Case Study: IRS Business System Modernization Process Improvement

Recognizing problems with its legacy information technology systems, the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) embarked on a modernization effort over a decade ago, with limited success. In 1998, the IRS embarked on a new approach and awarded a contract to the PRIME Alliance to assume the development and integration role for the systems that were expected to modernize the IRS way of doing business. The IRS Business Systems Modernization Office (BSMO) was established to manage this program. However, as with past modernization efforts, the BSMO had difficulties in developing the discipline to efficiently and effectively manage the acquisition aspects of this modernization effort. The General Accounting Office suggested that the BSM program instill this discipline by improving a number of management process areas, including its acquisition processes. This suggestion included application of the Software Acquisition Capability Maturity Model (SA-CMM) as guidance on how to improve. This paper provides an overview of applying the SA-CMM to the IRS modernization effort to establish and implement more effective acquisition management processes and practices. The experience includes the process improvement planning stages of first selecting the SA-CMM as a framework for process improvement, through to completion of the final assessment where a maturity level 2 rating was achieved against the SA-CMM.