A conceptual approach to support through-life business transformation in an aerospace and defence context

Through Life Capability Management (TLCM) is a complex evolving domain that requires a new approach to better understand the different viewpoints, models and practices within various enterprises to support a future conceptual model development. This research applied Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) to identify the activities necessary to transform an existing aerospace and defence business model to one that would support TLCM. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with experts and stakeholders across a range of different relevant functions and organisations to identify the activities required to support conceptual model development. A bottom-up approach was used to provide a TLCM ontology and a top-down approach was proposed to develop the root definitions derived from the experts' perception of TLCM. The benefits and drawbacks of using SSM including the human-activity system and mapping the activities onto a TLCM cube (architectural) model are discussed

A soft systems methodology for transforming organisations to product-service systems (application in defence and construction industry)

Nowadays organisations from different business sectors and with contrasting management approaches are increasingly prioritising the satisfaction of clients’ needs through service provision. The transformation of a company from predominantly product only to a product and service mix is studied. The transformation will generally involve the transfer of some activities from one part of the supply chain to another and, in some cases, this involves the transfer of activities previously carried out by the client to the product-service company. This paper describes the application of SSM (Soft Systems Methodology) to this transformation such that the views of those stakeholders across the supply chain can be captured and conflicting expectations and views can be highlighted. We provide an initial model for developing a SSM in defence construction organisations to show that the general approach is relevant to this particular feature of transformation. The SSM approach will lead to identification of barriers to transformation, the understanding of implications on overall performance and – importantly – the joint consideration of these matters and solution generation by customer and supplier in a non-confrontational fashion. The overall objective is to make recommendations that alleviate identified concerns, barriers and obstacles to this transformation. The outcomes of the research will show how the SSM conceptual models can help managers in either sector to realise the necessary activities needed to perform the transformation in a successful manner

A stakeholder-based analysis of the benefits of network enabled capabilities

Realisation of the benefits sought from Network Enabled Capability (NEC) requires industry and UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) to work effectively together with a shared vision. Earlier studies have revealed disparate understandings of the NEC concept and a lack of agreement on its definition. Furthermore, although the benefits of NEC have been intuitively recognised, it is not clear that these benefits have been metricated in a fashion suitable to justify the investment needed in research and development for their realisation. This paper reports on a workshop involving military users and industrial systems engineers that sought to identify and prioritise the benefits of NEC through which NEC development may be assessed. It also draws on the outcomes of other interactive workshops on the perception of NEC by stakeholders organised within the framework of NECTISE research programme. The motivation for this paper is to disseminate NEC benefits on which there is industry and user consensus to encourage the generation of meaningful measurements of NEC value in the future. The outcomes have revealed considerable coherence between the stakeholder groups in recognition and priority of the benefits, although these benefits were all of an operational (military) nature. This indicates a good prospect for industry engagement in the NEC aspiration and metrics are now needed to measure the effectiveness of using NEC in different contexts such as military and industry. The benefits are also included in the impact of NEC on the systems engineering discipline, but in order to achieve them systems engineering may be required to change or adapt new practices

NEC themes: a conceptual analysis and applied principles

This paper deals with essential principles of Interoperability, Agility, Collaboration and Knowledge applied in the context of Network Enabled Capability Through Innovative Systems Engineering (NECTISE). Using empirical investigations these concepts have been identified as NEC-readiness themes and they contribute significantly to the realisation of NEC. Based on a systemic analysis and application of theoretical principles, the approach described in this paper contributes towards the demonstration of NEC as well as the identification of a limited set of critical features for capability planning and systems design. Some research questions are derived and discussed and a gap analysis strategy is proposed. These themes also defined as critical features have been investigated in a variety of contexts The main contributions of this paper are related to the mapping the themes to the military capability model and formalisation of the relationships. The purpose of such an exercise is to exploit learning from other (mainly civil) domains in the military context, with regard to the readiness themes which overlap with a limited set of critical features for design within a NEC context

Managing innovation: a multidisciplinary scenario development approach

The UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) is focusing on and shifting toward a Network Enabled Capability (NEC) approach for improved military effect. This is being realised through the physical networking and coherent integration of existing and future resources including sensors, effectors, support services, and decision makers. This paper is a case study (for NEC) of how the development and use of scenarios for demonstrating academic research can aid and help manage innovation. It illustrates the development, use and application of a multiple stakeholder scenario within the NECTISE research programme that helped establish and exploit a collaborative multidisciplinary working environment and how it helped manage innovative academic research. Our experience suggests that this approach can support the engagement of multiple stakeholders with differing perceptions and priorities and will provide a scenario development strategy for improved research and innovation for many other large systems

The future of trans-Atlantic collaboration in modelling and simulation of Cyber-Physical Systems - A strategic research agenda for collaboration

Smart systems, in which sophisticated software/hardware is embedded in physical systems, are part of everyday life. From simple products with embedded decision-making software, to massive systems in which hundreds of systems, each with hundreds or thousands of embedded processors, interoperate the use of Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) will continue to expand. There has been substantial investment in CPS research in Europe and the United States. Through a series of workshops and other events, the TAMS4CPS project has established that there is mutual benefit in the European Union and US collaborating on CPS research. An agenda for collaborative research into modelling and simulation for CPS is thus set forth in the publication at hand. The agenda includes models for many different purposes, including fundamental concepts, design models (e.g. architectures), predictive techniques, real-time control, human-CPS interaction, and CPS governance. Within this framework, seven important themes have been identified where mutual benefits can be realised by EU-US cooperation. To actively advance research and innovation in these fields, a number of collaboration mechanisms is presented and concrete actions to encourage, enhance and implement trans-Atlantic collaboration in modelling and simulation of CPS are recommended

Modeling the linkage between systems interoperability and security engineering

Industry, finance, and other business activities are increasingly reliant on computer networks and systems, which demand effective interoperability of systems. But this also demands effective systems security, which poses a major challenge to the socio-technical interactions enabled by interoperable tools. This paper addresses modeling of the linkages between interoperability and security in the model design stage of systems development. It considers current interoperability frameworks and the manner in which they may be combined with security standards and desirable characteristics to create trusted, robust systems that are central to the operation of network enabled large scale applications. An holistic approach for interoperability and security is presented based on systems requirements modeling and model based architecting principles

Managing capability knowledge across the extended enterprise

The Through Life Capability Management (TLCM) construct, currently being embraced by defense departments across the globe, is a commercial and social endeavor that requires a multitude of socio-technical systems to work together effectively in a system of systems. TLCM demands changes in the organization and culture of the defense supply chain in ways that fly in the face of traditional commercial wisdom. This paper reports on an on going enterprise model that is being created as part of a wider research project into the management and sharing of knowledge across the TLCM enterprise. The model describes the UK MoD TLCM enterprise as a set of responsibilities that agents execute by accessing identified resources, in this instance limited to information and knowledge. Preliminary results indicate changes in the structure of the supply chain organization that raises significant challenges in the areas of decision making, knowledge sharing, organizational learning, culture and behavior

Job design for manufacturing in an era of sustainability

The paper explores the changes that are likely to be necessary as the world moves to a more sustainable way of life. When these changes are added to the development of the Internet of Things, in which it is envisaged that devices with some level of embedded intelligence will communicate with each other, as will intelligent services, it appears that our current ways of conducting job design may be found wanting. The principles of socio-technical design will still apply; how these principles will necessarily be extended is the subject of this paper; how to include aspects of sustainability, the need to train for resilience, etc

Maintaining systems-of-systems fit-for-purpose

The objective of this research is to create a method and process for the engineering of system characteristics so that composing Systems-of-Systems (SoS) that have experienced unpredictable changes in operation, composition or external factors can be maintained Fit-For-Purpose (FFP)