We have all seen some variant of the famous Sidney Harris cartoon – two people standing at the chalkboard, an incredibly complex series of equations or process flow on the left, a simplification or result on the right, and the words “then a miracle occurs” in the middle. It’s an …

In 1839, Edward Bulwer-Lytton wrote in his play Richelieu, “The pen is mightier than the sword.” In this, Bulwer-Lytton meant to say that communicating thoughts was more powerful in effecting change than committing acts of violence through war. But might there be something more powerful than the pen? Systems engineers …

The choice of representations in model-based systems engineering (MBSE) turns on the needs of the audience for understanding. The purpose of communication is to express the ideas of the sender in a way that produces a common understanding between the sender and the receiver. Those versed in communication know achieving …

(This is Part I of a two-part series. The second post in this series is: Is there a systems engineering silver bullet? Part II: (Not) Reinventing the Wheel.) Is there a systems engineering silver bullet that ensures mission, program, or project design success? As much as we would like to …