The Quality Assurance Institute (QAI) India Ltd, a joint venture between QAI USA and Intecos, has been set up to facilitate enhanced competitiveness amongst software organisations through multifaceted interventions.

Says executive director Navyug Mahnot, "QAI focusses on the triad of people, process and technology to achieve a breakthrough performance in organisations. It also enables a competitive advantage through the applications of consulting, training, assessments, benchmarking, certification, conferences and a corporate membership programme."

In fact, QAI is a full solution provider for software producing units, teams and organisations and has been instrumental in institutionalising software processes through the implementation of software such as CMM, ISO 9000 and the People CMM (People Capability Maturity Model) framework in over 50 leading organisations, says Mahnot. According to him, QAI is the first Indian organisation to offer consulting and training services in the area of People CMM to its clients. QAI's Peoples CMM related services include conducting awareness training programmes, abridged assessments, KPA (key process area) specific consulting, etc.

"We provide consulting services, training for a company's mid-level management, which typically handles risk, projects, quality and change management," says Mahnot.

He points out that the top management, which usually comprises strategic decision makers, is usually catered to by organisations like McKinsey, Boston Consulting Group and Arthur Anderson. Still other companies like NIIT and STG cater to the lower segment of the pyramid. "We at QAI target only the middle management," he says.

Mahnot says the biggest issue hounding software companies today is People CMM, wherein the effort is to maximise the potential of the workforce as well as retain it, says he.

"We are the only body in India to help implement this programme in companies. People CMM is a maturity framework developed in 1995 by the Software Engineering Institute (SEI), Carnegie Mellon University, the US, to help software organisations focus on improving the capability of their workforce. PCMM (Curtis, Hefley and Miller 1995) guides organisations in improving their ability to attract, motivate, develop and retain the talent needed to steadily improve their workforce capability," explains Mahnot.

People CMM describes an evolutionary improvement path from ad hoc, inconsistently performed workforce practices, to a mature, disciplined development of the knowledge, skills and motivation of the workforce. The practices included in People CMM have been chosen from industrial experience because they have significant impact on individual, team, unit and organisational performances.

The main objectives of People CMM are to help organisations to characterise the maturity of their workforce practices, guide a programme of continuous workforce development, set priorities for immediate action, integrate workforce development with process improvement, and establish a culture of professional excellence.

Basically, the PCMM model guides the organisation through five different stages of development, depending upon their people manage- ment practices.

Each stage provides a layer in the continuous improvement of an organisation's workforce practices. PCMM guides an organisation from its status as a company that pays scant attention to the development of its workforce into an organisation that is "an employee's choice", explains Mahnot.

The PCMM figure depicts the five levels that will guide the organisation to the next stage. Growth through the maturity levels creates fundamental changes in how people are managed and the culture in which they work.

In maturing from the Initial to Repeatable level, the organisation develops the discipline of performing basic practices for managing its workforce. In maturing to the Defined level, these practices are tailored to enhance the particular knowledge, skills and work methods that best support the organisation's business.

The core competencies of the organisations are identified, and workforce activities aligned to support the development of these competencies. In maturing to the Managed level, the organisation uses data to evaluate how effective its workplace processes are and to reduce variations in their execution.

The organisation quantitatively manages organisational growth in workforce capabilities, and then appropriates and establishes competency based teams.

In maturing to the optimising level, the organisation looks continually for innovative ways to improve its overall talent.

The organisation is thus actively involved in applying and continuously applying methods for developing individual and organisational competence, Mahnot adds.

QAI charges Rs 1-20 lakh for its programmes, depending on the number of days a company needs to achieve its goals. QAI India includes among its clients companies such as Aptech, Datamatics, SISL, Wipro, TCS, Intelligroup, Lucent Bell, American Express and Motorola.