Complex and Enterprise Systems Engineering

ENTERPRISE AND COMPLEX SYSTEMS ENGINEERING

Series Editors: Paul R. Garvey and Brian E. White

The burgeoning discipline of Enterprise Systems Engineering (ESE) is developing to deal with complex adaptive systems. ESE extends the Traditional Systems Engineering (TSE) discipline and processes in new and different ways. Although the ESE state-of-the-art is still quite immature, the interest and potential benefit of developing such a discipline is extraordinarily high because of the pervasive nature of the Internet, wireless communication, ubiquitous computing, intelligent agents, non-hierarchical control, etc.

We define an enterprise not as a business entity, nor a very large system, nor even as a system-of-systems, but an entity arising from taking a completely different perspective suggested by these complex behavior patterns. It is not simply a matter of scale. We consider an enterprise to be a collection of systems whose operational capabilities are inextricably intertwined with considerations of people, processes, and technology, whose boundaries are often imprecise, and which can often be characterized by a set of special, additional properties, such as emergent behavior, non-determinism, and environmental dependencies. ESE also considers the entire environment in which the system must operate, including, but not limited to, the human-machine interface, the governance structure, maintenance and support, etc. The architecture of the enterprise and both its explicit requirements and implicit potential capabilities will evolve and emerge as trends in technology, scope of the enterprise, the aggregate user base, and other factors evolve over time.

Emergent behavior occurs when a collection of systems operate in an environment that enables different, often more complex, behaviors than could have been predicted by observing their individual characteristics. Thus, an enterprise's behavior is often unpredictable and may represent a new level of the system's evolution. The challenge to the enterprise systems engineer is to exploit these new, emergent capabilities for the user community's benefit.

The number of interactions in an enterprise increases exponentially with the number of systems, thus potentially allowing for many new and subtle capabilities and behavior patterns to emerge in non-deterministic ways. The challenge to the enterprise systems engineer is to characterize and constrain the enterprise's complex behavior so that its evolution, while not predictable, is controllable.

The environment of the enterprise includes not only the systems of which it is composed, but the people (i.e., organizations), processes (e.g., governance and standards), and technology that surround it and profoundly effect its operation and evolution. The challenge to the enterprise systems engineer is to understand and adapt to these environmental dependencies so that the enterprise can evolve in response to changes in its environment while remaining stable and controllable.

Thus, Enterprise Systems Engineering is a discipline of engineering that focuses on integration of many engineering sub-systems and principles into a complete system.

It accomplishes all of the tasks of "traditional" systems engineering, further informed by an expansive view of the context (political, operational, economic, technological, interacting systems, etc.) in which the system(a) under consideration are being developed, acquired, modified, maintained, or disposed of.

ESE may be required when the complexity being faced (due to scale, uncontrollable interdependencies, and other uncertainties) breaks down the assumptions upon which textbook systems engineering is based, such as requirements being relatively stable and well-understood, a system configuration that can be controlled, and a small, easily discernible set of stakeholders.

But what's missing? Even the simplest systems interoperate with and are interdependent with other systems in the broader enterprise. Their development processes follow organizational vision, goals, and governance, necessarily changing as political and financial environments change. Their requirements change as the people who operate them adapt the processes for their usage. They evolve as technology evolves and matures. TSE does not naturally account for these complex, adaptive influences. Thus, we consider ESE to be an augmentation of TSE with people, processes, and technology, subject to external ("environmental") influences.

The goal of the series is to further understanding and adoption of ESE with equal emphasis on people, processes, and technology.

At present, the books in the series are:

Architecture and Principles of Systems Engineering, Charles Dickerson and Dimitri N. Mavris

Designing Complex Systems: Foundations of Design in the Functional Domain, Erik W. Aslaksen

Engineering Mega-Systems: The Challenge of Systems Engineering in the Information Age, Renee Stevens

Model-oriented Systems Engineering Science: A Unifying Framework for Traditional and Complex Systems, Duane W. Hybertson

Forthcoming Books

Enterprise Systems Engineering: Theory and Practice, George Rebovich, Jr. and Brian E. White, Publication Date: July 23, 2010

Complex Enterprise Systems Engineering for Operational Excellence, Kenneth C. Hoffman and Kirkor Bozdogan, Publication Date: April 2011

Leadership in Decentralized Organizations, Beverly G. McCarter and Brian E. White, Publication Date: April 2011

Systems Engineering Economics, Ricardo Valerdi, Publication Date: December 2011

Analytical Methods for Risk Management: A Systems Engineering Perspective, Paul R. Garvey