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Speaker Meetings: Looking Back at 2009 PDF Print E-mail
Written by Jorg Largent   
The speaker meetings have become a forum for the members of the Los Angeles Chapter in which they can learn from leaders in the industry — learning the challenges faced by various projects and learning about the successes and failures of other projects in the application of the systems engineering process. The learning and sharing process involves a presentation, followed by questions and answers and the presentation of a gift from the Chapter as an expression of the Chapter’s appreciation. The Los Angeles Chapter hosted nine speaker meetings (plus a modified speaker meeting co-hosted with the Southern California Software Process Improvement Network) during 2009.

Our first speaker meeting of the year, on January 14, featured Daniel Winton, a senior engineering specialist with the Aerospace Corporation. Daniel’s presentation was titled “Mission Assurance Through Improving Software Technical Readiness Assessments for National Security Space Systems.” This presentation outlined an approach for better addressing systems software in Technology Readiness Reviews by providing an alternative definition of software Critical Technology Elements and by providing a new systems-softwarefocused Technology Readiness Level scale. It provided recommendations on how systems-software development risk could be reduced and how the state of systems software readiness could be assessed.

For a speaker meeting in February, Chapter leaders and interested members attended the second annual gathering of the “2009 Software and Systems Chapters Congress of Los Angeles and Orange Counties.” The meeting was held on February 17. Representatives from chapters of professional and technical societies located in Los Angeles and Orange Counties and involved with software and systems development met at Northrop Grumman in Redondo Beach. The meeting was cohosted by INCOSE and the Southern California Software Process Improvement Network. Other participating professional organizations included the Association for Computing Machinery, three groups from the Institute for Electrical and Electronic Engineers, the Southern California Quality Assurance Association’ and the Institute for Software Research University of California.

Douglas L. Loverro, a member of the Defense Intelligence Senior Executive Service and the Executive Director, Space and Missile Systems Center, Air Force Space Command, at the Los Angeles Air Force Base was the featured speaker at the speaker meeting on April 13. Dr. Loverro spoke on threats to our space capabilities and the clear national imperative to protect these systems. He discussed the Space Protection mission, focused on the threats to our space systems and the implications to future space architecture, and highlighted the importance of Space Situational Awareness, increased protection capabilities, and necessary changes to the way our nation views space.

The May 12 speaker meeting featured Elaine Thorpe, a Boeing Technical Fellow in the area of Human Systems Integration (HSI). Speaking from her role as leader of the HSI Function Skill Team, which seeks to define common processes, products, tools, and training for HSI engineers across the Boeing Enterprise, Elaine discussed systems engineering issues and challenges facing the development of advanced systems from the HSI perspective.

On June 9 Jimmy Thai, Assistant Vice-president for Science and Technology and Program Manager for the Tsunami-Warning Systems program office with SAIC, spoke on the applications of systems engineering for a Tsunami warning system for the Indian Ocean and the people living on the shores of the ocean. The need for the system was brought into stark focus by the tragic tsunami of December 26, 2004, which took the lives of over 225,000 people, severely affected over 150 million more in the region, and triggered an economic impact of nearly $8 billion.

The August 18 speaker meeting featured P. A. “Trisha” Jansma from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). Trish is the Lead for the NASA Systems Engineering Framework (SEF) for the NASA Office of the Chief Engineer. She is also the Deployment Lead for the Systems Engineering Advancement Project at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, California. Trish discussed the determination on the part of NASA management that the SEF not become “shelfware,” and the commitment of resources to ensure that it was actively deployed into the NASA systems engineering community. The presentation described the three elements of the NASA SEF and all the activities being done in each element. It also described the approach, methods, and mechanisms being used to deploy it across the Agency.

The Chapter hosted two speaker meetings in October. The first speaker meeting (October 13) featured John Thomas, Vice-president, Booz Allen Hamilton. He spoke on technical leadership and the role of the systems engineer in program success. The second speaker meeting (October 29) featured Dr. Arthur Pyster from the Stevens Institute of Technology. Dr. Pyster spoke on creating the systems engineering body of knowledge and curriculum guidelines for graduate degree programs in systems engineering. The November speaker meeting involved a change in format, as the meeting was hosted by SpaceX. SpaceX also included a tour of its Hawthorne facility as a part of the evening’s activities. Chris Bauer, Sales Director for SpaceX, was the featured speaker. The last speaker meeting of the year was held on December 8. The featured speaker was Andre (AJ) Lee, who discussed a wide spectrum of applications of the systems engineering process and discussed the application of several systems engineering tools as a part of dealing with large disasters such as Hurricane Katrina and, most recently, the “Station Fire” firestorm in the San Gabriel Mountains between Los Angeles and Palmdale.
Last Updated ( Saturday, 16 January 2010 10:49 )