Why a CMMI Level 5 Company Fails to Meet the Deadlines?

Reliable effort and cost estimation remains to be a challenging issue even for mature software organizations. Although, these organizations collect historical data to base their future estimates, changes in circumstances (such as application type, development platform, etc.) prevent their successful utilization. As a result, companies often suffer from underestimated and unrealistic schedules. Managing software projects that involve a large number of globally distributed stakeholders makes estimation and planning even more challenging. Related studies show that even knowledgeable project managers often underestimate hidden costs and sources of delay associated with distributed development. Therefore, management activities such as estimation of development effort, planning and control require special attention. In this paper we discuss experiences gained from a highly distributed software project, which aimed at development of a product based on a new platform and architectural solution. The project was conducted in a CMMI Level 5 company and still failed to meet initial plan constraints. We thus provide an overview of management decisions in the light of their consequences, and discuss potential areas of improvement.