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When Do You Need to Actively Manage System of Systems Engineering: A Quantitative Analysis

Daniel J. Epstein Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering ISE 650 Seminar"When Do You Need to Actively Manage System of Systems Engineering: A Quantitative Analysis"Jo Ann Lane, PhDABSTRACT: Today's need for more complex, more capable systems in a short timeframe is leading more organizations towards the integration of new and existing systems with commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) products into network-centric, knowledge-based systems of systems (SoS). With this approach, system development processes to define the new architecture, identify sources to either supply or develop the required components, and eventually integrate and test these high level components are evolving and are being referred to as SoS Engineering (SoSE). In recent years, the systems engineering (SE) community has struggled to decide if SoSE is really different from traditional SE and, if it is different, how does it differ. Recent case study research, primarily by the Department of Defense's Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD), has confirmed that there are indeed key differences and that traditional SE processes are not sufficient for SoSE. Additional studies of several large-scale SoSE programs and several SE programs that were considered part of one or more SoSs identified four types of SoSE management strategies.
This presentation describes the results of further investigations that explored two of these SoSE management strategies with respect to engineering effort and return on SoSE investment. The two most common SoSE management strategies (with and without an SoSE team to guide capability development) were compared and used to assess the value-added of the SoSE team with respect to total SE effort expended to engineer an SoS capability. It is clear from both the OSD pilot studies and the system dynamics model analysis conducted as part of this research that there exist conditions under which investments in SoSE have positive and negative returns on investment. This presentation provides insights into the first quantitative determination of these conditions and points out directions for future research that would strengthen the results.THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 10, 2009, ANDRUS GERONTOLOGY (GER) 309, 3:30 – 4:30 PMBIO: Jo Ann Lane recently completed her PhD in the USC ISE Department under the guidance of Professors Barry Boehm and Stan Settles in the area of system of systems (SoS) engineering and cost modeling. As a PhD candidate, she was awarded the 2007 International Council on Systems Engineering (INCOSE) Foundation/Stevens Doctoral Award for promising research in Systems Engineering and Integration.

Location: Ethel Percy Andrus Gerontology Center (GER) - 309

Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

Contact: Georgia Lum