The course provides an overview of the full breadth of Systems Engineering activitiesand shows how the various Systems Engineering processes integrate with each other.

The course aims to cover the 'range' of Systems Engineering activities and providejumping off points for further study in specific areas. All of the tutorial informationprovided is grounded in practical experience of large scale, complex-system projects. Thecourse is richly illustrated with examples, rules and heuristics to enable attendees togain maximum benefit and to help apply the course information within their organisations.

The course aims to provide 'tools for thinking' about Systems Engineering and to helpparticipants develop and integrate their knowledge of Systems Engineering. The course hasa broad-scope but the intention is to provide the most useful information in aneasy-to-use manner.

Intended Audience: This tutorial is aimed at those who are new to thefield of Systems Engineering, those who require a fast technical update and those who wantto implement world-class Systems Engineering practice in their organisations.

Rob Collins is with Entelecheia Limited. He gained hisfirst degree from the University of Keele, completing a joint honours degree in Physicsand Computer Science. After graduation, Rob was awarded a research scholarship to continuework on technology for people with disabilities. He completed his doctorate on SoftwareEngineering for self-adaptive teaching systems, within the Psychology Department at theUniversity of Keele over the following four years.

After a year as an Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Keele, Rob wasappointed as Reader in Software Engineering at the Bournemouth University. He has taughtcourses on undergraduate and post-graduate Software Engineering courses on Ada, HCI andformal methods.

Rob has given dozens of lectures, tutorials and seminars to professional societies(IEE, SCSC, INCOSE), Universities and companies. He is an experienced lecturer and teacherand previous courses and tutorials have always been rated very highly.

Rob has provided consultancy in Systems Engineering and Safety Critical Systems to anumber of major companies including British Aerospace Military Aircraft, Dunlop-Eldec, EHI(the prime contractor for the EH101 helicopter), Smiths Industries, Westinghouse Signals,Siemens Plessey Systems and Archer Communications Systems Limited.

His recent publications include "Psychological Predispositions to Error in Safety,Reliability and Failure Analysis", (a major review of the manner in which wellunderstood psychological mechanisms can explain the occurrence of a number of recentengineering disasters) and "Systemic Failure Modes: A model for Perrow's NormalAccidents in Complex, Safety Critical Systems".

Proposed Course Outline:

• Introduction: Course Logic and Tutorial Method
• Session 1:
  • The Systems Engineering Process
    • What is a System? Emergence, Complexity
    • What is the Systems Engineering Process
    • How do you know when Systems Engineering is going wrong?
    • The Systems Engineering Management Plan (Structure, Content, Use)
    • What information does the SE process use?
    • Constructing a Systems Engineering Database
    • Distinguishing Process and Programme
    • Metrics to Control the SE Proces
  • Requirements
    • Properties of Requirements
    • Management - Standards and procedures. Monitoring and measuring, Configuration Control
    • Data to associate with requirements
    • Decomposition
    • Engineering
    • Check-list of best-practice for Requirements Management and Engineering
• Session 2:
  • Systems Analysis (SA)
    • The variety of SA methods (Yourdon, Schlaer Mellor, SSADM etc.)
    • Standards and Procedures
    • Introduction to key methods
    • Systems Engineering Process Modelling
    • Events, Threads and Processes
    • Understanding the Failure Domain
    • When to consider Human Factors Analysis
• Session 3:
  • People
    • SE roles and responsibilities
    • SE competencies - Managing the skills gap
    • The role of Psychology in SE
  • Integrated Logistic Support (ILS)
    • What is ILS?
    • Relative cost and importance
    • Elements of ILS (Reliability; Maintainability; Spares support; Training; Handbooks; PHS&T)
    • Plans and procedures for ILS
    • The failure domain (again!)
• Session 4:
  • Modelling and Simulation
    • When and when not to use models and simulations
    • Pitfalls of modelling (why it often goes wrong!)
    • Types of models and where they are applicable
    • Controlling and planning modelling activities
    • Validation and Verification of models
    • Check-list for successful modelling and simulation
  • Interface Control
    • Why is it important?
    • Common mistakes
    • Required information
  • Verification and System Proving
    • Why worry about Verification?
    • Planing early for success
    • Your verification plan
    • Check-list for successful Verification and System Proving