Publication

This report describes the results from the second in a series of related efforts to address systems engineering shortfalls in projects characterized as quick response, networkenabled, or emergent. The objectives of this task were to 1) Gather additional information on methods, processes and tools (MPTs) associated with the environment identified in Phase 1 of this work and develop a taxonomy of MPTs identified; 2) Investigate the use of micro-process modeling techniques to support the definition and evaluation of MPTs; and, 3) Provide implementation guidance on the three MPTs recommended in Phase 1.

The products of the research are directly relevant to the challenges currently being faced by the sponsor:

• the description of the three recommended MPTs in an expanded taxonomy and individual implementation guidance
• the development of a micro-process model of Scrum in Little-JIL and successful demonstration of fault tree and finite state verification analyses
• the identification of key critical success factors for rapid response and innovative development environments

The recommendations for future research based on these results are:

• continue the identification of useful MPTs and their description in the expanded taxonomy
• investigate the practicality and usefulness of a test bed facility to evaluate incremental improvement of existing MPTs and new approaches to systems engineering, including new MPTs
• conduct empirical studies of anecdotal MPT claims, e.g. scalability of Scrum
• use the gaps identified in this work to establish focused innovation teams to create, evaluate and if appropriate, pilot new systems engineering approaches and MPTs that will address each team’s specific gap
• investigate new process improvement methods that are applicable in rapid response and innovative environments
• identify the characteristics of agile, adaptable processes for agile engineering