CMMI & Agile: Value in Both Paradigms

CMMI and Agile are compatible. At the project level, CMMI focuses at a high level of abstraction on what projects do, not on what development methodology is used, while Agile methods focus on how projects develop products. Therefore, CMMI and Agile methods can co-exist. There can be much value gained from Agile and CMMI synergies. Today, many CMMI-adopting organizations have Agile development teams. Conversely, CMMI can be effectively introduced in an Agile setting where an iterative, time-boxed approach is used, which is perfectly compatible with CMMI.

CMMI and Agile can complement each other by creating synergies that benefit the organization using them. Agile methods provide software development how-to’s that are missing from CMMI best practices that work well—especially with small, co-located project teams. CMMI provides the systems engineering practices that help enable an Agile approach on large projects. CMMI also provides the process management and support practices that help deploy, sustain, and continuously improve the deployment of an Agile approach in any organization.