Application of GQM+Strategies in a Multi-industry State-Owned Company

Abstract

Technological applications have an increasingly important role in most companies. Investment in Information Technologies (IT) is also growing in most of them. The need to align IT-related goals with the company’s strategic goals becomes imperative. GQM+Strategies is an approach to align organizational goals, strategies, and measurements at different levels of an organization. This paper describes experiences learned from a GQM+Strategies implementation at a large multi-industry state-owned company. The implementation was conducted by an academic research team joined by representatives of the company. Results showed an improved alignment and integration of different goals. Moreover, a holistic goal visualization was achieved, even though the company works in two different industries. As a state-owned company, external pressures force continuous planning. Sometimes, inadvertently designing those plans is the only goal achieved (i.e., plans are never executed). Using GQM+Strategies, the research team leveraged the separation of goals and strategies, allowing identification of redundancies and replicated efforts across the company. The implementation of the GQM+Strategies approach in such a complex context was very valuable. However, it also required a large amount of effort from the researchers and company representatives.