Mission Engineering: Difference between revisions

From SEBoK Draft
Jump to navigation Jump to search
m (Text replacement - "<center>'''SEBoK v. 2.6, released 13 May 2022'''</center>" to "<center>'''SEBoK v. 2.6, released 20 May 2022'''</center>")
m (Text replacement - "SEBoK v. 2.12, released 20 May 2025" to "SEBoK v. 2.12, released 27 May 2025")
 
(9 intermediate revisions by 2 users not shown)
Line 1: Line 1:
----
----
'''''Lead Author:''' Ron Giachetti,'' '''''Contributing Author: '''Andy Hernandez''.
'''''Lead Author:''' Judith Dahmann'' '''''Contributing Authors:''' Ron Giachetti, Andy Hernandez, Rhys Kissell''
----
----


This article describes the emerging concept of mission engineering, especially as it is being practiced by the US Department of Defense.  Mission engineering is closely associated with systems of systems (SoS) because most missions are accomplished through the coordination and interoperability of multiple systems. The article defines mission engineering and describes the systems engineering activities involved in mission engineering.  
This article describes mission engineering, especially as defined by the United States Department of Defense (US DoD). The article defines mission engineering and describes the systems engineering activities involved in mission engineering.


==Definition of Mission Engineering==
==Definition of Mission Engineering==
{{Term|Mission_Engineering_(glossary)|Mission engineering}} describes the application of systems engineering to the planning, analysis, and designing of missions, where the mission is the system of interest.  Mission engineering analyzes the mission goals and thread, analyzes the available as well as emerging operational and system capabilities, and designs a mission architecture to achieve the mission goal (Gold, 2016).  Consequently, mission engineering must simultaneously consider operational, technical, and acquisition issues and their integration in order to design a solution to achieve the mission goal (Van Bossuyt et al. 2019). Lastly, the term “mission” is generally used in the military context, and most mission engineering is for military systems.  However, the term, and the process and knowledge it describes, could be applied to space missions or other mission areas.
{{Term|Mission_Engineering_(glossary)|Mission engineering}} is an interdisciplinary process encompassing the entire technical effort to analyze, design, and integrate current and emerging operational needs and capabilities to achieve desired mission outcomes. In mission engineering, the mission itself becomes a system of interest. The US DoD’s Mission Engineering Guide (2023) states: <blockquote>The mission engineering process decomposes missions into constituent parts to explore and assess relationships and impacts in executing the end-to-end mission.  </blockquote>System engineering focuses on designing systems (including SoS) to achieve specified technical performance metrics.  Mission engineering goes one step further to evaluate the performance of the SoS in achieving the mission or capability objectives when implemented in a simulated realistic scenario. Mission engineering evaluates whether the SoS achieves the expected or desired effects and determines whether those effects contribute to mission success.


Missions are almost always conducted by multiple systems coordinating their actions and sharing data. We call these mission-oriented system-of-systems (SoS).  Ideally the mission-oriented SoS could be rapidly conceived, assembled, and deployed by operational commanders to react to immediate threats.
== Goal of Mission Engineering ==
The goal of mission engineering is to engineer missions by identifying the right things (i.e., technologies, systems, SoS, or processes) to achieve the intended mission outcomes and provide mission-based inputs into the systems engineering process to aid the Department in building things right. [US DoD, 2023)


==Definitions and Principles==
The US DoD developed the first guidance on mission engineering, and there is a growing body of practice in mission engineering competencies, education and methods (Hutchison et al., 2018) (Von Bossuyt et al, 2019) (Beam, 2015). Zimmerman and Dahmann (2018) reviewed the challenges that face mission engineering and presented the case for the use of digital engineering to support mission engineering, as well as the engineering of systems, which was the initial focus of the US DoD Digital Engineering Strategy (Dahmann, 2019). Use of systems modelling language (SysML) to develop mission architecture models that support mission engineering practices is now considered good practice (Dahmann and Parasidis, 2024).  
A mission describes what the system will do and the purpose of doing it.  The mission statement describes Kipling’s “six honest serving-men” – who, what, when, where, why, and sometimes how (Kipling 1902).  The mission provides the context for defining measures of effectiveness and for development of the Concept of Operations (CONOPS).


The mission is accomplished by operational nodes completing one or more operational activities.  An operational node can be an organization, individual, or system.  Operational activities are actions that either transform one or more inputs into outputs or change the state of the system.  A system provides capabilities through the execution of operational activities.
==Key Concepts in Mission Engineering==
Key concepts in mission engineering are:


==Mission Engineering Activities==
'''Mission:''' The “task, together with the purpose, that clearly indicates the action to be taken and the reason thereby. More simply, a mission is a duty assigned to an individual or unit” [US DoD. 2011].  
The following are the main activities of mission engineering:


'''Mission Capability Analysis and Definition''' – The engineer analyzes the problem scenario to determine what capabilities are required and to develop a CONOPS for the mission.
'''Mission Thread (MT):''' The “activities of a given mission approach” [US DOD, 2023]


'''Mission Thread Definition''' – The engineer analyzes the end-to-end set of operational activities.  The starting point is modeling the operational activities, their sequencing, and the information flows between them. For military systems, the mission thread is often a kill chain describing the sequence of activities from searching for a threat to engaging a threat.
'''Mission Engineering Thread (MET):''' “How the mission activities related to the actors, systems, and organizations are executed in a specific mission context” [US DOD, 2023].  METs are equivalent in concept to kill chains or effects chains but are formalized representations of mission execution, used to model system and actor interactions in a specific operational context.  


'''Tradeoff Analysis''' – The engineer develops alternatives for accomplishing the mission and conducts trade studies to determine the best alternative given resources and time available.
'''Mission Architecture:''' “An interwoven effects web, or kill web, comprised of many mission threads and mission engineering threads” [US DoD, 2023]


'''Mission Architecting''' – The engineer develops an operational architecture describing the capabilities, the operational activities, operational nodes, and other relevant elements to model the mission.  
== Implementing Mission Engineering ==
The US DoD Mission Engineering Guidebook 2.0 lays out a methodology for implementing mission engineering as shown below.
'''Requirements Engineering''' – The engineer determines the functional and non-functional requirements from the capability analysis, CONOPS, and mission threads.  The engineer allocates the requirements to the operational nodes.  In many cases, the systems in the operational nodes might require engineering to fulfill the requirements.


'''Interoperability Analysis''' – The interoperability between systems completing the mission must occur at both the operational and technical levels (Giachetti et al. 2019).  Operational interoperability describes the ability of the systems to coordinate their activities to support completion of the mission thread.  Technical interoperability describes the ability of the systems to exchange data with considerations for the timeliness and quality of the data.  The interoperability analysis generates additional requirements on the systems.
=== Mission Engineering Methodology from the DoD MEG 2.0 (US DoD,2023) ===
The key activities in implementing mission engineering are (Dahmann and Parasidis, 2024]:


'''Mission-Oriented SoS Implementation''' – The mission-oriented SoS must be implemented through designing and developing new systems, modifying existing systems, and/or modifying doctrine, policies, procedures, and other non-materiel means to help achieve the mission.
'''Mission Problem Definition:''' ME starts with defining and understanding the problem to be addressed, which drives the focus and scope of the ME and analysis activity. ME problems may be based on a proactive interest in the mission outcomes of a priority or pressing scenario, a reaction to a perceived problem in mission results or by an interest in the potential for a new or emerging technology or new operational concept to impact the success of the mission.  


'''Mission Verification and Validation''' – The engineer verifies that the system as delivered satisfies the requirements and validates that the system fulfills the mission purpose and stakeholder needs.
'''Mission Characterization:''' Mission characterization is a description of the operational mission context for the problem of interest including factors such as the epoch, physical environment, threat, blue force mission objectives, force laydown and CONOPs, as well as the objectives of the mission, which are the measure of mission outcomes.  
 
'''Mission Architecture:''' Data extracted from mission characterization drives a model of baseline architecture including the baseline MT and METs.  This is used as the blueprint for operational analysis of the impact of the baseline architecture on mission outcomes. Once the baseline operational analysis is complete and gaps in mission outcomes have been identified, the mission architecture models are updated to incorporate alternative approaches and concepts to be considered in the analysis.  
 
'''Mission Engineering Analysis:''' The mission impact of the baseline architecture is analyzed in an appropriate analysis environment, typically an operational analysis simulation to assess the mission outcomes of the baseline in the selected scenario and vignette.  The analysis is then run with the changes that represent the selected alternative concepts or capabilities to assess the mission impact of the alternative architectures.  
 
'''Results and Recommendations:''' Using the results of the ME analysis, comparing the baseline mission outcomes with the incorporated outcomes of alternative concepts, provides the base for results and recommendations.
 
As stated in the DoD ME Guidebook,” [t]he results of mission engineering are used for a variety of purposes. For instance, findings can inform technology investments, suggest alternative ways to use current systems, identify mission gaps and preferred approaches to addressing these gaps, and trigger the initiation of a new acquisition to meet capability gaps.” [US DoD, 2023].
 
Mission engineering continues to evolve as a critical capability within defense systems development, enabling the integration of complex capabilities around mission outcomes rather than isolated system performance with potential application beyond defense.  


==References==
==References==
Line 41: Line 51:


Dahmann, J. Keynote Address: “Mission engineering: System of systems engineering in context.” Proceedings of the IEEE System of Systems Engineering Conference, 19–22 May 2019, Anchorage, AK, USA.  
Dahmann, J. Keynote Address: “Mission engineering: System of systems engineering in context.” Proceedings of the IEEE System of Systems Engineering Conference, 19–22 May 2019, Anchorage, AK, USA.  
Dahmann, J, and G. Parasidis. 2024. Mission Engineering. ITEA Journal. 24(3).
Dahmann, J. 2024. Mission Engineering – Extending Systems of Systems Engineering to Mission. 34th Annual INCOSE International Symposium, July. Dublin Ireland.
Department of Defense. 2023. Department of Defense Mission Engineering Guide Version 2.0. Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering, https://ac.cto.mil/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/MEG_2_Oct2023.pdf


Giachetti, R., S. Wangert, R. Eldred. 2019. "Interoperability analysis method for mission-oriented system of systems engineering". Proceedings of IEEE International Systems Conference (SysCon), Orlando, FL, USA, 8-11 April 2019, pp. 1-6.
Giachetti, R., S. Wangert, R. Eldred. 2019. "Interoperability analysis method for mission-oriented system of systems engineering". Proceedings of IEEE International Systems Conference (SysCon), Orlando, FL, USA, 8-11 April 2019, pp. 1-6.
Gold, R. 2016. "Mission engineering." Proceedings of the 19th Annual National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA) Systems Engineering Conference, Springfield, VA, USA, 24-27 October 2016.


Hutchison, N.A.C., S. Luna, W.D. Miller, H.Y. See Tao, D. Verma, G. Vesonder, and J. Wade. 2018. "Mission engineering competencies." Proceedings of the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) Annual Conference and Exposition, vol. 2018.
Hutchison, N.A.C., S. Luna, W.D. Miller, H.Y. See Tao, D. Verma, G. Vesonder, and J. Wade. 2018. "Mission engineering competencies." Proceedings of the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) Annual Conference and Exposition, vol. 2018.


Kipling, R. “The Elephant’s Child, Just So Stories”. 1902.  
Kipling, R. “The Elephant’s Child, Just So Stories”. 1902.  
US Department of Defense. Mission Engineering Guide. November 2020.
US Department of Defense. Mission Engineering Guide 2.0. October 2023, pp. 3.
US Department of Defense. Joint Publication 3-0 Joint Operations. 11 August 2011.


Van Bossuyt, D.L., P. Beery, B.M. O’Halloran, A. Hernandez, E. Paulo. 2019. "The Naval Postgraduate School’s Department of Systems Engineering approach to mission engineering education through capstone projects." IEEE ''Systems'' 7(3): 38.
Van Bossuyt, D.L., P. Beery, B.M. O’Halloran, A. Hernandez, E. Paulo. 2019. "The Naval Postgraduate School’s Department of Systems Engineering approach to mission engineering education through capstone projects." IEEE ''Systems'' 7(3): 38.
Zimmerman, P and J Dahmann. Digital Engineering Support to Mission Engineering. 21st Annual National Defense Industrial Association Systems and Mission Engineering Conference. October 2018.


===Primary References===
===Primary References===
Gold, R. 2016. "[[Mission Engineering (reference)|Mission engineering]]." Proceedings of the 19th Annual National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA) Systems Engineering Conference, Springfield, VA, USA, 24-27 October 2016.
None.
 
Hutchison, N.A.C., S. Luna, W.D. Miller, H.Y. See Tao, D. Verma, G. Vesonder, and J. Wade. 2018. "[[Mission Engineering Competencies|Mission engineering competencies]]." Proceedings of the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) Annual Conference and Exposition, vol. 2018.
 
Van Bossuyt, D.L., P. Beery, B.M. O’Halloran, A. Hernandez, E. Paulo. 2019. "[[The Naval Postgraduate School’s Department of Systems Engineering Approach to Mission Engineering Education through Capstone Projects|The Naval Postgraduate School’s Department of Systems Engineering approach to mission engineering education through capstone projects]]." IEEE ''Systems'' 7(3): 38.


===Additional References===
===Additional References===
Line 66: Line 84:
<center> [[Capability Engineering|< Previous Article]] | [[Systems of Systems (SoS)|Parent Article]] | [[Healthcare Systems Engineering|Next Article >]]</center>
<center> [[Capability Engineering|< Previous Article]] | [[Systems of Systems (SoS)|Parent Article]] | [[Healthcare Systems Engineering|Next Article >]]</center>


<center>'''SEBoK v. 2.6, released 20 May 2022'''</center>
<center>'''SEBoK v. 2.12, released 27 May 2025'''</center>


[[Category:Part 3]][[Category:Concept Definition]][[Category:Topic]]
[[Category:Part 3]][[Category:Systems of Systems (SoS)]][[Category:Topic]]

Latest revision as of 23:42, 23 May 2025

Lead Author: Judith Dahmann Contributing Authors: Ron Giachetti, Andy Hernandez, Rhys Kissell

This article describes mission engineering, especially as defined by the United States Department of Defense (US DoD). The article defines mission engineering and describes the systems engineering activities involved in mission engineering.

Definition of Mission Engineering

Mission engineeringMission engineering is an interdisciplinary process encompassing the entire technical effort to analyze, design, and integrate current and emerging operational needs and capabilities to achieve desired mission outcomes. In mission engineering, the mission itself becomes a system of interest. The US DoD’s Mission Engineering Guide (2023) states:

The mission engineering process decomposes missions into constituent parts to explore and assess relationships and impacts in executing the end-to-end mission.  

System engineering focuses on designing systems (including SoS) to achieve specified technical performance metrics.  Mission engineering goes one step further to evaluate the performance of the SoS in achieving the mission or capability objectives when implemented in a simulated realistic scenario. Mission engineering evaluates whether the SoS achieves the expected or desired effects and determines whether those effects contribute to mission success.

Goal of Mission Engineering

The goal of mission engineering is to engineer missions by identifying the right things (i.e., technologies, systems, SoS, or processes) to achieve the intended mission outcomes and provide mission-based inputs into the systems engineering process to aid the Department in building things right. [US DoD, 2023)

The US DoD developed the first guidance on mission engineering, and there is a growing body of practice in mission engineering competencies, education and methods (Hutchison et al., 2018) (Von Bossuyt et al, 2019) (Beam, 2015). Zimmerman and Dahmann (2018) reviewed the challenges that face mission engineering and presented the case for the use of digital engineering to support mission engineering, as well as the engineering of systems, which was the initial focus of the US DoD Digital Engineering Strategy (Dahmann, 2019). Use of systems modelling language (SysML) to develop mission architecture models that support mission engineering practices is now considered good practice (Dahmann and Parasidis, 2024).

Key Concepts in Mission Engineering

Key concepts in mission engineering are:

Mission: The “task, together with the purpose, that clearly indicates the action to be taken and the reason thereby. More simply, a mission is a duty assigned to an individual or unit” [US DoD. 2011].  

Mission Thread (MT): The “activities of a given mission approach” [US DOD, 2023]

Mission Engineering Thread (MET): “How the mission activities related to the actors, systems, and organizations are executed in a specific mission context” [US DOD, 2023].  METs are equivalent in concept to kill chains or effects chains but are formalized representations of mission execution, used to model system and actor interactions in a specific operational context.

Mission Architecture: “An interwoven effects web, or kill web, comprised of many mission threads and mission engineering threads” [US DoD, 2023]

Implementing Mission Engineering

The US DoD Mission Engineering Guidebook 2.0 lays out a methodology for implementing mission engineering as shown below.

Mission Engineering Methodology from the DoD MEG 2.0 (US DoD,2023)

The key activities in implementing mission engineering are (Dahmann and Parasidis, 2024]:

Mission Problem Definition: ME starts with defining and understanding the problem to be addressed, which drives the focus and scope of the ME and analysis activity. ME problems may be based on a proactive interest in the mission outcomes of a priority or pressing scenario, a reaction to a perceived problem in mission results or by an interest in the potential for a new or emerging technology or new operational concept to impact the success of the mission.  

Mission Characterization: Mission characterization is a description of the operational mission context for the problem of interest including factors such as the epoch, physical environment, threat, blue force mission objectives, force laydown and CONOPs, as well as the objectives of the mission, which are the measure of mission outcomes.  

Mission Architecture: Data extracted from mission characterization drives a model of baseline architecture including the baseline MT and METs.  This is used as the blueprint for operational analysis of the impact of the baseline architecture on mission outcomes. Once the baseline operational analysis is complete and gaps in mission outcomes have been identified, the mission architecture models are updated to incorporate alternative approaches and concepts to be considered in the analysis.  

Mission Engineering Analysis: The mission impact of the baseline architecture is analyzed in an appropriate analysis environment, typically an operational analysis simulation to assess the mission outcomes of the baseline in the selected scenario and vignette.  The analysis is then run with the changes that represent the selected alternative concepts or capabilities to assess the mission impact of the alternative architectures.  

Results and Recommendations: Using the results of the ME analysis, comparing the baseline mission outcomes with the incorporated outcomes of alternative concepts, provides the base for results and recommendations.

As stated in the DoD ME Guidebook,” [t]he results of mission engineering are used for a variety of purposes. For instance, findings can inform technology investments, suggest alternative ways to use current systems, identify mission gaps and preferred approaches to addressing these gaps, and trigger the initiation of a new acquisition to meet capability gaps.” [US DoD, 2023].

Mission engineering continues to evolve as a critical capability within defense systems development, enabling the integration of complex capabilities around mission outcomes rather than isolated system performance with potential application beyond defense.

References

Works Cited

Beam, D.F. 2015. Systems engineering and integration as a foundation for mission engineering. Monterey, CA, USA: Naval Postgraduate School.

Beery, P., E. Paulo. 2019. "Application of Model-Based Systems Engineering Concepts to Support Mission Engineering." IEEE Systems. 7(3): 44.

Dahmann, J. Keynote Address: “Mission engineering: System of systems engineering in context.” Proceedings of the IEEE System of Systems Engineering Conference, 19–22 May 2019, Anchorage, AK, USA.

Dahmann, J, and G. Parasidis. 2024. Mission Engineering. ITEA Journal. 24(3).

Dahmann, J. 2024. Mission Engineering – Extending Systems of Systems Engineering to Mission. 34th Annual INCOSE International Symposium, July. Dublin Ireland.

Department of Defense. 2023. Department of Defense Mission Engineering Guide Version 2.0. Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering, https://ac.cto.mil/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/MEG_2_Oct2023.pdf

Giachetti, R., S. Wangert, R. Eldred. 2019. "Interoperability analysis method for mission-oriented system of systems engineering". Proceedings of IEEE International Systems Conference (SysCon), Orlando, FL, USA, 8-11 April 2019, pp. 1-6.

Hutchison, N.A.C., S. Luna, W.D. Miller, H.Y. See Tao, D. Verma, G. Vesonder, and J. Wade. 2018. "Mission engineering competencies." Proceedings of the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) Annual Conference and Exposition, vol. 2018.

Kipling, R. “The Elephant’s Child, Just So Stories”. 1902.

US Department of Defense. Mission Engineering Guide. November 2020.

US Department of Defense. Mission Engineering Guide 2.0. October 2023, pp. 3.

US Department of Defense. Joint Publication 3-0 Joint Operations. 11 August 2011.

Van Bossuyt, D.L., P. Beery, B.M. O’Halloran, A. Hernandez, E. Paulo. 2019. "The Naval Postgraduate School’s Department of Systems Engineering approach to mission engineering education through capstone projects." IEEE Systems 7(3): 38.

Zimmerman, P and J Dahmann. Digital Engineering Support to Mission Engineering. 21st Annual National Defense Industrial Association Systems and Mission Engineering Conference. October 2018.

Primary References

None.

Additional References

None.

< Previous Article | Parent Article | Next Article >
SEBoK v. 2.12, released 27 May 2025
Retrieved from "https://sebokwiki.org/draft/w/index.php?title=Mission_Engineering&oldid=74906"