Why engineering and acquisition projects fail?

1. SE6
Systems Engineering Panel Session
1 August 21‒22, 2019
Glen B. Alleman
Wednesday 21 August 2019
2: 40PM ‒ 4:00PM

2. Why engineering/acquisition projects fail?
and what is project failure defined as?
 There is no measurable definition of what
Done looks like in units of measure meaningful
to the decision maker
 Measures of Effective
 Measures of Performance
 Key Performance Parameters
 Technical Performance Measures
 Reducible (Epistemic) and Irreducible
(Aleatory) uncertainties that create risk are not
handled in a meaningful manner
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PGCS 2019 Key Note, Canberra Australia

3. To what extent and what kind of project failures can be
attributed to inconsistencies between project /program
management and systems engineering?
 The disconnect between Systems Engineering
and Project Performance Management has
been well documented
 The inconsistences are self inflicted wounds,
since both SE and PM (Project Performance
Management) have much in common and those
connections are well documented
 Research shows the root cause of this disconnect
is in the integration of the two disciplines and the
mismanagement of that integration
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PGCS 2019 Key Note, Canberra Australia

4. To what extent and what kind of project failures can be
attributed to inconsistencies between project /program
management and systems engineering?
 Common causes of the Dis-Integration
between PM and SE
 Cost and schedule performance measures are
not integrated with Systems Engineering
performance measures
 Work effort is duplicated, with program members
receiving potentially conflicting views of the same
technical and programmatic work activities
 Requirements tracked and manager separately,
resulting in different views of the customer needs
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PGCS 2019 Key Note, Canberra Australia

5. To what extent and what kind of project failures can be
attributed to inconsistencies between project /program
management and systems engineering?
 Barriers to successfully making these
connections, starts with …
 Cultural differences between Program Managers
and Systems Engineers and their Stakeholders
needs through the lens of:
 Managing, planning, and implementation processes
 Defining system components and the interactions of
these components
 Building system component in the presence of cost,
schedule, and technical performance uncertainty
 Integrating systems components to deliver needed
Capabilities for the needed cost on the needed Date
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PGCS 2019 Key Note, Canberra Australia

6. How can we bridge the gap between SE
and PM?
 Start with a model of the integration
 Data
 Processes
 Outcomes
 Recognize
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PGCS 2019 Key Note, Canberra Australia

7. What is agenda for industry and academia
on this issue?
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PGCS 2019 Key Note, Canberra Australia

8. 8 PGCS 2019 Master Workshop, Canberra Australia