Widening the Net of HSI in the Army Acquisition Process

Abstract

While industry has typically benefitted from considering human system integration (HSI) throughout the product development cycle, a unique set of challenges exist in the context of military acquisition that has prevented its early and late consideration in the cycle. Early input is critical for identifying capability gaps and potential error- or problem-prone feature implementations. This panel, comprised of multidisciplinary practitioners and researchers from the Army Research Laboratory, discusses methods they have trialed to integrate HSI processes into early-stage system design decisions, and the challenges and lessons that they have learned along the way. These panelists draw from their varied areas of expertise ranging from the design of aviation and ground vehicles to Soldier-worn protective gear and from small weapons to command and control systems to reveal critical factors and insights that are generalizable across a wide range of products and industry sectors, as well as those that warrant further investigation.