Mary Sakry and Neil Potter are cofounders of The Process Group, a company that
consults in process improvement.
In 1990, Neil and Mary founded The Process Group. Since then, they have been helping organizations implement project management, estimation,
requirements engineering, inspections, supplier management and CMM / CMMI.
(See testimonials). They have been SEI-authorized lead appraisers since the beginning of the SEI program. They are instructors for the SEI Introduction to CMMI course, and lead
appraisers (with High Maturity certification) for the CMMI SCAMPI appraisal method.
Neil and Mary are co-authors of the book "Making
Process Improvement Work - A Concise Action Guide for Software Managers and
Practitioners," Addison-Wesley, 2002.
Mary Sakry has been working in software development, project management and
process improvement since 1976. For 15 years she was a Project Manager
and Software Engineer within Texas Instruments (TI) in Austin, Texas. In 1988,
while employed by TI, Mary was a member of a corporate Software Engineering
Process Group (SEPG) and responsible for SEI CMM self-assessments across TI
worldwide. She has an M.B.A. in Business Management from St. Edwards University
and a B.S. in Computer Science from the University of Minnesota.
Neil Potter has been working in software design, engineering and process management
since 1985. In 1988 Neil was an SEPG manager in a TI software development group,
spanning USA, India and England. He has a B.Sc. in Computer Science from the
University of Essex in England and Six Sigma Greenbelt certification from the
University of Michigan.
The Software Engineering Institute has awarded the SCAMPI High Maturity Lead
Appraiser certification to Neil Potter and Mary Sakry. This certification recognizes their
expertise for determining that an organization has demonstrated the capability
to quantitatively manage its projects to produce high-quality, predictable results
at CMMI Maturity Levels 4 and 5. Benefits of this certification include recognition
from the SEI as a member of the select group of individuals who are setting
the standards for the lead appraiser community.