ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews the current state of systems engineering (SE) and enterprise architecting (EA) along with enhancements to portray an integrated approach to enterprise systems engineering and architecting (ESE/A). The objectives of the enhancements are to advance the state of EA and SE practice from predominantly static and deterministic approaches to dynamic and probabilistic ESE/A processes. Organizations have long been considered “complex” in the casual use of the term, however, the study of them as complex systems did not begin until the 1950s and 1960s as a result of research done in the fields of general systems theory and cybernetics. The study of complex systems requires a balance of contrasting perspectives depending on the context of the system: holism versus reductionism, top- down versus bottom- up. The perspectives and analytical approaches taken in a study of a complex system are contingent on the system under study and the particular dynamics being investigated.
