Re‐evaluating systems engineering as a framework for tackling systems issues

TLDR

Systems engineering was developed to address the design, implementation, and operation of large, complex technical systems, and over the past decade it has expanded to include social and organizational aspects, evolving from engineering science to a transdisciplinary framework that incorporates established systems approaches to management. The paper examines contemporary systems engineering, concluding it is a metamethodology for developing and evolving large socio‑technical systems and is suitable for any problem involving a substantial technical component. The authors find that contemporary systems engineering functions as a metamethodology for developing and evolving large socio‑technical systems. © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Abstract

Abstract The engineering discipline of systems engineering was developed as means to address the design, implementation and operation of large, complex technical systems. Whilst systems engineering includes methods for addressing the whole life‐cycle of the end product system, and processes for determining what should be made, it still reflects many aspects of the traditional engineering worldview. During the past decade or so, there has been a growing trend within the systems engineering community to appreciate that systems engineering has much wider concerns than just addressing the end product system, and properly encompasses the social aspects of the interaction of people with the end product system, and also the organizational system in which the development is done. Over this period, the framework of ideas that underpins systems engineering has also progressed from engineering science to a transdisciplinary position that incorporates many of the established systems approaches to management. In this paper, we examine the nature of contemporary systems engineering and conclude that systems engineering is a metamethodology for the development and evolution of large, socio‐technical systems. We argue that, as such, systems engineering is an appropriate methodology for any problem situation where the solution can be expected to involve a substantial technical component. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.