COMMUNICATE
MOBILIZE
PILOT
ADOPT
SUSTAIN
Determine Current State,Shape and Fitness
Create Awareness and Urgency;y;Set Targets and Engage Stakeholdolders
Roll out Proofs of Concept; Incentivize Early Adoption
Enable Broad-Based Adoption by by bSimplifying and Automating Procescesses
Integrate Quality into the Day-in-the-Life of Practitionerers
and Demonstrate Executive e Sponsorship to Sustain Chahange
Build the Right Team
Sample Transformation Team
Figure 4
Roles Organizational Roles ResponsibilitiesSponsors Chief information officer, chief quality officer
and IT senior management team.Set quantifiable quality goals for the organization and incorporate them as part of performance management. Espouse the need for quality transformation. Incentivize adoption of best practices. Monitor and control progress.
Thought Leaders and Champions
Highly motivated employees who understand the need for a quality initiative and are willing to pioneer quality as a way of life.
Publicize and advocate best practices. Lead by example. Deliver quick wins and early successes.
Influencers Teams that have successfully adopted best practices and demonstrated strong results.
Highlight the benefits of successfully adopting standard processes.
Practitioners Members from ground-level teams (project managers, team leads).
Ensure best practices are followed by all day-to-day projects.
Catalysts HR, communications, external consultants.
Assist in developing marketing materials. Conduct workshops to socialize the initiative/ best practices.
It is critical to establish a team with clearly defined roles and responsibilities, as well as support from senior leadership. A successful quality trans-formation initiative requires a sponsor that will not only drive and own the initiative but will also develop a guiding team of senior executives, key line managers, human resources and strategic planning. Sponsors must align with transforma-tion objectives, overcome obstacles and serve as advocates who communicate the reasons for the urgency and change. Management teams must partner with supporters and change agents across the organization and groom them to be ambassadors of the quality transformation.
When organizations face issues such as bandwidth constraints, availability of skills and access to best-in-class industry standards, they can engage subject matter experts who possess the required experience to introduce best practices and broaden awareness during the initial phases of planning and rollout (see Figure 4).
By selecting the right pilot project, organizations can lay the foundation for successful implementa-tion of the initiative. Identifying pilot candidates entails the following:
• Select quick-win opportunities based on self-assessment results.
• Identify opportunities that will highlight major benefits of the program. Such successes can be used as a trigger for the adoption of best practices.
• Leverage teams that follow best practices to define and standardize processes for pilot focus areas. Having internal references for success lowers resistance to change. Organi-zations may also need to consider infusing the team with experts to leverage industry best practices and standards.
5cognizant 20-20 insights
To ensure widespread adoption, organizations need to educate teams on the benefits of the new processes — including simplification and automa-tion — and develop effective incentives. Guiding principles to ensure successful adoption include:
• Incentivize and drive early adopters by making quality improvement a part of annual KPIs.
• Establish milestones along the way and celebrate with rewards and recognition.
• Track adoption through a metrics program. Adoption should be voluntary and driven through healthy competition.
• Realign roles to improve the focus on quality. Senior developers and solution architects should be assigned to validate the correct use of design patterns and reusable components, and test managers and production support leads should participate in requirements reviews. To avoid hand-off gaps, teams should conduct 360-degree reviews of deliverables.
The final stage in every initiative is making sure that the defined processes are sustainable and to integrate them into the organization. Ways to facilitate successful integration include:
• Emphasize the benefits of the initiative. Ease of adoption and value gained drive sustainability.
• Utilize periodic tracking of strategic and operational metrics to show alignment with organization goals and incremental change in performance and process maturity.
• Socialize the progress and outcomes with the teams through posters, luncheon sessions, newsletters, e-mail communications, etc.
• Include key result areas aligned with quality initiatives in the performance reviews of deci-sion-makers.
• Deploy support groups to advance adoption and sustainability of the processes.
• Engage lagging business units by conducting knowledge-sharing sessions and promoting the adoption of tools and best practices.
• Celebrate wins with the team. Rewards and recognition are as critical as the overall initiative.
Once quality becomes an integral part of the culture, the organization can begin to transition responsibility for sustaining change from the focused work groups to the rest of the enterprise.
Quick Take
A major global bank kicked off an organization-wide quality transformation initiative with the direct participation of its senior leadership team and 100-plus influencers across the globe.
• Primary sponsor: Group CIO
• Program owner: Chief quality officer
• Steering committee: Executive team made up of CIO direct reports with ownership of individual workstreams, such as requirements management and release management, covering end-to-end software development and service delivery.
• Workstream leads: Self-motivated line managers with growth potential and leadership capabilities.
• Workgroup members: Peer groups of developers, testers, project managers and business analysts, spread across geogra-phies and application areas.
• Quality champions: One to two practitio-ners per geography or application area, responsible for socializing best practices and standards across all workstreams.
This structure resulted in a matrix that engaged the entire organization, with multiple stakeholders taking ownership of various parts of the initiative.
Structure for Success
EVALUATE
11
22
33
44
55
66
COMMUNICATE
MOBILIZE
PILOT
ADOPT
SUSTAIN
Determine Current State,Shape and Fitness
Create Awareness and Urgency;y;Set Targets and Engage Stakeholdolders
Roll out Proofs of Concept; Incentivize Early Adoption
Enable Broad-Based Adoption by by bSimplifying and Automating Procescesses
Integrate Quality into the Day-in-the-Life of Practitionerers
and Demonstrate Executive e Sponsorship to Sustain Chahange
Build the Right Team
EVALUATE
11
22
33
44
55
66
COMMUNICATE
MOBILIZE
PILOT
ADOPT
SUSTAIN
Determine Current State,Shape and Fitness
Create Awareness and Urgency;y;Set Targets and Engage Stakeholdolders
Roll out Proofs of Concept; Incentivize Early Adoption
Enable Broad-Based Adoption by by bSimplifying and Automating Procescesses
Integrate Quality into the Day-in-the-Life of Practitionerers
and Demonstrate Executive e Sponsorship to Sustain Chahange
Build the Right Team
6cognizant 20-20 insights
Looking AheadTo deliver a sustainable business impact from quality transformation initiatives, IT organi-zations need to generate awareness and set specific actionable goals across all levels of the enterprise, not just for their quality assurance teams. Quality goals must be championed by peer groups of IT practitioners and enabled with tools and automation that improve productivity and consistency.
Taking the first step is half the battle. By following through with the six steps of this proven framework, organizations can ensure a successful quality management initiative.
Quick Take
Our work on quality improvement initiatives has yielded the following examples of simplified processes and associated benefits.
• Static code analysis and unit testing for code reviews. These tools significantly reduce the time and effort required for manual code review processes without any compromise to quality.
• Engagement of business stakeholders on requirements quality and demonstrating traceability with the delivered code. The impact of requirements quality on functional-ity can be demonstrated by testing the require-ments on wireframes or simulations.
• Building of automation platforms. A standard automated build platform across the organi-zation reduces the time and effort spent on
making code changes by eliminating the need to reinvent the wheel.
• Use of automated tools for standard status reporting. Doing so reduces the time required for preparing status reports for senior management.
• Project lifecycle workflow systems. These systems reduce the need for manual auditing.
• Incident management and escalation workflows. The use of process management tools for standardizing the tracking and fixing of incidents provides an analytics ability for root-cause analysis.
Proper Planning Prevents Poor Performance
About CognizantCognizant (NASDAQ: CTSH) is a leading provider of information technology, consulting, and business process outsourcing services, dedicated to helping the world’s leading companies build stronger busi-nesses. Headquartered in Teaneck, New Jersey (U.S.), Cognizant combines a passion for client satisfac-tion, technology innovation, deep industry and business process expertise, and a global, collaborative workforce that embodies the future of work. With over 100 development and delivery centers worldwide and approximately 219,300 employees as of September 30, 2015, Cognizant is a member of the NASDAQ-100, the S&P 500, the Forbes Global 2000, and the Fortune 500 and is ranked among the top performing and fastest growing companies in the world. Visit us online at www.cognizant.com or follow us on Twitter: Cognizant.
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© Copyright 2015, Cognizant. All rights reserved. No part of this document may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the express written permission from Cognizant. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice. All other trademarks mentioned herein are the property of their respective owners. TL Codex 1648
About the AuthorsSaptarshi (Rishi) Mukherjee is an Assistant Vice-President of Consulting within Cognizant Business Consulting’s Strategic Services Practice. Rishi is engaged in business development and execution of multiple consulting engagements across the banking/financial services and insurance industries. He is also responsible for creating consulting frameworks and publishing articles in Cognizant forums. He can be reached at [email protected].
Vinit Sharma is a Senior Manager of Consulting within Cognizant Business Consulting. He has nine-plus years of experience successfully leading and managing large IT performance and process improvement initiatives, program management and change management for various clients. Vinit holds an M.B.A. from the Indian Institute of Foreign Trade, New Delhi, and a bachelor’s degree from BMSCE Bangalore. He can be reached at [email protected].
Kajal Aggarwal is an Engagement Manager within Cognizant Business Consulting’s Strategic Services Practice. He has 12-plus years of consulting experience in IT and business process improvement, strategic and operations metrics, cost optimization and portfolio rationalization. He holds an M.B.A. from the Indian Institute of Foreign Trade, New Delhi, and a bachelor’s degree from the National Institute of Technology Karnataka, India. He can be reached at [email protected].
AcknowledgmentsThe authors would like to thank Akila Rajasekaran for her contributions to this white paper.
