Central Theme
The presentation offers a sharp critique of traditional and contemporary systems engineering (SE), arguing that its educational foundations, standards, and common practices are fundamentally flawed and incomplete. The speaker proposes a new paradigm called “Holistic Thinking Perspectives” to overcome these limitations and guides the audience on how to transition from being a merely ‘good’ engineer to an ‘outstanding’ one who successfully tackles complex problems.
Key Arguments and Findings
- Limitations of Current Thinking: The talk begins by highlighting that both conventional (reductionist) and standard systems thinking (holistic) are insufficient on their own, as they don’t provide a clear method for generating solutions.
- Holistic Thinking Perspectives (HTP): The core of the proposed solution is a framework of nine distinct perspectives (e.g., Big Picture, Functional, Structural, Temporal, Generic). This framework is designed to provide a comprehensive, 360-degree view of a problematic situation, integrating analysis, synthesis, and creative thinking.
- Critique of SE Education and Standards: The speaker argues that SE education is fragmented, focuses on the “what” instead of the “how,” and has significant gaps. Similarly, he criticizes SE standards (like DODAF) for being overly complex, focusing on management processes, and neglecting the crucial, early-stage problem formulation and conceptual design phases.
- The “A” vs. “B” Paradigm: A key distinction is made between two approaches. The modern “B” Paradigm starts with a set of requirements. The speaker advocates for a return to the “A” Paradigm, which starts with understanding the operational concept and the problem situation *before* defining requirements.
- Good vs. Outstanding Systems Engineer: A “good” engineer builds the system the customer *asks for*, often leading to a frustrating cycle of changing requirements. An “outstanding” engineer uses the “A” paradigm and incorporates generic system knowledge to understand and deliver the system the customer truly *needs*, resulting in a more stable and successful project. This is achieved by building a more complete initial model of the solution.
Significant Conclusions
The primary conclusion is that many systems engineering failures stem from a flawed and incomplete approach to the discipline itself. To become truly effective, engineers must shift from a process-centric, requirement-driven mindset to a problem-centric one. By adopting a holistic, multi-perspective framework, an engineer can better understand the problem, solution, and implementation domains, identify true needs versus stated wants, and ultimately prevent the issues that plague so many complex projects.
Mentoring Question
The speaker differentiates between a ‘good’ systems engineer who delivers what the customer wants and an ‘outstanding’ one who delivers what the customer needs. In your own work, what specific methods or thought processes do you use to distinguish between stated requirements and the underlying problem that needs to be solved?
Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=3CkS4qdjicA&si=fz5I-EssDCYainHH
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