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Overview
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781936420247 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Mercury Learning and Information |
| Publication date: | 09/30/2012 |
| Pages: | 250 |
| Product dimensions: | 6.00(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.80(d) |
About the Author
Howard Eisner has served as Distinguished Research Professor in the School of Engineering and Applied Science at The George Washington University(GWU) since 1989. Prior to that time he spent 30 years in industry where he was a researcher, manager and executive, serving as president of two systems engineering companies. He has written five books that relate to systems and engineering. In 1994, he received the GWU Engineering Alumni Award for Outstanding Achievement.
Table of Contents
Preface xiii
1 Introduction 1
1.1 Premises 1
1.2 What is a System? 4
1.3 User Perspectives and Concerns 6
Is there a System for...? 6
What do you Want in a System? 7
1.4 The Fuss about Process 9
1.5 Where do Humans Fit? 11
1.6 Systems and their Life Cycles 13
1.7 System Functions and Attributes 15
1.8 Systems of Systems 17
1.9 Sustainability and Regulations 20
Sustainability 20
Regulation 21
1.10 Bottom Lines 23
Some Systems Help us, and Some Systems Hurt us 25
2 Systems 27
2.1 Views of Systems 27
Subsystems and Functions 29
2.2 The Systems Approach 30
Suggestions from Simon Ramo 31
Systems Thinking 31
2.3 Systems Thinking and Theory 32
A Shorty Story about Systems Thinking 32
A General System Theory 33
The Fifth Discipline 33
2.4 Errors in Systems 34
2.5 Balance and Tradeoffs 37
Balance 37
Tradeoffs 38
3 Engineering 41
3.1 Classical Engineering 41
3.2 Science and Technology 44
3.3 Problem Solving 47
Articulating the Problem 47
Defining the Key Factors, Variables, and Observables 47
Drawing Inferences 48
Constructing Alternative Solutions 48
Evaluating the Alternatives 48
Selecting the Best Alternative(s) 49
Implementing the Best Alternative 49
3.4 Quality 49
3.5 Scarce Resources and Constraints 52
The Manhattan Project 52
Nuclear Missile-Carrying Submarines 52
The Strategic Defense Initiative 52
What about the Rest of our Systems? 53
4 Systems Engineering 57
4.1 Definitions of Systems Engineering 57
INCOSE 57
NASA 58
DoD 59
Andrew Sage 60
4.2 Structures of Systems Engineering 60
4.3 Architecting Systems 63
4.4 Views of Architectures 66
4.5 Stakeholders 68
4.6 Cost-Effective Solutions 70
Measures of Effectiveness 72
5 Systems Analysis 75
5.1 The Purpose and Pervasiveness of Systems Analysis 75
5.2 Some History of Systems Analysis 78
Operations Research 79
5.3 Some Forms of Systems Analysis 80
Linear Systems Analysis 80
Nonlinear Systems Analysis 81
Derivatives of Systems Engineering 82
5.4 Modeling and Simulation 82
Available M & S Software 84
5.5 Choose the Best System 85
5.6 Analysis of System Errors 87
Errors and their Measurement 88
Detection and False-Alarm Probabilities 89
6 Educating 91
6.1 Overview 91
6.2 Teaching and Learning 95
6.3 Is the System Broken? 97
Cost of a College Education 97
Dealing with the Internet and other Electronic Systems 98
Outreach to Government and Industry 98
Sponsored Research 99
Management 99
6.4 Ten Positives about Universities 99
6.5 Some Advice for the Student 102
6.6 Sustainability and Regulation 105
6.7 Perceptions of Academia 106
Questionnaire Scale 107
Observations 108
Voices from the Chronicle 110
6.8 Strategic Planning 110
Fundamental Principle 111
Elements of the Strategic Plan 111
Goals 112
6.9 The Future of Higher Education 113
7 Entrepreneuring 117
7.1 Looking at a Few Entrepreneurs 117
7.2 Thinking and Behaving Like an Entrepreneur 121
7.3 Monetizing 123
The IPO 124
The Seminal Idea 124
Where to Start? 125
7.4 The Road Most Traveled 126
A Little-Known Story about How to Fail 126
7.5 A Story of Monetizing, with (Possible) Lessons Learned 129
Conjectures 131
8 The Human Element 133
8.1 A Part of Most Systems 133
Human Engineering 134
Human Tendencies 135
Bottom Line 136
8.2 A User's Manual 136
8.3 Customer is Still (Mostly) King 138
8.4 Your Workplace and Family Both Contain Systems 140
Your Office 140
Your Family 141
Focusing on Children 142
8.5 Designing for the Human Element 143
8.6 The Human and Some Type I/II Errors 145
8.7 Our Human Political System-Through a Glass Darkly 147
9 Changing and Fixing Systems 151
9.1 Resistance to Change 151
Introduction 151
Domains for Change 153
9.2 Fixing Systems 154
Disagreements about Fixing 154
Diagnostics 156
9.3 Business Process Reengineering 157
9.4 A Day at a Time, a Step at a Time 159
Build a Little, Test a Little 160
How to Get to Carnegie Hall 160
Revolution Versus Evolution 160
Continuous Improvement 161
The Learning Organization 161
9.5 Zen and the Art of 162
Overall System Maintenance 162
10 Business as a System 165
10.1 Overview 165
The ICOM Diagram 166
Is your Business Working? 167
What Does it Take to have a Successful Business? 167
10.2 Strategic Directions 167
Strategic Direction for a Business 168
10.3 Business Strategies 170
Amazon 171
Oracle 171
IBM 171
Microsoft 172
Google 172
HP 173
Apple 174
Xerox 174
10.4 Performance Requirements 174
How do we Meet the Performance Requirements? 175
10.5 Measurements 177
Monthly Measurements 177
The Balanced Scorecard 178
10.6 GuruLand 179
11 Slipping in Systems 185
11.1 Overview 185
11.2 Two Dozen Ways to Fail in Dealing with Systems 186
11.3 A Quick Backward Look 201
12 Managing Systems 203
12.1 Goals and Statistics 203
Some GAO Views 204
System Acquisition Issues 204
Standish Group Chaos Report 205
Bull Survey 205
12.2 Project Management 206
Planning 206
Organizing 208
Directing 208
Monitoring 208
12.3 Managing outside the Box 209
Some of our "Outside the Box" Managers 209
How Many Sigma is "Outside the Box"? 211
12.4 Team Building 212
Building a High-Performance Team 213
The Team Buster 214
12.5 Group Think and NullThink 214
GroupThink 215
NullThink 216
12.6 Leadership 217
Leadership Gurus and their Themes 218
13 Integrating Systems 223
13.1 Integration Notions 223
13.2 Cost-Effectiveness Revisited 226
13.3 Integrability-Is that a Word? 229
Interoperability 231
13.4 Integration and the DoD 232
13.5 Other Voices and Rooms 234
The Calculus 234
Exclusions and Inclusions 234
Integrations as a Personal Skill 235
Integrating Polarities 236
13.6 A Test about Integration 236
Scoring Section 239
14 Commentary and Heurisitcs 241
14.1 Two Dozen Tilted Comments/Questions about Systems 241
14.2 Ten Heuristics for Managing a Project While Trying to Build a System 255
15 Recapitulation 259
15.1 Overview 259
15.2 Systems 261
15.3 Engineering 262
15.4 Systems Engineering 263
15.5 Systems Analysis 264
15.6 Educating 265
15.7 Entrepreneuring 266
15.8 The Human Element 267
15.9 Changing and Fixing Systems 268
15.10 Business as a System 270
15.11 Slipping in Systems 271
15.12 Managing Systems 272
15.13 Integrating Systems 274
15.14 Selected Commentary 275
Appendix Systems Thinkers 277
Index 281