Transforming how scientists, engineers, managers, and leaders confront complex systems

Many of the most critical challenges that humankind faces are “systems challenges” — complex problems involving many stakeholders with conflicting objectives, decision variables coupled in non-trivial ways, non-linear mappings of decisions to outcomes, and many sources of uncertainty. Focusing on Systems Science and Engineering, GAO Systematics involves transdisciplinary systems research, cross-section industry and government engagement, and transformative systems education that:

1) advance the state-of-the-art of systems science and systems engineering by addressing key research questions and applications related to systems interdependency and resilience, systems-of-systems, intelligent systems, and human-centered complex systems with a model-based data-driven lens that has not been emphasized before

2) push the boundaries of systems operations and management; systems strategies and leadership; and enterprise innovation in business, government, and other social-technical systems

3) transform the way scientists, engineers, managers, and leaders confront complex systems challenges to enable economic and business growth, societal well-being, and sustainability as a whole

Need for Systems Engineering and Systems Innovation

Different problems and opportunities from different domains, from the past to the future, have a common underlying set of systems challenges:

Guiding systems change

We are at a point of systems architectural paradigm change, in which the dominant high-level design or architecture of the system is being reconsidered. This is due to the disruption of new technology that enables unprecedented applications or cost savings, thus shifting the balance toward new architectures. Early and detailed systems-level trade studies of these new architectures are desperately needed to inform and guide this change process, as early adopters of such new architectures are likely to gain competitive advantage.

Systems-of-systems

The increase in complexity in the kinds of systems today, coupled with the deep uncertainty in the changing environment, has sparked governments and organizations around the world to rely more on international partnerships and system-of-system architectures, in which the system’s components present large degrees of managerial and operational independence as well as interdependence. Research is needed to help us understand how to steer emergent behavior in desired directions and embed resiliency into systems-of-systems.

Networks of intelligent agents

The systems that will solve the global challenges will likely consist of decentralized networks of intelligent agents. For instance, the concept of sensor webs, in which network sensors take and share data in real time, has been proposed in many different contexts, including transportation, pollution, hydrology, aerospace, and supply chains. An open question in systems research is to understand what characteristics drive different coordination schemes between simple autonomous agents to be more effective in different situations, especially as the system scales up.

Human-responsive design

While there have been fantastic advances in artificial intelligence and robotics that enable increased levels of automation, the local and global challenges presented have in common the impossibility of a fully automated system in the short and medium run. New models of human behavior and performance must be developed in order to identify factors driving the optimal functional allocation between humans and machines for different classes of problems. Furthermore, new design analytic techniques that focus on new and better human-system interactions are needed to improve the design process of complex systems, taking advantage of big data and knowledge-intensive technologies.

These challenges can only be solved through transdisciplinary research with a strong emphasis on data, information, and insights. They require the integration of knowledge across different scientific areas and new fundamental research in the discipline of systems that is not addressed by research in other disciplines.