DE Metrics: Categorize the Benefits and Value of Digital Engineering

Abstract

The Department of Defense (DoD) envisions that digital engineering information exchange, system modeling, and data driven system engineering processes will become core to product and process development. As this transformation occurs, it will change the way Systems Engineering (SE) is measured and valued. Over the past 3 years, the Systems Engineering Research Center (SERC) has studied the Digital Engineering (DE) transformation processes and progress. This work has focused on DoD acquisition and program office activities but is applicable to all enterprises undergoing DE and Model-Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) transformations. A previous SERC research task created an Enterprise System-of-Systems Model for DE-enabled acquisition, conceptually modeling the potential future DoD acquisition enterprise. This research helped to understand the structure of future DoD/contractor program enterprises when the five goals of the DoD DE strategy were achieved, and the expected outcomes of that transition. That research cited the need for the community to standardize and implement measures that reflect success at the enterprise level. A second research task was completed to define metrics that represent value, benefits, and change progress in enterprise DE transformation. A third task is currently underway to design and implement measures that quantify DE benefits.