Systems analysis approach for NASA and its projects, programs and enterprises

The current transformation from a NASA of loosely coupled enterprises to “one NASA” which embodies cross-enterprise Agency Missions and an Integrated Space Plan, has created an important need for an overall integrated Agency wide approach to systems analysis. One NASA will only work if the Agency assigns high priority to the development and deployment of a consistent methodological foundation supporting the selection and monitoring of R&D tasks that support new system concepts that enable future missions. This capability should be applicable at various degrees of abstraction depending upon whether one is interested in formulation, development or operations. It should also be applicable to a single project, a program comprised of a group of projects, an enterprise typically including multiple programs, and the NASA agency itself. Emphasis here is on technology selection and new initiatives, but the same approach can be employed to deal with new system architectures, risk reduction, task allocation among humans and machines, etc. The purpose of this paper is to describe one such approach to achieving this capability. This overall approach has been, and is being applied at JPL to a number of projects and programs, illustrative examples of which will be reported herein.