The Cost of Jointness: Insights from Environmental Monitoring Systems in Low-Earth Orbit

Dwyer, Morgan

doi:10.2172/1323608

Cited by 5 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 69 publications

(160 reference statements)

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“…To study cost growth on the NPOESS program, we applied the above framework to generate unique conclusions about the program's history and evolution [Dwyer and Szajnfarber, ; Dwyer et al., ; Dwyer, ]. NPOESS was a collaboration composed of the DoD, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and NASA that was intended to develop a constellation of environmental monitoring satellites for low Earth orbit.…”

Section: Case Study: the Npoess Programmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Table illustrates the detail with which we collected data within epochs and it maps this data to the complexity mechanisms that are represented in Epoch B's DSM. For the qualitative data that we used to construct DSMs for other epochs, refer to Dwyer [].…”

Section: Case Study: the Npoess Programmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…As with the technical architectures, we identify the complexity mechanisms contained in each organizational DSM by examining qualitative data within epoch data. Table provides an example of this data from Epoch D and illustrates how we connected qualitative data to the complexity mechanisms contained in the DSMs; for data from other epochs, refer to Dwyer [].…”

Section: Case Study: the Npoess Programmentioning

confidence: 99%

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A Framework for Studying Cost Growth on Complex Acquisition Programs

2015

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The government acquisition system is consistently plagued by cost growth and by attempts at acquisition reform. Despite these persistent challenges, the academic community lacks a methodology for studying complex acquisition programs both in‐depth and longitudinally throughout their life cycles. In this paper, we present a framework for studying complex acquisition programs that provides researchers with a strategy for systematically studying cost growth mechanisms. The proposed framework provides a means to identify specific technical and organizational mechanisms for cost growth, to organize those mechanisms using design structure matrices, and to observe the evolution of those mechanisms throughout a program's life cycle. To illustrate the utility of our framework, we apply it to analyze a case study of the National Polar‐orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS) program. Ultimately, we demonstrate that the framework enables us to generate unique insights into the mechanisms that induced cost growth on NPOESS and that were unacknowledged by previous studies. Specifically, we observed that complexity was injected into the technical system well before the program's cost estimates began to increase and that it was the complexity of the NPOESS organization that hindered the program's ability to effectively estimate and to manage its costs.

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Section: Case Study: the Npoess Programmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Case Study: the Npoess Programmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Case Study: the Npoess Programmentioning

confidence: 99%

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A Framework for Studying Cost Growth on Complex Acquisition Programs

2015

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“…In its current program, JPSS, NOAA is using NASA as an acquisition agent and is providing 100% of the funding for the system; for additional background on NOAA's past partnerships, please refer to Refs. (10,(18)(19).…”

Section: Case Study: Applying the Principlesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Cost of Jointness and How to Manage It

Dwyer

Szajnfarber

Selva

et al. 2014

AIAA SPACE 2014 Conference and Exposition

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Although joint programs are typically formed to reduce costs, recent studies have suggested that joint programs experience larger cost growth than non-joint programs. To explain this phenomenon, we present a model that attributes joint program cost growth to agencies' actions to maintain or regain their autonomy. We use this model to motivate principles for architecting joint programs and outline a process that can be used to identify opportunities for reforming current joint programs or for establishing new ones. Finally, we apply our approach to analyze joint program options for NOAA's low-earth orbiting weather satellite program and in doing so, identify several risks facing NOAA's current program and strategies for mitigating them.

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The Cost Impacts of Jointness: Insights From the NPOESS Program

Dwyer¹,

Szajnfarber²,

Cameron³

et al. 2014

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Bruce Cameron-is a lecturer in engineering systems at MIT and a consultant on platform strategies. At MIT, Bruce ran the MIT Commonality Study, a 16-firm investigation of platforming returns. His current clients include Fortune 500 firms in high tech, aerospace, transportation, and consumer goods. He holds an undergraduate degree from the University of Toronto and graduate degrees from MIT. [bcameron@mit.edu] Markus Bradford-is a junior economics major at MIT. He currently works as an undergraduate researcher at the MIT System Architecture Lab. His industry experience ranges from government and financial services and he is interested in project management in the technical space.[ mbrdfrd@mit.edu]Edward Crawley-is a professor of aeronautics & aeronautics and engineering systems at MIT. His research interests include system architecture, design, and decision authority in complex technical systems that involve economic and stakeholder issues. [crawley@mit.edu] AbstractAlthough joint programs are typically formed to reduce costs, recent studies have suggested that they may actually be more costly than non-joint programs. In this paper, we explore this hypothesis using an in-depth case study of the NPOESS program. To study jointness, we apply a semi-quantitative framework that quantifies the complexity impacts of jointness and enables us to observe their evolution over time. In particular, we describe how jointness impacted the NPOESS program-by inducing technical and organizational complexity-and illustrate how the relationship between both complexity types enabled, sustained, and induced cost growth. We also explain the evolution of the program's technical and organizational complexity by identifying five key technical decisions and collaborating agency interactions that increased complexity and cost. Finally, we conclude by noting that a key source of the NPOESS program's cost growth was not jointness per say, but rather, was the result of a mismatch in the amount of jointness that was present in the program's technical system but was absent in its managing organization.

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The Cost of Jointness: Insights from Environmental Monitoring Systems in Low-Earth Orbit

Cited by 5 publications

References 69 publications

A Framework for Studying Cost Growth on Complex Acquisition Programs

A Framework for Studying Cost Growth on Complex Acquisition Programs

The Cost of Jointness and How to Manage It

The Cost Impacts of Jointness: Insights From the NPOESS Program

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