Does Systems Engineering in Space Projects Pay?

This paper attempts to answer the question whether it “pays” to apply Systems Engineering methods, tools and techniques within a space project. To this purpose a possible correlation has been investigated between the Systems Engineering effort applied within a number of space projects and the project result in terms of technical quality, cost and schedule. Use has been made of historical data derived from the results of Systems Engineering audits of projects, some recent audits performed along the same lines and assessments of project results in terms of technical quality, cost and schedule by the systems engineers involved in the projects. Basis for the audits is a checklist addressing 93 different aspects of Systems Engineering in the field of requirements, concept design, design & development, verification and technical management. In total nine data sets related to six projects in the industrial and the academic world were used. Although the data obtained are rather “noisy” there appears to be a clear positive correlation between the SE effort applied and the project result. It appears also that the positive effects mainly show up in the cost and schedule results of the project, the technical quality of the project result being generally of a rather satisfactory level. Examining the results in detail the Systems Engineering effort in the field of requirements, design & development and technical management has the strongest correlation with the project result. The effort in the field of (concept) design and verification shows a less strong correlation. The data have been “refined” by deleting the projects that were most strongly influencing the correlation in a positive sense. The overall results remained, however, the same. An overview is given of those aspects generally receiving little attention in the Systems Engineering effort. Further analysis of these results will be the subject of a follow-on study