Systems Thinking and Systems Engineering in Complex Project Management

This essay delves into the application of systems thinking and systems engineering methodologies for managing complexities in project management. It highlights the importance of fostering partnership between project managers and systems engineers to effectively address uncertainty, ambiguity, and incomplete information. The essay explains how systems thinking, akin to biological systems, can be divided into systems and subsystems to tackle complex projects. It further discusses hard and soft systems thinking, systems dynamics, and the role of systems engineering in managing program, portfolio, and project relationships. The document emphasizes the need for project characterization to address coordination and communication challenges, and presents systems engineering models for handling project complexities, such as the Traditional V diagram and Reaction Chamber model. Ultimately, the essay concludes that integrating systems thinking and systems engineering enhances project management by improving interdisciplinary collaboration and reducing project complexities.

Running Head: COMPLEX PROJECT MANAGEMENT
A brief study on Complex Project Management
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1COMPLEX PROJECT MANAGEMENT
Introduction:
This assignment enlightens on the methodologies that are used to handle the complexities
in project management as well as promoting partnership between project manager and systems
engineer to handle uncertainty, ambiguity and incomplete knowledge and information.
Complexities in the project makes the outcome of the project uncertain. As a result Systems
thinking and systems engineering are used to manage complex projects. Additionally they can be
used to manage any complexities in the world. Just like body systems, the concept of systems
thinking, systems engineering and management can be classified into systems and subsystems.
The following paragraphs will broadly discuss the use of systems thinking and systems
engineering in managing complex projects.
Discussion:
System is defined as the conjunction of processes as a whole. The individual parts of the
systems will each act as a subsystem. The concept of systems thinking is to make a systems
approach to tackle problems of project management. It originated from the concept of an
organism. Just as the body system is divided into organ system, each organ system act as an
individual subsystem. The organ systems can be further divided into subsystems and so on. This
can be applied to complex projects. The projects can be viewed as a whole system that can be
divided into subparts that will act as a subsystem. The project strategy should change according
to the changing environment to survive. Systems thinking can be broadly classified into hard and
soft systems thinking. The way systems thinking is used in management decides the use of hard
or soft systems thinking. Work in the systems movement is broadly classified as applications of
systems thinking and development of systems thinking. The application of systems thinking is
classified into application in other fields and application in the field of management. As an

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application to project management hard and soft systems thinking is used to aid in decision-
making process of complex project management. Systems thinking has created a language and
epistemology that are used to describe phenomenon like concrete or abstract, natural or designed
and has supplied a variety of accounts of that complexity. The projects are handled by system
dynamics. The three considerations that are made to handle project complexity are emphasise on
planning, creating a conventional control model and involves managing scope in individual parts
of project management.
Similarly, systems engineering considers the relationship between the complementary
disciplines of program, portfolio and project management. For the success of a particular project,
program or portfolio, the quality of relationship needs to be considered. The value for an item
increases the quality of relationship between disciplinary of various project, program and
portfolio management. This will help in reducing the complexity of the projects. To consider the
complexities project characterization is required. It provides the relationship between uncertainty
and intricacy. It broadly classifies the projects based on coordination and communication of the
problem of projects. They are classified as complicated projects, straightforward projects and
volatile projects. Systems engineering provides a solution to the complexities of project by
providing a solution model. It is assumed that the proper communication of the projects might
help to fight the challenges of complexity of a project. Complexities might arise due to the
indefinite formulation of the projects, no immediate solution to problems, inefficient planning of
the project, ineffective work breakdown structure and no stopping rule. Therefore, the solution to
these complexities might be deep understanding of the problem, gathering relevant information
of the projects, analyzing the information and developing solutions accordingly. One of the
systems engineering model for handling project complexities is provided below:

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Figure 1: Systems engineering for processes styles
(Source: )
Traditional V diagram is systems engineering is used to deal with the associated issues of the
project. The processes life cycle can be broadly divided into concept, realization, utilization and
disposal. Developing the requirements, systems analysis, design and developing the systems falls
under the concepts zone. Next testing of the equipment needs to be done followed by systems
integration. Then in-service operation removal and disposal of the problems is done. If this
systems engineering is followed then the complexity of the projects can be reduced largely.
Another system that can be followed is the Reaction Chamber systems engineering process life
cycle model. Staircase model and Gantt chart application are done to reduce the risks in
deliveries of the projects.
Conclusion:
From the above discussions, it can be concluded that systems thinking and systems
engineering help in combating the complexities of the project. By following various processes

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and models of systems engineering, the project managers will be able to reduce the complexities.
Each project if treated as a system and accordingly divided into subsystems will help to manage
the projects better and improve the quality of relationship between various disciplines of project,
portfolio and program management.

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References:
Cooke-Davies, T. (2011, August). Aspects of complexity: Managing projects in a complex
world. Project Management Institute.