Suggested in this paper are a set of processes which augment—and do not replace—traditional systems engineering. As a complex system, the AOC evolves. Drawn from principles of complex adaptive systems, the augmentations to traditional systems engineering, known as Complex Systems Engineering, seeks to mimic the forces which drive evolution and guide the results. In this paper, principles of complexity science which apply will be presented, and the engineering approaches outlined.
Technology has thrown us a curve. We can imagine ways in which it might be employed to help realize our visions, and it seems that the technical solutions are right in front of us, yet as we attempt to apply good engineering discipline to achieve the imagined result, the possibility of success seems to fade into the distance. This isn't unique to the military. Large, intricate, complex systems all seem to share this characteristic and cause similar frustrations among those charged with their engineering. The Air and Space Operations Center is one such example.
A few years ago General J. Jumper (then Commander, Air Combat Command; now Chief of Staff, Air Force) realized that the AOC (heretofore a virtual pickup game of people, systems and procedures) needed to have some discipline imposed to realize its true potential. To this end, he declared AOCs to be "weapon systems" which were to be treated as such. As an expedient, the AOC built and stood-up at AUAB was declared to be the first instance of the AOC Weapon System (AOC-WS), and its configuration was set as the baseline. This baseline was put under a configuration control process seemingly appropriate for a weapon system. To be charitable, this merely imposed a speed-bump on change. New systems and alterations to the "baseline" have occurred almost unabated; all for good and valid reasons from the point of view of the warfighters. Their needs seemed not to be met by the then-current systems and technologies present there. This begs the question: why is this the case? These are responsible, competent people clearly intending to do the right thing, and behaving in a corporately-responsible manner.
The timing of the declaration of an AOC-WS also corresponds to the desire of the Air Force leadership to reinvigorate Systems Engineering in the Air Force. An examination of how one applies Systems Engineering to the AOC-WS starts to show the seams in our approach to traditional systems engineering. We have attempted to apply systems engineering techniques which have served us well in the past, and which were learned through hard lessons of failure over the past half century. Unfortunately, they seem not to scale to the enterprise. And the AOC seems to behave as an enterprise in the small.
