TRANSITIONING PROJECTS TO A MODEL-BASED APPROACH

This paper will discuss the recent efforts of the Squad Centric Mounted Maneuver (SCMM) project to transition from document based to Model Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) in an effort to synchronize disparate sources of information into a unified model. This effort began with the transition of the system One-Wire diagram into a Systems Modeling Language (SysML) Internal Block Diagram (IBD) to generate the interfaces for the entire system. With the help of various stakeholders to format the Magic Draw diagram to look similar to the previous Visio diagram we were able to get buy-in from project leadership and Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) who have relied on Visio to generate these One-Wires. After the success of demonstrating the power of a modeling tool to rapidly update content and query data into usable reports we began using Magic Draw to document behavioral analysis through use case diagrams, sequence diagrams, state machine diagrams and activity diagrams. The project has continued to understand how to read these SysML diagrams with the help of TARDEC Architecture support and have been able to transition these architecture artifacts into more concise system requirements. The project is now gaining momentum by using a common language (SysML) to document system interfaces and behaviors once present only on conference room whiteboards and power point charts. From this effort came several techniques, reusable model content, cross-organizational collaboration within TARDEC, and additional best practices for system architecture development.