Software Engineering Institute

The official acquisition guidance has been to describe “what” you want and to avoid telling the contractor “how” to do the work. Yet the process by which the contractor chooses to develop your software—even the software in your embedded weapon system—is important. The development processes are important for being able to validate the quality attributes (like cybersecurity) of the software when it is delivered. But even more important, the development processes determine the cost of sustaining the software for the life of the system. This talk addresses the significance of software development processes and provide some ideas about how they can affect your acquisition strategy, request for proposal, and contract terms.