C. Ariel Pinto

Interdependency-induced risk with applications to healthcare

Abstract Developing effective protection, mitigation and recovery measures for critical infrastructures is paramount in the wake of increasing natural and human-initiated hazards, risks and threats. Influencing these measures are interconnections (i.e., interdependencies) among infrastructure systems. Understanding the nature of system interdependencies can play an essential role in minimizing and/or reducing the probabilities and consequences of cascading failures in interdependent systems. This paper discusses the need for policy-makers, infrastructure operators and researchers to consider alternative approaches to formulating risk and enabling solutions to challenging 21st century issues related to interdependent infrastructures. Using the healthcare sector as an example, this paper suggests that identifying the risks associated with maintaining public health goes beyond traditional risk formulation to include the structural complexity brought about by infrastructure interdependencies.

Challenges to Sustainable Risk Management: Case Example in Information Network Security

Abstract: This article contributes to more sustainable management of risk by describing frameworks for (1) valuation of avoided risks and (2) improving outsourced information security services. These contributions address the absence of a structure for rewarding successful risk management, the need for an ever-more accurate economic measure of risk, and the difficulty of transferring risks to contract-bound outsourcing entities. The manager can use these concepts to make more informed decisions in allocating resources to risk management activities. Challenges and lessons from two case studies are presented: (1) application of risk-based ROI at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and (2) information assurance outsourcing at the Navy Marine Corps Intranet.

Modelling and measuring the operability of interdependent systems and systems of systems: advances in methods and applications

Interdependency is an important consideration in managing systems and systems of systems. Included in this consideration is identifying, representing, and measuring the ripple effects of dependencies between systems and consumers who rely on their products and services. Anticipating these effects enables planners to minimise dependency risks that, if realised, can have cascading impacts on the ability of systems to deliver services. This paper presents advances in modelling interdependent systems by integrating two methods: functional dependency network analysis (FDNA) and the inoperability input-output model (IIM). Their integration enables hierarchical modelling of perturbations to systems at the physical or operational network levels. To highlight the insights gained by integrating FDNA and IIM, a simulated electric power system that feeds a large metropolitan area is presented. This simulated case demonstrates that other consequence measures, such as the inoperability metric presented herein, must be used in conjunction with monetary objectives to generate holistic prioritisation strategies.

System of systems perspective on risk: towards a unified concept

Many systems and projects that concern systems engineers, engineering managers, and business managers today can be defined as system of systems (SoS), which are described as ambiguous, uncertain and dynamic, among others. In addition to the traditional view on risk identification, analysis and management, the concept of risk should be considered with respect to these systems of systems. The purpose of this paper is to analyse both fundamental concepts and recent publications in system of systems, business and engineering management, as well as risk analysis, modelling, and management for the purpose of better describing the concept of risk with respect to system of systems. The ultimate goal is to provide engineering and business managers the necessary perspective on the concept of risk and its management for the next generation of systems – including various descriptions of risk and discussion of the relevance of properties of system of systems to sustainable management of risks in engineered systems. To achieve a truly sustainable management of risk, there has to be a change in paradigm from a traditional description of risk to that of a more holistic perspective.

Multi-Criteria Decision Making and composting of waste in the municipality of Bacoor in the Philippines

Choosing the most appropriate and practical strategy for solid waste management is a complex undertaking. It requires the identification of relevant perspectives, meaningful criteria, and sound evaluation method. The municipality of Bacoor in the Philippines used Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) method to arrive at a chosen waste management strategy - composting - from a holistic set of perspectives. However, the successful implementation of the chosen strategy was proven to depend not only on a sound decision process but also on the reliability and accuracy of projecting uncertain future events.

Investigating Interbank Contagion with Agent-Based Modeling and Functional Dependency Network Analysis (FDNA)

Functional Dependency Network Analysis (FDNA) is a tool developed by engineer management researchers for developing systems that are more resilient and less prone to catastrophic failure. Considering financial networks as a system-of-systems, we introduce FDNA for analyzing non-engineering systems. This paper applies FDNA to the financial system to investigate not only what causes contagion but also how it spreads through a financial network, specifically to understand how the failure of one bank affects others in the system. A simple agent-based model of interbank lending will be presented and FDNA will be applied to it. A main goal of the paper is to promote application of a new tool from systems engineering to financial networks.

Competencies for governance of complex systems of systems

Systems of Systems (SoS) require organisational components to have staff with abilities appropriate to the challenges within SoS. Large organisations frequently use competency models as a tool to ensure that their staff have the proper skills to deal with these challenges. Competency models have been used for 40 years to select, train, promote or separate employees. While competency models represent an improvement on their primary predecessor, intelligence tests, weaknesses have been noted in the literature and challenges have been made to improve them. Most improvement efforts have been evolutionary adjustments or insertion of more elements. This research presents a completely new way to create, assess or transform a competency model. This framework can be used to design, assess or transform an existing competency model. This paper represents a significant expansion of a conference paper presented at SOSE 2014 in Adelaide, South Australia in June 2014.

Delayed-bang approach towards more sustainable critical infrastructure risk management

This article describes the Delayed Bang Approach for determining the value of risk management alternatives in critical infrastructure security. The discussion includes (1) the need for sustainable risk management (2) the importance of time valuation in evaluating competing loss prevention and loss reduction alternatives, (3) the convergence of deterministic engineering economics, survivability analysis , and probabilistic analysis, and (4) hypothetical examples of the Delayed-Bang Approach and significance towards more sustainable risk management.

An index to measure risk co-relationships in engineering enterprise systems

This paper presents an index that measures the impacts of dependency risks between parts of an enterprise which can negatively affect the ability of the whole enterprise to deliver capabilities and services. This measure will be termed the risk co-relationship index. The purpose of this index is to enable engineers and managers to identify and evaluate the ripple effects of risks from one part of an enterprise to another. Presenting a way to model and measure these effects advances engineering management practice by allowing engineers and managers to consider dependency risks and use the index in decisions on resource allocation and enterprise design and implementation.

Configuration of inter-office switch for extreme traffic with zone configuration evaluator diagram

Abstract The problem addressed by this paper is to enable a manufacturers representative to configure an inter-office switch with a balance of desirable functionality and measured performance under several potential extremes of traffic. The zone-configuration evaluator diagram (ZCED), a decision aid that generates the tradeoffs among different configurations, is developed to enable the switch manufacturer to forego the past practice of guaranteeing absolute performance to all of its diverse customers. This guarantee was achieved in the past by the manufacturer supporting a single conservative configuration only. The ZCED simultaneously characterizes (i) customer needs in three regimes: safety-critical, business-critical, or non-critical; (ii) extremes of traffic in terms of non-peak, average, peak, and peak–peak scenarios; and (iii) measurable performance in terms of frequency of lost transactions. Thus, a manufacturers representative selects a configuration appropriate to the customers individual needs and the manufacturer achieves higher revenue on the sale of desirable functions and features. A demonstration of the ZCED is developed based on a performance simulation of an actual small-office switch. The ZCED concept is readily adaptable to the configuration of other communication devices with diverse customer needs, traffic loads, and optional functionalities.