Developing Individuals

A key aspect of Enabling Individuals to Perform Systems Engineering is to deliberately develop individuals. This article describes how to develop a strategy to close SE competency gaps and maintain the SE competency plan for individuals.

Strategies to Close Competency Gaps

Once the list of required competencies is developed, the next step is to close any gaps. The table below provides an outline of methods organizations use to develop SE competency and close any competency gaps (Davidz and Martin 2011). The primary goal is to deliver excellent systems to fulfill customer needs. In order to do this, an organization develops the competency to deliver excellent systems to fulfill customer needs, which is the secondary goal. However, just because an organization has developed the competency to deliver excellent systems, it does not mean that the organization will necessarily deliver excellent systems on a consistent and regular basis. This table is provided as reference for readers on methods to close competency gaps.

System Delivery

To enhance their ability to deliver excellent systems to fulfill customer needs, some organizations focus directly on successful system delivery with specific initiatives directed at enhancing the delivery of the end goal.

Another approach organizations use is to focus on the performance of the project team. One method to accomplish this is to offer coaching of the project team for performance enhancement. APPEL (NASA 2010)

Develop Competency

To develop the competency to deliver excellent systems, organizations choose multiple paths, from developing the competency of individuals to developing the competency of the organization through processes (Davidz & Maier 2007). Additionally, to ensure that competency development is indeed enhancing system delivery, adequate measures should be put in place to confirm the efficacy of the selected methods.

Individual Competency

Methods used to develop individual competency include training courses, job rotation, mentoring, hands-on experience, handpicking individuals for key projects, university degree programs, customized educational programs, combination programs, and certificate programs.

Classroom training courses are a traditional method organizations use for knowledge transfer and skill acquisition. Here, an instructor directs a classroom of participants. The method of instruction may vary from a lecture format to case study work to hands-on exercises. The impact and effectiveness of this method varies considerably based on the skill of the instructor, the effort of the participants, the presentation of the material, the course content, the quality of the course design process, and the matching of the course material to organizational needs.

Another approach used to develop individual capability is job rotation. Here, a participant works in a series of rotational work assignments that cut across different aspects of the organization to gain broad experience in a relatively short amount of time.

Mentoring is when a more experienced individual is paired with a protégé in a developmental relationship. Many organizations utilize mentoring to varying levels of success. As with training, the impact and effectiveness of mentoring varies considerably. There must be a tenable pairing and adequate time must be spent on the mentoring.

Organizations may choose to develop systems competency in individuals by getting more hands-on experience for their engineers. A research study by Davidz ((2006); (Davidz and Nightingale 2008, 1-14)) on enablers and barriers to the development of systems thinking showed that systems thinking is developed primarily by experiential learning. As an example, some individuals found that working in a job that dealt with the full system, such as working in an integration and test environment, enabled development of systems thinking.

Another method to develop individual competency is to handpick individuals who appear to have high potential and focus on their development. Hand-selection may or may not be accompanied by the other identified methods.

Individual competency can also be developed through formal education, such as a university degree program. A growing number of systems engineering degree programs are offered in the worldwide.

Companies have also worked with their local university to set up customized educational programs for their employees. The company benefits because they can customize the educational program to the unique needs of their business.

An organization may choose a combination of methods to develop individual systems competency. A combination program might include education, training, job rotation, mentoring, and hands-on experience. Many companies offer these types of combination programs. Though many of these programs are not specifically oriented to develop systems skills, the breadth of technical training and experience, coupled with business training, can produce a rich understanding of the system for the participant. Furthermore, new combination programs can be designed to develop specific systems-oriented skills for an organization. Example combination programs include General Electric’s Edison Engineering Development Program (GE 2010) and Lockheed Martin’s Leadership Development Programs (Lockheed Martin 2010).

In a course certificate program, individuals receive a certificate for taking a specific set of courses, either at a university or as provided by the company. There are a growing number of certificate programs for developing systems competency.

Individual Certification

Organizations may try to ensure individual systems competency through a certification program. This type of certification can be a combination of work experience, educational background, and training classes. An example of an individual certification program is the Aerospace Corporation has an Aerospace Systems Architecting and Engineering Certificate Program (ASAECP).

Filters

Another option is to use certain individual characteristics as a filter for selecting employees for systems roles. Before an organization utilizes a list of individual characteristics as a filter, it is important to (1) critically examine how the list of individual characteristics was determined and (2) critically examine how the individual characteristics identified enable the performance of a systems job. Individual characteristics may (a) enable one to perform a systems job, (b) be viewed as important to perform a systems job, or (c) be needed and necessary to perform a systems job. Being necessary is much stronger than enabling, and before filtering for certain traits, it is important to understand if the characteristic is an enabler or a necessity. Understanding the generalizability of the findings is very important, since a list of characteristics that determine success in one organization may not be generalizable to another organization.

Organizational Certification

Another approach is to ensure organizational competency through certification. An example is ISO certification. (ISO 2010) Before this approach is used, it is important to verify that the capabilities required by the certification are indeed the systems capabilities sought by the organization.

Develop Organizational Competency

Organizations may choose to develop organizational systems competency through processes. One method organizations may choose is to pursue process improvement using an established framework. An example is the Capability Maturity Model® Integration (CMMI) process improvement approach. (SEI 2010, 1).

Concept maps, graphical representations of engineering thought processes, have been shown to be an effective method of transferring knowledge from senior engineering personnel to junior engineering personnel. (Kramer 2007, 26-29; Kramer 2005)

An organization may choose to develop organizational systems competencies by standardizing systems policies and procedures. An example is “NASA Systems Engineering Processes and Requirements”. (NASA 2007)

Some organizations use a web portal to store and organize applicable systems engineering knowledge and processes, which assists in developing organizational systems competency. An example is the Mission Assurance Portal for the Aerospace Corporation.

One organization is thinking about having a rotating professor role, where the person would work at the company and then be at a university to strengthen the link between academia and industry.

Alter Organizational Design

Another approach is to alter organizational design to foster and mature a desired competency, e.g., a reliability group.

Shorten Product Life Cycle

An organization may also choose to reposition its product life cycle philosophy to maintain system competency. Since the systems competencies of individuals are primarily developed through experiential learning, providing experiential learning opportunities is critical. An example is (APPEL 2009).

Maintenance of Competency Plans

Once an organization has developed an SE competency plan, maintenance should be considered. Since global contexts change, business strategies change, and the SEBoK develops, the organization should define how and how often the competency plan will be re-examined and updated. The process for assessing competencies and taking actions to improve them must be part of the normal operations of the organization and should occur periodically.

References

Citations

Academy of Program/Project & Engineering Leadership (APPEL). 2009. NASA's systems engineering competencies. Washington, D.C.: U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Association. [1]

Davidz, H. L., and J. Martin. 2011. Defining a strategy for development of systems capability in the workforce. Systems Engineering, the Journal of the International Council on Systems Engineering (INCOSE) 14 (2) (Summer, 2011): 141-143.

Davidz, H. L., and D. Nightingale. 2008. Enabling systems thinking to accelerate the development of senior systems engineers. Systems Engineering, the Journal of The International Council on Systems Engineering (INCOSE) 11 (1) (Spring, 2008): 1-14.

Davidz, H. L., and Maier M. W. 2007. An Integrated Approach to Developing Systems Professionals. International Council on Systems Engineering (INCOSE) 2007 - 17th Annual International Symposium Proceedings. San Diego, CA 2007.

Davidz, H. L. 2006. Enabling systems thinking to accelerate the development of senior systems engineers. PhD., Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

GE. Edison engineering development program (EEDP) in General Electric. CT, USA, 2010. [2]

Kramer, M. J. 2007. Can concept maps bridge the engineering gap. Crosslink, the Aerospace Corporation Magazine of Advances in Aerospace Technology 8 (1) (Spring 2007): 26-9.

Kramer, M. J.. 2005. Using concept maps for knowledge acquisition in satellite design: Tranlating 'statement of requirements on orbit' to 'design requirements'. PhD., Graduate School of Computer and Information Sciences, Nova Southeastern University.

Lockheed Martin. 2010. Training & leadership development programs for college applicants in Lockheed Martin Corporation. Bethesda, MD, USA. [3].

NASA. 2010. Academy of Program/Project & engineering leadership (APPEL): Project life cycle support in U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Washington, D.C. [4]

NASA. 2007. NASA procedural requirements: NASA systems engineering processes and requirements. Washington, D.C.: U.S. National Aeronautic and Space Administration (NASA), NPR 7123.1A.

SEI. 2007. Capability maturity model integrated (CMMI) for development, version 1.2, measurement and analysis process area. Pittsburg, PA, USA: Software Engineering Institute (SEI)/Carnegie Mellon University (CMU)