Why vmcse.com?
Everything you think you know about system engineering is probably WRONG!
After decades of promoting the importance of good requirements elicitation and good architectural design, major system projects still fall behind schedule and over run their budgets. Over the years, maybe system engineers actually have not learned anything after all. Maybe we’re still wrong about system engineering.
A change is long overdue.
About vmcse.com
If you’re a system engineer looking for incremental improvement in your system engineering process, then vmcse.com is probably not for you. You can find incremental improvement suggestions almost anywhere.
Instead, if you’re looking for radical improvement, looking for revolutionary change, looking for the really big benefits of improved system engineering, then this site is for you.
Do you never seem to get the full benefits of system engineering on your programs? Do you get your requirements right the first time, or is it still a struggle? Is your design process perfect, or do you still struggle to coordinate requirements, architecture, design and verification? Is something nagging at you, suggesting systems engineering should be better? If so, then this site is for you.
Why the vmcse.com website?
The purpose of this site is to challenge your way of thinking about systems engineering as usual, to say those things that nobody else seems to come out and actually say. A goal at vmcse.com is to expose some of the system engineering dogma as antiquated concepts that look good in concept but fail to deliver. At the same time I hope to provide some alternatives to get you moving in a better direction, or at least thinking about better methods.
In some cases, you’ll navigate away thinking I’m idiot, but if I’ve planted a seed of doubt about your bloated engineering processes, the site will have accomplished its goal.
What does vmcse stand for?
You can find System Engineering in vmcse.com, or even Chief System Engineer. You can find the system V, or even Models if you’re into MBSE. Ultimately, vmcse is a collection of letters that remind you of system engineering, and make for a good URL!
About Me
A long, long time ago (the 1980s) I graduated with a degree in Electrical Engineering, but found myself thrust into the world of software with my first job at the NASA Johnson Space Center. While there I became exposed to the real world of engineering, including bureaucracy, bloated processes and failed programs. I was reading articles in defense and aerospace trade journals that continually told of major programs that went over-budget, failed or were canceled. There was one very obvious commonality to all the failures; the system engineering efforts, especially requirements elicitation, were either non-existent or very poor.
I realized that the lack of systems thinking was the number 1 problem behind most engineering project failures, so I gravitated to systems engineering. I decided my mission in life was to improve systems engineering, and especially requirements elicitation and management. I wanted to make a difference.
Over thirty years later, I realized system engineering has not significantly changed. We still have poor system engineering practices. Lessons-learned are never implemented. Projects continue to fail and go over budget because poor system engineering continues to be the number one problem. Yet, I still want to improve the systems engineering discipline before I retire. That’s why I created vmcse.com.
Some private studies have shown that better system engineering practices can save a mid-sized company upwards of $10 million per year.
At one time, I naively thought a good goal was to save my company $1,000,000 in their system engineering department. It was a naïve goal. Why? Simple. Some private studies have shown that better system engineering practices can save a mid-sized company upwards of $10,000,000 per year. Yes, 10x as much! I’ve since decided to change my goal.
The goal of vmcse.com is to improve system engineering practices in multiple companies to the tune of $1 BILLION in savings over the next ten years. Is that a lot? Simply not doing this would have saved $2.2 billion easily.
Now after 30 years in technology and engineering, and 20 plus years as a systems engineer, I have accumulated a wealth of lessons learned. I hope I can share some of these here or at least make you THINK.
Disclaimer
As I write this, I am employed by a large defense contracting company. The opinions on vmcse.com are mine alone, or the opinions of the guest authors, and do not represent the opinions of my company or customers. I keep trying to educate them too.