Agile Systems Engineering: Delivering Tailored Methods and Processes

The topic of Agile systems engineering is an ever increasing talking point. In fact, INCOSE has an active working group focused on Agile processes and agile systems.

Executable models are the foundation of Agile systems engineering. They provide a means for systems engineers to minimize the ambiguity prevalent in text-based specifications, along with the verification necessary to ensure specifications are complete, consistent, and correct.

Equally important, in an Agile environment, systems engineering requires?tailored methods and processes to deliver incremental capabilities, and therefore demands a disciplined approach to coordinating parallel requirements elaboration and prioritization, technical development, operations, and sustainment activities.

Systems engineers play an essential role in operational, technical, and programmatic integration, as expressed in the core Agile software development tenet of active collaboration among developers, users, and other stakeholders.

Program leaders normally encourage systems engineers to engage developers, testers, users, and other stakeholders in their disciplined engineering processes.

To enable faster, smaller capability deliveries, Agile development requires proactive integration among enterprise architectures, platform architectures, and related development efforts, where each of the stakeholder groups are contributing concerns and opportunities from their constituency for the good of the successful release and system delivery.

To find the right balance between structure and the flexibility necessary to deliver usable capability aligned with user needs, programs should conduct continuous interdisciplinary systems engineering reviews in accordance with?DoDI 5000.02?requirements.

Full participation by key decision makers and users is fundamental to the Agile approach. One important systems engineering practice to consider in an Agile environment includes providing information to all key stakeholders on a consistent, regularly scheduled basis, either through design reviews or program reviews and the use of an Integrated Data Environment shared by the stakeholders such as the development contractor(s) and the government.

This improves government transparency, increases team understanding, and reduces the need for formal contract data deliverables.

Want to learn more? Tonex offers Agile Systems Engineering Training?Bootcamp, a 4-day course that covers the application of Agile environment in systems engineering. Agile systems engineering?training provides you with proven practices to help to collaborate effectively in a team through applying Agile development approaches.

You will learn how to provide high-quality and valuable working environment while accommodating changing requirements. The Agile systems engineering?hands-on bootcamp goes beyond just coding practices, providing you with skills that will empower the Agile principles.

For more information, questions, comments,?contact us.