The first step of
the “12 Steps to Useful Software Metrics” is to identify the customers
for each metric. The customer
of the metric is the person (or people)
who will be making decisions or taking
action based upon the metric; the person/people who needs
the information supplied by the metric.
There are many different types of customers
for a metrics program. This adds
complexity to the program because each
customer may have different
information requirements. Customers
may include:
• Functional Management: Interested in applying greater control
to the software development process,
reducing risk and maximizing return on investment.
• Project
Management: Interested in being able to accurately
predict and control project size, effort, resources, budgets and
schedules. Interested
in controlling the projects
they are in charge of and communicating
facts to their management.
• Software Engineers/Programmers: The people that actually do the
software development.
Interested in making informed
decisions about their work and work products. These
people are responsible for collecting a significant amount of the data required for the
metrics program.
• Test Managers/Testers: The people responsible for
performing the verification
and validation activities. Interested
in finding as many new defects as possible
in the time allocated to testing and in obtaining confidence
that the software works as specified. These
people are also responsible for collecting a significant amount
of the required data.
• Specialists: Individuals performing specialized functions (e.g., Marketing, Software Quality Assurance, Process Engineering, Software
Configuration Management,
Audits and Assessments, Customer Technical Assistance). Interested
in quantitative information upon which
they can base their decisions,
finding and recommendations.
• Customers/Users: Interested in on-time delivery of high quality software products
and in reducing the over-all cost of ownership.
If a metric does not have a customer, it should not be produced. Metrics
are expensive to collect, report,
and analyze so if no one is using a metric,
producing it is a waste of time and money.
The customers’
information requirements should
always drive the metrics program. Otherwise, we may end up with a product without
a market and with a program
that wastes time and money.
By recognizing
potential customers and involving
those customers early in the metric definition effort, the chances of success are greatly increased.
