By packaging this information and integrating it with practical experience, I expect this book to help new SEPGs to start their efforts and gain momentum. I expect this book to help process improvement champions to make the improvements that they can make on their own, but there may be global improvements that they cannot make on their own. If the champions want to convince senior management of the need for an SEPG and want to explain what the SEPG members would do for the organization, this book will be helpful. As I considered the source of inspiration for my work in software process improvement, I found a most unlikely source in my early life experience with dance and choreography. The analogy comes alive in this book.
Dance is like producing software.
Learning a dance could involve things such as reading the notation and interpreting the steps, or it could involve watching someone who has performed the steps before, trying to do the steps, trying the steps with the music, and making changes when something isn't working. Improving a process involves similar activities. As professionals, programmers are gifted and talented individuals, brilliant in their own right, who can collaborate to give a performance that does not diminish any individual performance. Choreography involves movement ofthe body, guiding one or more dancers through certain steps and through changing rhythms while maintaining balanceto create a peak performance for their audience. Software process improvement involves the movement of an organization, guiding one or more individuals through certain activities and through changing conditions while maintaining balance to create a peak performance for their customers.