configuration management

Every project is dependent upon people, processes, and tools:  they are how the work gets done. These three essential elements are not equal, though, as each has its own strengths and weaknesses.   Each one provides a different value to our projects.

Creating a change control group (or any other process improvement effort) can be incredibly successful—or it can get bogged down with impossible "people" issues, often due to conflicting communication styles and personalities. If you want your team to be a success, you may need to consider some of these people issues, or else risk failure due to personality issues that really matter. It's not hard to address these challenges and build a change control function that will succeed despite some of the inherent challenges in getting people who may have very different styles and approaches to work together.

Joe Farah explains that a configuration management (CM) strategy must deal with product development from both a product and from a project perspective. Dashboard technology can help to clarify the perspectives and simplify the management functions, especially from an information perspective.

Most professionals in the software development industry recognize the need for Configuration Management (CM).  CM has been around long enough for people to have experienced problems when CM was either not in place or when the level of CM was insufficient for the needs of the work.  CM values of identification, control, audit, and report are meant to ensure integrity of the product under development.  These days, almost everyone has, at least, version control practices which include a version control tool and a simple checkout/checkin process.  However, as with any engineering discipline, the level of the CM implementation (since CM is much more than just version control) will depend greatly on the culture along with the methods and governance that exist within the company.