What is an ISO/IEC 15504 conformant model?
ISO/IEC 15504 defines requirements for performing an assessment. One such requirement is to use an assessment model compatible with the reference model (measurement framework). ISO/IEC 15504 provides an exemplar assessment model that meets such requirements but that is not part of the REQUIRED part of the standard. Indeed, there are other examples (or instances) of assessment models available for instance SPICE 4 Space (used by the European Space Agency), Bootstrap (until July 2003) and other commercial and internal company based assessment models. For the people interested in CMMI in particular, it is interesting to note that the SEI is committed to making the CMMI meet the requirements of ISO/IEC 15504. For now, conformance to ISO/IEC 15504 is based on self declaration by the parties proposing models. This might eventually change in the future with, potentially, formal recognition of conformance scheme to be managed by an objective body.
