Learning from Programmatic Failures Paul Collopy

Learning from Programmatic Failures  What is a Programmatic Failure?  Should we be concerned?  What can we do?

What is a Programmatic Failure?  Major Cost Overrun  A Year or More Delay in Schedule  Cancellation Due to Program or Performance

What is a Programmatic Failure?  Major Cost Overrun  A Year or More Delay in Schedule  Cancellation Due to Program or Performance 90% of Current NASA Programs 80% of Current DoD Programs 2 of 2 Current NASA Programs 80% of Current DoD Programs Few NASA Programs 30% of DoD Programs

Should We Be Concerned?  DoD Programmatic Failures Cost ~ $150 million per day On the order of the cost of the Iraq or the Afghanistan War  Pentagon estimates a $600 Billion LCC overrun for F-35  Space Station cost 6 times the original estimate, excluding Shuttle Flight costs  Space Shuttle cost 3.5 times the original budget $200 billion could have funded a manned mission to Mars  Overruns on the James Webb Space Telescope cost JPL its Mars Exploration program $200 B total overrun

Should We Be Concerned?  DoD Programmatic Failures Cost ~ $150 million per day On the order of the cost of the Iraq or the Afghanistan War  Pentagon estimates a $600 Billion LCC overrun for F-35  Space Station cost 6 times the original estimate, excluding Shuttle Flight costs  Space Shuttle cost 3.5 times the original budget $200 billion could have funded a manned mission to Mars  Overruns on the James Webb Space Telescope cost JPL its Mars Exploration program $200 B total overrun

What Can We Do?  Our systems engineering process has failed us  Biased cost estimates indicate an endogenous cost growth process  Although we focus our process and research on conceptual and preliminary design,  We need to fix the SE process for Detailed Design Everything Is Fine at PDR

0 % 20 % 80 % 100 % Concept Design Detailed Design ProductionUse and Dispose Cost Committed Cost Incurred After illustration on the website of the Engineering Design Centre and Newcastle University Prelim Design

Systems Engineering during Detailed Design  Systems Engineering is the process that guides, coordinates, and facilitates Design Engineering Guidance for Complex Systems Coordination for Optimal Design Facilitation – stay out of the way!  Guidance – Preferences  Coordination – Consistent Objective Functions  Facilitation – Minimal restrictions, constraints, requirements

Research on SE During Detailed Design

The Renaissance in Systems Engineering  Systems Engineering Research has never been more critical to our nation’s future  We need radical (getting to the root cause and fixing it) solutions to the most pressing problems  This will necessitate re-thinking our current research agendae