Details for Performing Collaborative, Distributed Systems Engineering (CDSE): Lessons Learned from CDSE Enterprises

The United States aerospace and defense budgets are shrinking, resources are scarce and requirements are more demanding; aerospace and defense enterprises are expected to deliver a more capable product in less time and with fewer resources. To achieve this tough mission, the enterprises that comprise the United States aerospace and defense industries must form strategic partnerships and collaborations to utilize their respective resources, knowledge, and expertise to meet their customers’ needs. Collaboration, be it between competing companies or within different divisions of the same company, is necessary for the survival of each company and the defense industry. In the past, United States aerospace and defense company relationships consisted mostly of a prime contractor, with sub-contractors providing a specific hardware or software subsystem, as specified by the prime contractor. Today, aerospace and defense company relationships are moving more toward that of “partners” where the previous supplier or sub-contractor for hardware or software subsystems is now sharing in the overall system design and engineering efforts. Since the partner companies and intracompany divisions are still geographically distributed throughout the United States, it is necessary for the aerospace and defense contractors to perform collaborative, distributed systems engineering (CDSE) over several geographical locations. Previous research has demonstrated that the design practices of distributed design teams differ from those of traditional, co-located teams. However, many companies today are performing CDSE using systems engineering (SE) processes and methods developed for traditional SE environments and are therefore encountering many issues. Successful SE practices are difficult to carry-out when performed by a traditional, colocated enterprise. The addition of geographic distribution and cross-company or intra-company collaboration in SE presents a myriad of social and technological challenges that necessitate new and different SE methods for success. Best practices for CDSE are currently unknown (or undocumented). In an attempt to benchmark the current state of CDSE practices in industry, this research presents the collection of CDSE lessons learned and success factors gathered from two case studies carried out at two United States aerospace and defense companies. The case studies examine many different factors that pertain to the companies’ current CDSE efforts, including collaboration scenarios; collaboration tools; knowledge and decision management; SE practices and processes; SE process improvements; SE culture; SE project management, SE organization; and SE collaboration benefits and motivation. Since the research for successful CDSE practices is in its infancy, this research also outlines key areas for future CDSE research.