Instituting Software Metrics in Small Organizations: A Practical Approach

Literature reports indicate that software companies with less than 50 employees may represent up to 85% of the software organizations in several countries, including the United States. While the well-known process models may not be ideal in a relatively small setting, there is good news. Some of the large process models are being scaled down at the same time that new models are being developed specifically for smaller software organizations. The best news is that software process research metrics have been studied for years, and there are many options available for metrics utilization, either within or outside of a process improvement framework, regardless of the size of the setting. This work explores the challenges and benefits of using software metrics in small organizations, and outlines a practical framework, based on the Goal/Question/Metric paradigm, for instituting metrics programs in small organizations. This approach is motivated by industrial experiences reported in the literature and contributes to improving software development practices.