13 May 2026 11:00 AM EDT
Title: Integrating Agile into the Classic Systems Vee
Abstract:
Some organizations need a process for making tradeoffs between the time to conduct systems engineering and the risk of requirements being insufficient. Best practices provide thresholds (which minimally provide the capability needed) and aspirational objectives. In contrast, agile considers minimal viable requirements (adding value but not all the capabilities needed).
Based on Nobel-Prize winning psychological research, this webinar proposes using all three targets in scoring solutions. Because this approach is based on the normal distribution, it is easy to address both requirement volatility and interactions between requirements. While agile only addresses requirement volatility during the design process, the proposed approach is robust to requirement changes both during the design process and after the solution is deployed and is being used.
The application of this approach to set-based drone design was published IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management.
Biography:
Dr. Robert Bordley is currently Professor and Program Director, of the Systems Engineering and Design M. Eng. Degree. Bob is an ESEP, CAB Chair, Fellow of INFORMS, Fellow of the American Statistical Association and Fellow of the Society for Decision Professionals. Bob won the Decision Analysis Ramsey Medal, the DA Publication Award, the Michigan INCOSE Lifetime Achievement Award and the Engineering Society of Detroit Gold Award. Bob also worked at the National Science Foundation, Booz- Allen-Hamilton and retired from General Motors. At General Motors, Bob won the General Motors Chairman’s Award, GM’s President’s Council Award, GM Award of Excellence, GM Incredible & Creative Design Award etc. Bob authored one book, Managing Project Complexity and Risk with Systems Engineering, twelve book chapters and ninety refereed publications. Bob has been INFORMS Council Member, Decision Analysis Board member, ASA risk section President and POMS Vice-President.