This paper describes the development of a systems engineering (SE) approach to enable the application of SE and systems thinking in a new product development (NPD) process in an organization that is unfamiliar with the application of SE. The application of SE is enabled by using a tailored A3 architecture overview (A3AO) template. By using this template, a mechanism is presented to start the application of systems engineering in an organization that has limited experience with SE. By using A3AOs directly a way to capture and communicate the system architecture among stakeholders is provided. This approach is implemented and evaluated in a small‐scale case‐study.