“indeed” (l.6) can be correctly replaced by in addition to.

The Capability Maturity Model (CMM) and the more recent CMM Integrated have initiated a new discipline of engineering management that plays a dominant role in software practice and research. The literature offers a number of successful cases of how software firms adopted these models and the CMMs do indeed offer many useful recommendations for how to systematically assess and improve software operations. The CMMs are, however, rooted in the ideal of a rational, control-centered culture for software development, and although other software process improvement (SPI) approaches have been suggested, they do not differ from the CMMs when it comes to underlying values. It is therefore not surprising that most software firms struggle to take advantage of the potential benefits of SPI as they adopt this technology into the complex and dynamic realities of their day-to-day operations.

For small software firms, it is particularly challenging to adopt SPI technology because the dominating approaches to SPI target large organizations; there are few resources available for improvement in small software firms; it is by no means trivial tailoring SPI knowledge to their needs; and, because it normally takes several complex and expensive initiatives to reach new maturity levels. These challenges combined with sensitivity to highly dynamic environments require small software firms to seek alternative approaches to exploit the potential benefits of SPI technology.