Astronomical Space Missions ASM

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Astronomical Space Missions (ASM)

• Project Management and Systems Engineering
• 31 May 2006
• Lecturer Paul Wesselius

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Contents

• Project Management
• Systems Engineering

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1. Project Management

• Well-written, eminently readable, book, Project
  management, Thomas W. de Boer, in Dutch, 2005,
  Pearson Education Benelux
• Emphasis on commercial projects, not completely
  applicable to scientific projects
• Nevertheless good starting point for definitions
  and descriptions of methods to be employed
• A project consists of (i) persons, (ii)
  material/parts and equipment, (iii)
  methods/processes (iv) management
• A project wishes to achieve a specific goal the
  way to reach the goal is the final product of
  the project
• Other important terms in connection to a project
  (i) project initiator (ESA, SRON itself), (ii)
  sponsor (pays for executing the project, SRON),
  (iii) problem owner (senior astronomers), (iv)
  user (junior astronomers), (v) customer (??
  general public?)

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More about a project

• Project plan should answer six questions (i) Why
  do we do it? (ii) Which final product? (iii) How
  is project executed? (iv) Who does it?, (v) Which
  means will be employed? (vi) When will it occur?
• Communication (i) problem definition, (ii)
  prevent resistance, (iii) remove resistance, (iv)
  listen to the users (introduce wishes from
  sponsor and users in the project plan!)
• The following functions are usually needed for a
  project (i) project initiator, (ii) sponsor,
  (iii) user, (iv) project leader, (v) secretariat
  and administration, (vi) team leader, (vii) risk
  manager, (viii) quality manager, (ix) financial
  manager, (x) analyst, (xi) designer, (xii)
  builder

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Subsequent project stages, schematically depicted
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Organizational type and culture

• Several types of organization occur for SRON the
  types division organization and adhocracy are
  important. When a project starts elements from an
  adhocracy are important, at later phases a
  disciplined division should take over. (For very
  large projects like HIFI several divisions are
  involved complicating matters)
• Zeus, Apollo, Athena, or Dionysos cultures exist
• Zeus the Boss decides it all
• Apollo rules and procedures should be adhered to
• Athena proper task execution, work in project
  teams
• Dionysos emphasis on individuals, persons can
  shape their own functions and work
• SRON follows mostly the Athena culture, but some
  groups and persons have Dionysos traits since a
  few years it is attempted to introduce some
  Apollo elements

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Roles in a project

• Team leader has natural authority but he
  should not force team members to do what he says
• Monitor keeps track of things happening in the
  team but do not manage down to too much detail
• Team worker keeps an eye on collective interest
  but sometimes criticism is essential for the
  team
• Producer work goes first, reliable but not
  very flexible
• Specialist knows much about a relatively small
  area but should stop nagging about technical
  details at some point
• Stimulator very motivated person, can meet
  deadlines at short notice but quiet project
  periods are necessary too
• Networker looks for new possibilities, makes new
  contacts but try to limit yourself to the
  present project
• Innovator creative, new ideas but can become
  too much

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Material and Equipment

• Select the methods to be used with great care
  choice of project personnel, use of materials and
  equipment strongly depends on it (e.g. save
  weight for electronics by applying
  surface-mounted technology or mixed Asics)
• Use the knowledge of analyst, designer and
  builder well can save a lot of money
• Try to use existing things as much as feasible
  look carefully at and remain within your working
  environment
• Project needs to have quality concerning final
  product, methods employed and eventual
  realization of the final product
• Methods should be in accordance with the project
  collaborators make careful choices which things
  to do in-house

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Global project structure

• At start of project Why? What? How? Who? When?
• Why? Make write-up about main function of final
  product and describe the main secondary functions
  (goal of project)
• What? How to implement the projects goal with
  the final product. It should be verifiable that
  the final product is ready.
• How? Make global planning. Which project steps
  are taken? How much time will each cost? How many
  persons, how much materials and equipment are
  needed? Address quality and risk.
• Who? Fill functions within the project. Each
  function comprises an assignment of tasks and
  responsibility
• When? After defining What?, How?, and Who?
  make a preliminary time schedule for the project
• Then, make a first cost estimate
• Discuss this global project proposal with the
  initiator and sponsor resist changes in this
  global planning thereafter

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Communication is all-important!!
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Detail planning I

• Product Breakdown Structure (PBS) divide the
  final product into part-products
• Make the mutual dependency of part-products clear
• In figures (see example slides) the detail
  increases from left to right or from top to
  bottom
• Be complete, do not go in too much detail
• The project breakdown should be acceptable to the
  project collaborators
• Sometimes virtual products are introduced a
  virtual product should consist of tangible
  part-products (e.g. Signal Chain for HIFI)
• The Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) assigns tasks
  in order to build a part-product (task one or
  more coherent activities with a corresponding
  responsibility)

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Detail planning II

• The work breakdown is complete when every task
  can be sized in terms of activities, manpower,
  time schedule and result
• Formally a task is connected to a responsibility
  and an activity concerns the actual execution of
  a task in practice these two are very closely
  interweaven
• Try to connect a part-product to each task
  otherwise establishing when a task is ready may
  be problematic
• WBS is directed to How to do the project PBS
  is result-oriented, What should be done
• SRON often uses the term WBS when it should be
  PBS
• The specification of each product comprises (i)
  definition of parts, (ii) purchase plan of these
  parts, (iii) quality demands

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PBS Example HIFI Mixer Assembly
Focal plane unit
Mixer assembly
Mecon mechanical design firm in Doetinchem TPD
firm in Delft eng. engineering
HIFI called this a Work Breakdown Structure
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Work Breakdown Structure, example
Following course XYZ
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Dependencies time estimates

• Establish dependencies between tasks
• Arrange project such that dependencies are
  minimized ? will lead to extra resources (extra
  costs), but flexibility in planning and adherence
  to time schedule are strongly increased
• Example HIFIs three sets of test equipment with
  (expensive!) cryostats mixer unit cryostat,
  mixer assembly cryostat, focal plane unit
  cryostat
• Estimating time for a task is difficult (i) it
  is a prediction, (ii) estimating time for
  innovative tasks is very difficult, (iii) the
  organization itself changes because of the
  project there may be resistance to the project,
  (iv) necessary, beforehand unknown activities may
  come up, (v) time spent is on the one hand a
  target, on the other hand a reasonable estimate
• To estimate time (i) analyse the WBS and/or PBS,
  (ii) look at analogous projects, (iii) use
  expertise of other persons

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Time Schedule activities

• Take remaining dependencies into account
• Wait times may occur, when dependent on third
  parties
• Availability of resources (persons, equipment,
  materials, parts)
• Define milestones target, checkpoint, reporting,
  part-delivery
• Overhead tasks should not be forgotten and should
  appear in WBS
• Plan slack time for unforeseen
• Use Gantt chart (also called Bar Diagram) each
  activity occupies a row columns describe at
  least (i) task description, (ii) start date,
  (iii) end date, and maybe also (iv) duration,
  (v) person(s) involved, (vi) remarks,
• Dependencies are indicated with an arrow in GANTT
  charts
• Milestones have a time duration zero

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A Model Gantt Chart

• Elements
• List of activities
• Start/end
• Milestones
• Slack time

STM Structural thermal model EM electrical
model FM flight model Phase C/D detailed
design and building phase
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A real (HIFI) Gantt chart
A large project like HIFI can only work
with overview GANTT charts otherwise it gets
messy
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Risk Management

• Risk is a factor or cause that may frustrate the
  planned progress of the project
• The risk profile diagram shows the risks
  associated with eight project aspects (i) method
  (known or unknown), (ii) goal (accepted or
  controversial), (iii) final product (changes in
  course of project?), (iv) environment (should be
  stable), (v) process (influence of project on the
  organisation), (vi) change (change of surrounding
  organization)
• These 8 aspects translate into four risk
  categories of a project (see figure on next
  slide)
• SRON has not a great tradition in risk management

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Figure 7.1 of de Boers book Basic diagram
for risk profile
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Filled-in risk profile. The context of the
project and the resistance to it are
most problematic.
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Teams

• A team group persons collaborating towards a
  common goal, using agreed working methods and
  possessing complementary skills a team should be
  rather small
• The division of skills over team members should
  be balanced
• Considerable development is needed to make a team
  out of an arbitrary group of persons
• A real team is effective and has great impact
• The lifecycle of a team consists of (i)
  formation, (ii) settling (usually with internal
  quarrels, etc), (iii) standardization, (iv)
  working as a team
• Working in a team can be very pleasant (i)
  persons from different disciplines work
  together, (ii) it has a begin and an end, (iii)
  each new team has another composition, (iv) the
  information flow is stimulating, (v) ideas are
  exchanged, (vi) it is a challenge

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Project aspects

• Time, Costs, Quality are the three most important
  aspects of management
• Time and Costs should be as low as possible,
  Quality should be high
• When a project has been planned carefully any
  change in time, costs or quality will always
  affect the other two aspects
• E.g. HIFI quality remains at highest level, time
  schedule cannot slip ? costs increase enormously
• Project management performs regular checks (i)
  still on time? (ii) still within cost estimate?
  (iii) quality still sufficient? (iv) any changes
  necessary? (v) do the changes have the desired
  effect?
• Do nothing as manager when there is nothing to
  do!!

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Measuring progress

• Tracking GANTT chart compare baseline planning
  to real progress of all tasks when a task is
  unfinished estimate percentage readiness
• When checking cost the Earned Value Analysis is
  relevant
• Earned Value (EV) is calculated by multiplying
  the planned costs for each task with the
  percentage the task is completed and adding it
  all up e.g. 3 tasks cost each 1000 2 tasks
  are ready, one for 50 then the Earned value is
  2500.
• The Real Costs (RC) to achieve this result on the
  three tasks may be higher, e.g. 3250.
• Cost Variance EV RC - 750 this
  represents a cost increase for the project
• Other indexes are defined as well

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Schematic overview of a typical project
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Management Model Space Astronomy
The PI model
ESAs astronomical projects are required to have
this structure
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Remarks to PI model

• ESA prescribes the PI model for astronomical
  missions
• ? a PI institute has great problems to control
  costs
• Schedule is most important to agency,
• Other partners problems may have to be solved
  also financially by PI institute,
• Strong Project Manager needed from earliest
  stages to guard the cost aspects,
• At Phase A a full commitment must be made for the
  whole project then, a cost estimate based on a
  realistic breakdown is not yet possible
• Base the estimate on previous projects keep at
  that stage a reserve of maybe even 100 reduce
  the reserve later

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Management structure EOS projects
The manager model
ESA often uses this model for earth observation
projects the manager comes from industry the PI
has much less power than for astronomical projects
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Project Management HIFI

• Functions in HIFIs project team
• PI (Principal Investigator) leadership (Thijs de
  Graauw)
• Project Manager management decisions (Kees
  Wafelbakker)
• Co-I (Co-Investigators) Co-I team highest
  level forum to advise PI
• Steering committee often heads of institutes
• Chief Engineer (Nick Whyborn) and Systems
  Engineering Team (leader Henri Aarts)
• Manager Assembly, Integration, Verification
  (Willem Luinge)
• Manager Operations (Peter Roelfsema)
• Local manager for each participating
  institute/group
• Work leaders for subtasks when the contribution
  is large, like that of SRON

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2. Systems Engineering

• Mostly based on Systems Engineering Handbook of
  INCOSE, TP-2003-016-02, Version 2a, 1 June 2004
• A Systems Engineering Team (SET) is needed to
  assist the project manager (for complex projects
  only! E.g. HIFI)
• The Systems Engineering process should be
  studied and used by all engineers just as
  scientists apply the scientific method.
• To become a good Systems Engineer requires at
  least five years of training
• Systems Engineers are the glue that binds all
  system elements together
• Hierarchy within a system
• System, Element or Segment, Subsystem, Assembly,
  Subassembly, Component, Part
• HIFI uses all except Element or Segment

INCOSE International Council on Systems
Engineering A Part is usually simple, but can
be complex (e.g. upconverter)
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Hierarchy within a system (or project)
Figure 2-1 of INCOSE
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Systems Engineering definition Wikipedia

• Systems engineering (or systems design
  engineering) is an interdisciplinary approach and
  means for enabling the realization and deployment
  of successful systems. It focuses on defining
  customer needs and required functionality early
  in the development cycle, documenting
  requirements, then proceeding with design
  synthesis and system validation while considering
  the complete problem operations, environment,
  design, development, manufacturing, deployment,
  cost schedule, performance, training,
  maintenance, test and disposal. Systems
  Engineering integrates all of the engineering
  disciplines and specialty groups into a unified,
  team effort.

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Systems Engineering picture overview
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The position of SE relative to project activities
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Example of SE for a technical project
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Figure 2-3 of INCOSE TP-2003-016-02 Systems Engi
neering Process Overview
Project definition
Design
Building
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Life cycle phases of a project as
defined different organizations compare to
sheet 23 of lecture on Mission Design
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Tasks Systems Engineer

• Basic tasks are
• Define System Objectives (Users Needs)
• Establish Functionality (Functional Analysis)
• Establish Performance Reqts (Requirements
  Analysis)
• Evolve Design and Operations Concept
  (Architecture Synthesis)
• Select a Baseline (Cost/Benefit Analysis)
• Verify that Baseline meets Requirements (Users
  Needs)
• Validate that Baseline satisfies the User (Users
  Needs)
• Iterate the Process through Lower Level Analysis
  (Decomposition)
• SE should also examine proposed changes
• Is the change necessary?
• Help choosing the most cost-effective solution

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Configuration and Data Management

• Configuration Management (CM) is a SET task
  according to INCOSE
• CM ensures effective management of the evolving
  configuration of a system during its lifecycle
• Specifications, hardware drawings, software code
  are covered by Configuration Management
• Data Management (DM) of all data generated by
  the project is also defined as a SET task by
  INCOSE. Data apart from the CM information may
  consist of test plans, test procedures, test
  results, engineering analysis reports, .
• At SRON CM is done not wholeheartedly by
  Product Assurance/Quality Assurance
• A certain decentralization of DM will be needed
  for very large projects e.g. the HIFI calibrator
  group keeps its own files on the HIFI calibration
  source

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Risk Management

• See also sheets 19-21
• Risk Management recognition, assessment, and
  control of uncertainties that may result in
  schedule delays, cost overruns, performance
  problems, .
• It is imperative that everyone on the project
  feels free to openly discuss risks!
• Four risk categories (i) technical, (ii) cost,
  (iii) schedule, (iv) programmatic
• Programmatic events beyond control of project
  manager
• Overview risk areas in Figure 6-4 of INCOSE SE
  Handbook risks in different project phases are
  discerned e.g. in the conceptual phase risks
  could occur in (i) trade-offs, (ii)
  subcontractor performance, (iii) assessing
  technology, (iv) requirements allocation

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Product Teams

• Process integrated set of activities that
  accomplish a stated objective.
• Identify processes to be used,
• Assess maturity of these processes,
• Focus on process improvements with high payoffs,
• Encourage individuals to propose improvements.
• Design is the process of defining, selecting
  and describing solutions to requirements in terms
  of products and processes.
• Another term Integrated Product and Process
  Development
• Integrated Product Development Team (IPDT) is an
  overall team comprised of many smaller teams
  given the appropriate resources and charged with
  the responsibility and authority to define,
  develop, produce, and support a product. They
  should be staffed with persons of all necessary
  skills.

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Examples of alternative IPDT organizations
Figure 7-5 of INCOSE
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Good Teams (IPDTs)
Table 7-3 of INCOSE see also sheet 22