Research > Areas

I am interested in all aspects of software-intensive systems engineering - with a particular focus on the upstream phases of the systems lifecycle, the management of this information and continual process improvement - taking a multidisciplinary and human-centred approach.

Research is an on-going endeavour, so the day-to-day details change quite a lot. However, the framework for directing my research is pretty stable.

Research Framework

The general topic of my research - systems engineering:

Systems engineering is the disciplined use of various skills to develop a set of components that, as an interrelated whole, achieve defined objectives.

Basically, this definition tells us two things:

1) Systems engineering is about doing the right thing - meeting defined objectives.

In systems engineering speak - this is a concern with systemics. It involves understanding the "big picture" in some way, so you can work out what exactly is needed and why.

2) Systems engineering is about doing things right - harnessing and using the most appropriate techniques, methods and tools for each situation.

In systems engineering speak - this is a concern with systematics. It involves an organised or disciplined approach to whole lifecycle engineering.

My research interests therefore fall into these two broad areas:

1) Getting some handle on what is the right thing to do:

• The upstream stages of the system lifecycle - understanding the business, the environments, the problems, the requirements (as an integrated whole).
• The management and traceability of this information to ensure that the right thing is still being done as businesses, environments and problems change.

2) Exploring ways to learn how to do the thing right and contribute to a discipline for (software-intensive) systems engineering:

• How exactly are these upstream activities undertaken and, more crucially, how can we transfer this understanding to those whose job it is to undertake these activities, whilst also imparting the necessary skills?
• How can practical guidelines, exemplars and standards be developed?

My concern is to ground my research in industrial problems and to validate it in real settings. A further concern is to develop underpinning concepts, realised through the use of simple techniques, methods and supporting tools, with more general applicability.