Some suggestions from software engineers.

[iDeveloper]

Hey guys, i thought this would be a good place to ask my question.
I'm a student, graduating this winter with BS in CS and going back for my Master degree. I also have an internship for 2 years now, which involves software troubleshooting and engineering. To be honest, i love programming and have no regrets about my career path, but i absolutely cannot stand my job.
I don't know if it's just me or not, but as i got into doing some software development at this place i found out that there is really no development cycle here whatsoever. Everyone does their own thing, the tester pops up every once in a while and starts arguing about the requirements. In fact, i've worked on a couple of minor projects and didn't get requirements until i actually finished the damn project. Management is a terrible show stopper. Can't move without management approving something, which takes days. Every once in a while some manager's report or application breaks and literally takes priority over every single project that you'd be working on. So you just drop whatever the heck you're doing with complete disregard of its priority. Everything just seems inside out and upside down.
Some projects requests coming in with project description of literally 1 sentence, describing what needs to be done. So you spend weeks in meeting with people who are completely unaware of the actual project request and who tell me that the process is complex and erroneous that it would be illogical to turn it into a project and start developing until it actually gets improved. I can go on and on but i'll stop here.
So, I, being the IT noob that i am, have a question to some of you guys who've been in the game for a while now. Are most companies like this? I guess it'd be excusable for small companies, but there is like 100 people in this department, about 20 are developers.
Honestly, cannot wait to leave this place. I mean, there were times when i was literally depressed for weeks at this place.

[Ezzaral]

Are most companies like this? I guess it'd be excusable for small companies, but there is like 100 people in this department, about 20 are developers.
Honestly, cannot wait to leave this place. I mean, there were times when i was literally depressed for weeks at this place.

Most? Who knows? But it's certainly not uncommon - and it's got nothing to do with the size of the company. The one thing you can be sure of is that it isn't likely to change anytime soon, so just bail if you can't accept it as just part of the job. Software development gets horribly mismanaged all of the time. You learn to live with some level of it and promote better practices wherever you can, or you polish the resume and hit the bricks.

[sarehu]

My job isn't like that. Not all of them are.

[loctan]

To the more seasoned people around here, how do CMMI ratings act as a predictor of level of software engineering maturity? I realize that's what the rating is supposed to be, but I didn't know if many organizations put up a front when auditors come around and then throw it all out when they leave.

What I am getting at is, can the OP use metrics like CMMI rating to accurately judge an organizations software process maturity when deciding if he or she wants to work there?

My place isn't like that at all. Everyone works together to get the job done. Managers, for the most part, stay out of the way. It has changed as the scope of my project has been better defined, etc. It was sort of chaos in the beginning though.

Funny you mention the tester though. I can just picture some mad tester guy running into your office ranting and raving throwing his arms all around in the air.

[foreverlove]

Mody CMMI ratings as the forecast level, the maturity of software engineering, indeed, have a certain reason