In 1992 Norm Brown, founder of the Software Program Managers Network (SPMN), was assigned responsibility for planning and conducting assessments of Navy programs in the Assistant Secretary of the Navy’s office. He observed firsthand the devastating effect that ineffective software management has on software projects. During the same period Mike Evans, President of C&C Associates, was conducting software risk assessments for commercial and DoD customers. He was finding similar problems delaying, if not destroying projects. In comparing notes the two recognized that they had independently reached the same conclusion of the 1987 Defense Science Board: “Major problems with military software development are not technical problems, but management problems.” The SPMN was formed in reaction to this chronic problem and in response to cries for help from software practitioners and program managers.
DACS Newsletter Spring 1996
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