Aligning Perspectives and Methods for Value-Driven Design

Abstract

Recent years have seen a push to use explicit consideration of "value" in order to drive design. This paper conveys the need to explicitly align perspectives on "value" with the method used to quantify "value." Various concepts of value are introduced in the context of its evolution within economics in order to propose a holistic definition of value. Operationalization of value is discussed, including possible assumption violations in the aerospace domain. A series of prominent Value-Centric Design Methodologies for valuation are introduced, including Net Present Value, Multi-Attribute Utility Theory, and CostBenefit Analysis. These methods are compared in terms of the assumptions they make with regard to operationalizing value. It is shown that no method is fully complete in capturing the definition of value, but selecting the most appropriate one involves matching the particular system application being valued with acceptable assumptions for valuation. Two case studies, a telecommunications mission and a deep-space observation mission, are used to illustrate application of the three prior mentioned valuation methods. The results of the studies show that depending on method used for valuation, very different conclusions and insights will be derived, therefore an explicit consideration of the appropriate definition of value is necessary in order to align a chosen method with desired valuation insights.

Development and application of a value driven design assessment framework to an unmanned air system design

“…MAUT has been incorporated in the multi-attribute trade-space exploration (MATE) paradigm for generating a multitude of system designs and identifying the optimal ones, [118], [119], [120] and [121]. It was also applied in establishing the requirements' specification of commercial aircraft [122], in evaluating space system designs for the telecommunications and deep-space observation missions [103], and the development of satellite value models [123].…”

“…This may be more appropriate for the design of civil aviation systems, since profit is the driving factor, while less tangible aspects of value, such as environmental friendliness, customer loyalty and contribution to society, are more difficult to monetise. Ross et al [103], applying a series of Value-Centric Design Methodologies in the evaluation of two case studies, a telecommunication mission and a deep-space observation mission, demonstrated than no method is fully complete in capturing value. Instead, as they point out, the perspectives/perceptions of value need to be aligned with the method selected for pursuing VDD.…”

Value driven conceptual design of unmanned air system for a defence application

“…Multi-attribute utility theory has been used as a standard technique in several applications in research and real-world problems, from the airline industry [7] and earthquake projects [5] to deep-space observation mission [35].…”

Value modelling for multi-stakeholder and multi-objective optimisation in engineering design

“…In this equation, and are the total and individual utility functions respectively, while are the scaling constants and is an additional normalization constant generated through the iterative process presented in Appendix 6B, (Keeney and Raiffa 1976 (Ross et al 2010).…”