by: Mark E. Mullaly, PMP
September 01, 2005

So What Is Maturity, Anyway?

Much has been written about maturity models as a tool for organizational improvement, yet there persist a number of challenges, half-truths and misunderstandings – about how they work, and what they are used for.

First, let’s start with an understanding of what we mean by maturity. If we look at the Oxford Concise Dictionary for an answer, it suggests “developed fully” and “duly careful and adequate”. The inter-section of these two meanings represents perfectly what a project management maturity model should do for an organization: “Define the means by which project management is developed fully enough for projects to be managed adequately and with due care.”

Fundamentally, a maturity model’s purpose is to identify a path for-ward in being able to attain this goal. Any organization should be able to identify those capabilities and approaches that will allow them to manage successfully and reliably. A maturity model should provide them with the support and guidance necessary to evaluate their performance today and identify the next steps forward in realizing these capabilities.

At their heart, maturity models are means of understanding how organizations approach project management. They are 'road maps' that define a path forward from the place we find ourselves today to our desired future – whatever that might be. And they are means of objectively being able to compare the performance of one organization to another.

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