224 CHAPTER ◆ 2 4 Gate 3
● Phase 3: Integration. Communicate the findings and create new performance
goals.
● Phase 4: Action. Make plans, take action, and monitor progress toward perfor-
mance goals.^1The first step of process benchmarking is to specify a process or a series of interconnected
processes to be studied. Next, a benchmarking standard or team with superior performance
in that process being examined is identified. The high performance process of the team is
then studied. In this way a performance gap is established and the elements, which have led
to the superior performance, can be understood. The final step is to formulate an improve-
ment plan and implement the actions necessary to close the performance gap.
The key to reusability is not just to reuse code, but more importantly to reuse the analysis
and design processes. Establishing firmwide standards and best practices for evaluation of
trading/investment systems and software design is critical. These standards will provide
a framework within which best-of-breed trading/investment system and technology can
emerge and evolve. All steps in our methodology are examples of processes for which a
firm can benchmark and standardize development processes. Benchmarks and standards
may also include:● Documentation standards that specify the form and content for, for example,
Money Documents, investment policies, iteration and release plans, code and user
documentation, and testing documentation, and provide consistency throughout a
project.
● Design standards that provide rules and methods for translating the prototypes and
software requirements into the software design and for representing it in the design
documentation.
● Code standards that provide methods and rationale for translating the software
designs into code. These may define language, style conventions, rules for data
structures and interfaces, and internal code documentation.Best practice evolves quickly. Honest team self-criticism forms the foundation of the
drive toward better practices and toward best-in-class performance. Because financial
markets change so rapidly, staying up to date, with new and improved processes, is itself
a never-ending process.24.2. Deliverables/Inputs
At this gate meeting, top management will expect several deliverables, including:● Software requirements specification document.
● Software and hardware architecture documents, including proof the system meets
the quality attribute requirements.
● Working software and hardware with documentation.
● User documentation.
● User acceptance test report signed by the product team.
● Full probationary trading performance report, including trade selection reports and
results of regression tests versus the gold standard run package results from Stage 2.