For the Journey to Expertise in Systems Engineering, Enhance the Path with Shu Ha Ri

Abstract

This paper offers a perspective for considering enhancements to the current programs for developing systems engineering professionals, incorporating consideration for developing characteristics of expertise and mastery throughout. Shu Ha Ri represents an approach for three phases of mastery development, established in ancient practices such as some martial arts and mimicked in many current approaches: beginner > intermediate > advanced, apprentice > journeyman > master, bachelors > masters > doctorate. Anders Eriksson's research on expertise depicts three levels of progression, naïve practice > purposeful practice > deliberate practice, building on Bloom's earlier three phases of development. However, Eriksson's model is limited to domains where the demonstration of expertise can be characterized, is well understood, and is measurable or at least objectively evaluable by existing domain experts. Most systems engineering expert achievement certifications that exist are still relatively subjective or IKIWISI (I'll know it when I see it) evaluations by the subject's future peer experts. For a given population of experts in systems engineering, there is a shared thematic set of highly diverse experiential assessment characteristics which diverge in orthogonal dimensions from some of the earlier assessment levels. David Epstein suggests that the power of generalists comes to play more when experts address wicked problems (those lacking a pre-ordained approach for solving) than when specialists address kind problems (the opposite). Kind problems are not necessarily easy to solve, but the route is well defined. Solving wicked problems without exemplar solutions often requires the generalist's leveraging of analogic thinking, and the recognition and possible synthesis of matchable patterns (isomorphisms) learned from diverse experience sampling of other domains, not merely relying on T-shaped or Pi-shaped knowledge. Using the Shu Ha Ri framing presents an opportunity to consider enhancements to earlier systems engineering practitioner development stages towards excelling beyond emergence and effectiveness.