Software Engineering Institute Carnegie Mellon

Experiences in Implementing Measurement Programs

Wolfhart Goethert
Will Hayes

Technical Note
CMU/SEI-2001-TN-026

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Although industry has made significant improvements in implementing measurement programs for software development, data collected by Rubin Systems show that a large percentage of metrics programs fail. This technical note describes some useful lessons learned at a number of organizations that have implemented measurement programs using the Goal-Driven Software Measurement methodology. It includes a description of the methodology, an examination of challenges, obstacles, and solutions, an initial set of indicators and measures, and some artifacts (such as templates and checklists) that can enable successful implementations. The main motivation of this technical note is to provide some practical advice and guidelines for planning and implementing measurement programs.