where the first three steps are about using business goals to drive the identification of the right metrics and the last three steps are about gathering the measurement data and making effective use of the measurement results to drive decision making and improvements. Basili described his six-step GQM process as follows:
Develop a set of corporate, division and project business goals and associated measurement goals for productivity and quality
Generate questions (based on models) that define those goals as completely as possible in a quantifiable way
Specify the measures needed to be collected to answer those questions and track process and product conformance to the goals
Develop mechanisms for data collection
Collect, validate and analyze the data in real time to provide feedback to projects for corrective action
Analyze the data in a post mortem fashion to assess conformance to the goals and to make recommendations for future improvements