Data Driven Decisions

Chapter 17Systems Engineering Tools

Systems engineering work attracts graduates from a wide variety of degree programs. It is important to understand, though, that systems engineering tools are used differently from other professional tools gained by studying architecture, art, engineering, science, business, or mathematics. Systems engineering tools are fundamentally technical, and they are designed to take specific measurements through a myriad of processes and combine them into a single framework and language for mutual understanding across contributing teams. These tools will never be a particularly valuable crosswalk for connecting two non‐technical, non‐specific business units such as marketing and design.

The marketing and design departments can work together based on branding exercises. They can work together based on psychology. They can work together based on highly detailed customer analysis. But there are very few use cases where marketing and design can be brought together using the tools we have been discussing because systems engineering tools need highly specific inputs based on measurable data.

Since the dot‐com boom and the rise of the Internet, the amount of digital activity that human beings encounter and the number of measurements and possible quantification of data that exists based on those encounters has increased exponentially.

The reason that systems engineering is now so valuable when it comes to intangible assets began its life in the dot‐com boom ...