Using Stakeholder Value Analysis
Analysis
to Build Exploration Sustainability
Sustainability
By Eric S. Rebentisch, Edward F. Crawley, Geilson Loureiro, John Q.
Dickmann, and Sandro N. Catanzaro
16.842 Fundamentals of Systems Engineering
Journal Club Week 2
Student 1
Student 2
September 18, 2009
Sustainability in Space Exploration




Valued outputs – produce and
deliver valued outputs (e.g.
knowledge) to a wide spectrum of
societal beneficiaries
Policy robustness – interaction
with external environment (e.g.
government resource-providers)
Risks of exploration – understand
and minimize risks involved and
communicate them to all
stakeholders
Affordability – multiple elements
must be acquired and operated
within a realistic budget
Value Delivery System
Identify
Stakeholders
Identify
Stakeholder
Values &
Needs
Define System
Objectives
Objectives
Preference
Order
Develop
Architecture
Choices
2
Stakeholder Theory

What do stakeholders do?
◦ Provide resources, support, employees, technologies, and
govern activities
Identify
Stakeholders
Identify
Stakeholder
Values &
Needs
◦ May relate to each other hierarchically, contractually, or in
another fashion

Define System
Objectives
Objectives
Preference
Order
Develop
Architecture
Choices

According to Kochan and Rubenstein (2000),
stakeholders must:
1.
Hold assets that are critical to the enterprise’s success
2.
Put their assets at risk in the enterprise
3.
Have sufficient power to compel influence
Types of stakeholders:
◦ Direct (or definitive) – meet all 3 above criteria
◦ Indirect (or latent) – do not meet all 3 above criteria
3
Space Exploration Stakeholders

Stakeholder identification
◦ Initially identified 32 groups
◦ Aggregated into 13 larger groups
◦ Sorted into 5 general categories of societal interest (both
direct and indirect)
Identify
Stakeholders
Exploration
Identify
Stakeholder
Values &
Needs
Explorers
Engineers
NASA
Science
Scientists
NASA
Other USG
Agencies
Economic
Commercial enterprises
Other USG Agencies
Engineers
Security
DoD
Intelligence
International
Partners
Define System
Objectives
US Public
Media
Educators
Executive Branch
Congress
NASA
Societal interest groups for space exploration
Objectives
Preference
Order
Develop
Architecture
Choices
Public
Image by MIT OpenCourseWare.

Stakeholder value identification
◦ Gathered from public opinion and polling data, archives of
Presidential statements, inference from budgetary and
strategy documents, etc.
◦ 100 total specific needs statements
Next: translate needs to system objectives
ObjectObject-Process Methodology
(OPM)

Expresses the function, structure, and behavior of systems as
a flow from objectives through concepts to specific
implementations
Generic OPM process artifacts.
Identify
Stakeholders

OPD – Diagrams
OPL:
To (neutral process)
◦ Objects
Identify
Stakeholder
Values &
Needs
Define System
Objectives
Objectives
Preference
Order
Develop
Architecture
Choices
Stakeholder
[Attribute of neutral process]
◦ Processes
Need
Specific operand
Neutral process
The (neutral operand)
Value
Attribute of
identification
Neutral process
By (specific process)
◦ States

OPD:
Neutral
operand
[Attribute of specific process]
OPL – Language
Attribute of
specific process
Using (generic system concept)
[and/or] (specific system form)
◦ Automatically
composed objective
statement based on
OPD
Specific Operand
Specific Process
Specific process
Sources of metrics
Stakeholder
Need
Natural Operand
Natural Process
OPM Objectives
Commercial space
Space mining
Cheaper space
Transportation
Infrastructure
Routine inexpensive
access to the moon
Provide
Space transportation
Infrastructure
Building
To provide routine inexpensive
access to the moon by building
space transportation infrastructure
Commercial space
Space tourism
Cheaper space
Transportation
Infrastructure
Routine inexpensive
access to leo
Provide
Space transportation
Infrastructure
Building
To provide routine inexpensive
access to leo by building space
transportation infrastructure
Generic system
concept
Specific system
form
Objectives
To reduce entry barriers for businesses
needing access to orbit by developing
the market for launch services.
Images by MIT OpenCourseWare.
100 specific needs  24 overarching objectives
5
Prioritizing Objectives

Identify
Stakeholders

1.
Importance to the goal of space exploration (technical success)
2.
Value to the various stakeholders involved (sustainability)
Arrow’s Impossibility Theorem (1951):
◦ It is not possible to convert the ranked preferences of more than 3
individuals to a community-wide ranking without resorting to a
dictator
Identify
Stakeholder
Values &
Needs
Define System
Objectives
Objectives
Preference
Order
A single value delivery method must consider an objective’s:
◦ Implication: no prioritization method will perfectly satisfy all
stakeholders

Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP)
◦ Based on building a matrix of pairwise comparisons of different
objectives, assigning weight to relative importance
Develop
Architecture
Choices
◦ Would result in too many pairwise comparisons  impractical

Multi-Attribute Utility Theory (MAUT)
◦ Based on negotiations by “experts-representatives”
◦ Space exploration system is too broad  impractical
6
Direct Assessment
Allocates points to each objective
 Similar to techniques used in Quality Function Deployment
 Used bilateral agreement of researchers to approximate
consensus of a complete group
 Questions:

Identify
Stakeholders
◦ Impact – How much will the benefit delivered by exploration align
with the stakeholder’s values?
◦ Return – What kind of benefit impact is this stakeholder able to
deliver back to exploration activities if this objective is met?
◦ Lag – What is the time frame in which the stakeholder will be able
to deliver back to exploration activities if this objective is met?
◦ Ease – How easy is it to satisfy these objectives through an
exploration program focused on the Moon and Mars?
Identify
Stakeholder
Values &
Needs
Define System
Objectives
Objectives
Preference
Order
Develop
Architecture
Choices

Scoring:
0
No relation
1
Minor relation
3
Intermediate
Relation
9
Strong Relation
7
Preference Weighting Matrix
Identify
Stakeholder
Values &
Needs
5
stakeholder
categories
24 objectives
x
Lag
Ease
Average over
all
stakeholders
Define System
Objectives
Objectives
Preference
Order
Develop
Architecture
Choices
Return
x
5
stakeholder
categories
24 objectives
Impact
x
5
stakeholder
categories
24 objectives
Identify
Stakeholders
24 objectives
5
stakeholder
categories
Appendix B
Map of stakeholders’ preferences for
seeing different objectives
accomplished
Stakeholder Classes
Objectives
Exploration Science
Economic
Security
Public
To increase knowledge about the evolution of the solar system
2.3
4.3
0.7
4.5
2.7
To pursue sustained exploration by locating and exploring in situ resources
7.0
4.0
2.0
1.5
2.7
To prepare for the exploration of the next destination by increasing operations, resources and infrastructure knowledge
9.0
4.0
4.0
0.5
2.7
To increase crew safety, ensure crew physical health and increase crew comfort
7.0
4.0
1.3
3.0
5.0
Image by MIT OpenCourseWare.
8
Value Delivery Mechanism

◦ 1) reflect collective interests of societal
stakeholders
◦ 2) provide prioritization for meeting objectives
and can inform tradeoffs in system
architecting
Identify
Stakeholders
Identify
Stakeholder
Values &
Needs
Define System
Objectives

Objectives
Preference
Order
Develop
Architecture
Choices
Weighted objectives:

Need a flow-down of stakeholder values
into evaluation and ranking of technical
system architectures
Integrating stakeholder value-based
objectives with well-developed models
and analytical tools
9
Proximate Measures


Identify
Stakeholders
Identify
Stakeholder
Values &
Needs
Define System
Objectives
Objectives
Preference
Order

Metrics of societal value are not easily
incorporated into system architecting
Proximate measures form a bridge between
stakeholder needs and the architect’s needs
Operationalized with directly measurable
indicator metrics
Stake holder
Explorers
Scientists
Need
Scientific
exploration
Objective
To increase knowledge
gained from exploration
by conducting experiments
Aggregated Objective
Proximate Measure
To increase
knowledge about
the solar system
Quality of data
Develop
Architecture
Choices
Amount of data
Indicator Metric
Recon and survey
Spatial area of a given site that can be reached
Diversity of sites
Ability to temporally re-plan within mission
(week to month)
Ability to temporally re-plan and adapt in
campaign
Exploration payload delivered to M surface
Observation days for crew on surface
Observation days for robots on surface
Image by MIT OpenCourseWare.
10
Proximate Measures
21 proximate
measures
Value
Identify
Stakeholders
Identify
Stakeholder
Values &
Needs
Affordability
Exploration
Science
Commercial
Security
Define System
Objectives
Objectives
Preference
Order
Develop
Architecture
Choices
Public
Policy
Robustness
Risk &
Safety
• In each category, proximate
measures assigned
weighting factor
• No weighting across
categories
• Each of 61 indicator metrics
assigned weighting factors
corresponding to respective
proximate measures
11
Tec
echnic
hnical
al Archit
hitec
ectture
ure Analy
nalyssis
Weighted overarching exploration
objectives
Proximate measure weights
Indicator metric weights
Identify
Stakeholders
Identify
Stakeholder
Values &
Needs
OPN-generated technical architecture options
Produce architecture design vector
Calculate architecture indicator metrics
Define System
Objectives
Aggregate indicator metrics to proximate measures
Objectives
Preference
Order
Compare calculated proximate measure with benchmark
architecture scores
Develop
Architecture
Choices
Identify highest-performing candidate architectures for further
analysis
Image by MIT OpenCourseWare.
12
Architecture Assessment

Comparison of two architectures by metric
categories
Identify
Stakeholders
Identify
Stakeholder
Values &
Needs
Define System
Objectives
Objectives
Preference
Order
Develop
Architecture
Choices
Left: 60 Days
Right: 635 Days
1.2
1
0.8
0.6
0.4
0.2
0
EXP
SCI
COM
SEC
PUB
AFF
POL
RIS
Image by MIT OpenCourseWare.
13
Other Architectures
Identify
Stakeholders
Identify
Stakeholder
Values &
Needs
Define System
Objectives
Objectives
Preference
Order
Develop
Architecture
Choices
Enterprise
 Integrates stakeholders
nominally external to
organization
 Continuously delivers
value
Policy
 Stakeholders control
vital fiscal resources
 Intermediaries between
exploration enterprise
and other exploration
stakeholders
Weighted overarching exploration
objectives
Identify exploration objectives for
enterprise solution
Identify enterprise function(s) to
address objectives
Aggregate functions into overarching
enterprise functions
Identify enterprise forms that provide/
address overarching functions
Develop enterprise architecture
concepts from forms
Image by MIT OpenCourseWare.
14
Summary

Main paper contributions:
◦ Elevates importance of sustainability in
system architecting and design
◦ Brings focus on delivering value to
stakeholders over lifecycle of endeavor
◦ Value delivered through enterprise and
policy environment as well as technical
system
◦ Tools and insights will benefit system
architects in the design of many complex
engineering systems
15
Dis
isccus
uss
sion



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


Have you encountered Arrow’s Impossibility Theorem? How
did you resolve the situation?
Have you employed some kind of method for rank-ordering
requirements/objectives in other projects?
What are the advantages/disadvantages of object-process
methodology (diagramming objective statements)?
What are the advantages/disadvantages of analytically
integrating rank ordering of stakeholder objectives into the
system architecting process?
Do you feel that the value delivery process detailed in this
paper would help or hinder you in a systems architecting type
problem?
Can you think of examples other than space exploration
where there are both direct and indirect stakeholders
involved?
How does the implementation of a value delivery mechanism
help to ensure sustainability?
16
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16.842 Fundamentals of Systems Engineering
Fall 2009
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