A. Park
G3 Technologies, Inc. (Edensoft Labs division), Maryland, United States
Keywords: Sustainment risk, Readiness risk, Continuity risk, Sustainment intelligence, Knowledge concentration
Our work shows that PMO staff can gain the visibility they need to inspect software engineering work, uncover sustainment and readiness risks, and make informed decisions to drive improvements. These risks persist in every codebase because the underlying engineering work is invisible to those managing it – you can’t manage what you can’t see or understand. Over 21 years, we have delivered and sustained 30M lines of mission-critical code for USG customers with zero sustainment or readiness failures, including a SOF-supported product running for 14 years. This long track record is evidence that sustainment and readiness risks can be eliminated. Sustainment risk arises when developers can’t safely update someone else’s hard-to-maintain code. Measuring the maintainability of each developer’s work enables PMO leaders to enforce standards and ensure future developers can continue the mission. Readiness risk emerges when key knowledge is concentrated in developers who will rotate out. Identifying these single points of failure allows leaders to address them before personnel changes impact delivery. Based on these findings, PMOs can drive sustainment and readiness risks to zero when they have the right visibility and can act decisively.