RESEARCH OVERVIEW Collaborative Systems Thinkingseari.mit.edu/documents/summit/05-SEAriSummit_RR_CTL.pdfApproach :Exploratory research anchored by a series of case studies looking

RESEARCH OVERVIEW

Collaborative Systems Thinking:The role of culture and process in supporting higher level systems thinking

Caroline Twomey Lamb, Doctoral Research Assistant

[email protected]

October 16, 2007

Committee: D. Nightingale (Chair), D. Rhodes, and A. Weigel

seari.mit.edu © 2007 Massachusetts Institute of Technology 2

Researcher’s BackgroundCaroline Twomey Lamb

• Research Interests– Design theory/Systems engineering

– Social component of engineering complex systems

– Impact of process standardization on systems thinking

• Education– 3rd year doctoral student, Aero/Astro ’08 (exp.)

– S.M. Aerospace Engineering (MIT ‘05)

– S.B. Aerospace Engineering (MIT ’03)

• Professional Experience– Pratt and Whitney

– Composites fabrication/testing for DARPA contract

– Wind tunnel testing


Motivation

• Engineering is a socio-technical activity

• Historic emphasis on technical side

• Increasing systems

complexity

• No one individual can

possess necessary

competencies

• Move to team as

fundamental work unit

• Longer development

cycles

• Fewer program starts

• Process

standardization to

codify design practices

and knowledge

• Demographics crisis

within engineering

• Large anticipated loss

of skilled engineers in

near future

• 70% of system level

design knowledge

undocumented

Desire to understand how systems thinking manifests within engineering teams


Research Summary

Project Title: Collaborative Systems Thinking:The role of culture and process in supporting higher level systems thinking

Sponsor: National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate Fellowship/Lean Aerospace Initiative

Goal: Identify organizational culture and process-based enablers and barriers to collaborative systems thinking within the aerospace industry

Approach: Exploratory research anchored by a series of case studies looking at the enablers and barriers to engineering teams in theaerospace industry developing collaborative systems thinking


Research Goal

To advance understanding of how

engineer’s develop systems thinking skills

by exploring the concept at the team level

Engineering Demographics in the US Manned Fighter Programs by Decade


In other words…

“Dream Airplanes” by C. W. Miller


Key Challenges

• Divergent definitions of systems thinking within engineering community– No universally accepted definition of systems thinking within

engineering community

– Following definition developed by Dr. Heidi Davidz and grounded in 200+ interviews

• Engaging teams and management in addressing social component of engineering– Dealing with soft issues in engineering design

– Historically topics engineers to not value/are not comfortable discussing

• Identifying ways to improve process implementation towards fostering systems thinking


Research Questions

1. What is collaborative systems thinking?a) What is team thinking?

b) What does systems thinking look like at the team level

2. What are the enablers or barriers to

collaborative systems thinking?a) How might an organization’s culture, engineering culture, or

team sub-culture impact team-level systems thinking?

b) How do processes, meant to support shared practices,

promote or deter shared conceptualizations of the system?

3. What synergies or tensions between process

and culture contribute to collaborative systems

thinking?


Collaborative Systems Thinking (1)

What is team thinking?

• Thinking is purposeful, reasoned and goal-directed action towards the solving of problems (Agkun and Lynn, 2005)

• Elements of thinking– Problem exploration

– Evaluation of alternatives

– Decision Making

• Team thinking is the human equivalent of parallel processing (Entin et.al., 2004)

– Emerges from intersection of individual team members’ thinking, behavior and team processes

– Team thinking is greater than the sum of individuals’ thinking

– Communication is key to team thinking

– Brainstorming, team norms, and processes enable this communication


Pilot Interviews

Collaborative Systems Thinking (2)

What is systems thinking?

What is collaborative systems thinking?

Systems thinking is utilizing modal elements to consider the componential, relational, contextual, and dynamic elements of the system of interest (Davidz, 2006)

Systems thinking is utilizing modal elements to consider the componential, relational, contextual, and dynamic elements of the system of interest (Davidz, 2006)

Collaborative systems thinking is an emergent behavior of teams resulting from the interactions of team members and utilizing a variety of thinking styles, design processes, tools, and languages to consider systems attributes, interrelationships, context and dynamics towards executing systems design.

Collaborative systems thinking is an emergent behavior of teams resulting from the interactions of team members and utilizing a variety of thinking styles, design processes, tools, and languages to consider systems attributes, interrelationships, context and dynamics towards executing systems design.

Design Theory

Team T

hinking

Team Composition


Culture and Standard Process

• The impact of culture and process

on team performance a repetitive

theme in literature

• Defining leverage points will help

in observing tensions and

synergies

• Process is must easier to change

than culture

• Alignment creates reinforcing loop

• Misalignment produces conflicting

stimuli and dysfunctional behavior

Undocumented

team norms

Documented tasks

and methods

Culture Standardized

Process

Espoused

beliefs

Vision

statements

Underlying

assumptions

Strategy for

standardization

Social

networks

Process flow

maps, org-charts

Undocumented

team norms

Documented tasks

and methods

Culture Standardized

Process

Espoused

beliefs

Vision

statements

Underlying

assumptions

Strategy for

standardization

Social

networks

Process flow

maps, org-charts


Experimental Method

Literature

SearchReview

Past

Relevant

Cases

Pilot

Interviews

Theory

Synthesis

Data

Analysis

Theory

Generation

and Idea

Sharing

Coding,

statistical

analysis,

MS Excel

Case StudiesData Sources

Primary

Documentation

Interviews

Observations Surveys

Experimental Design

Identify

potential case

opportunities

Identify

potential case

opportunities

Work with

point

of contact

Work with

point

of contact

Collect survey dataCollect survey data

Interview engineering

team members

Interview engineering

team members

Observe team membersObserve team members

Case ?

Case Case

Case β

Case ?

Case ?

Case α

Case Case γ

Case

Case ε

Case ζ

δ


Initial Results

• Effective communication is necessary

– Good communication uses the multiple language of design (sketches, equations, models,

simulations, etc)

– Evidence supports role of information sketching in improving early communication and

improving final design

• Use of multiple thinking styles: convergent and divergent

– As problem solvers, engineers excel at convergent thinking

– Leaves goal space only partially explored, missed opportunities improve design

– Divergent thinking predicated on culture that promotes early critical discussion without fear of

criticism

• Product orientation solidifies team objectives

– Clear goals enable better communication and teamwork

– Exciting, motivating goals, get people to think and act outside of the box

• Engineering culture is its own worst enemy

– Engineering archetypes affirm individuals, technology considerations over social, and

procrastination

– Norms limit communication and result in schedule pressure

• Culture and process are important elements in CST:


Anticipated Contributions

Expected Outcomes:

• Operationalized definition of collaborative systems thinking

• List of enablers and barriers to collaborative systems thinking

Broader Impact:

• Provide organizations with information that facilitate positive interventions in process and shaping culture to promote systems thinking development in the workforce

Knowledge Deployment:

• Paper at 2008 Conference on SE Research (CSER)

• INCOSE 2008 Paper

• Series of journal papers on issues in collaborative engineering and systems thinking

• Targeted briefings for participating organizations


Further Information

C. Lamb and D. Rhodes, Promoting Systems Promoting Systems Thinking Through Alignment of Culture and Thinking Through Alignment of Culture and Process: Initial Results,Process: Initial Results, CSER Conference, March 2007

C. Lamb and D. Rhodes, Standardized Standardized Process as a Tool for High Level Systems Process as a Tool for High Level Systems Thinking,Thinking, INCOSE 2007, June 2007

Documents

RESEARCH OVERVIEW Collaborative Systems Thinkingseari.mit.edu/documents/summit/05-SEAriSummit_RR_CTL.pdfApproach :Exploratory research anchored by a series of case studies looking