Public reporting burden for the collection of information is estimated to average 1 hour per response, including the time for reviewing instructions, searching existing data sources, gathering and maintaining the data needed, and completing and reviewing the collection of information. Send comments regarding this burden estimate or any other aspect of this collection of information, including suggestions for reducing this burden, to Washington Headquarters Services, Directorate for Information Operations and Reports, 1215 Jefferson Davis Highway, Suite 1204, Arlington VA 22202-4302. Respondents should be aware that notwithstanding any other provision of law, no person shall be subject to a penalty for failing to comply with a collection of information if it does not display a currently valid OMB control number. This report investigates the current approaches to Concept of Operations (CONOPS) development in use in various DoD and commercial organizations with the goal of understanding why CONOPS creation is such a lengthy process, and how the process can be made more agile. A number of CONOPS are cataloged and analyzed to understand which parts of the current standards are used by the creators of a CONOPS. Traditional CONOPS creation processes are discussed based on literature and face-toface interviews with those involved with creating CONOPS in both traditional and nontraditional domains. Based on these findings, an agile CONOPS process that emphasizes stakeholder involvement and expedites shared mental models development is put forth. Additionally, current and emerging technologies that might be applicable to creating a graphical CONOPS are discussed. Finally, recommendations for future research to develop a toolbox for creating graphical CONOPS are presented. REPORT DATE OCT 20092 SUBJECT TERMS SECURITY CLASSIFICATION OF: 17. LIMITATION OF ABSTRACT Same as Report (SAR)18 ABSTRACTThis report investigates the current approaches to Concept of Operations (CONOPS) development in use in various DoD and commercial organizations with the goal of understanding why CONOPS creation is such a lengthy process, and how the process can be made more agile. A number of CONOPS are cataloged and analyzed to understand which parts of the current standards are used by the creators of a CONOPS. Traditional CONOPS creation processes are discussed based on literature and face-toface interviews with those involved with creating CONOPS in both traditional and nontraditional domains. Based on these findings, an agile CONOPS process that emphasizes stakeholder involvement and expedites shared mental models development is put forth. Additionally, current and emerging technologies that might be applicable to creating a graphical CONOPS are discussed. Finally, recommendations for future research to develop a toolbox for creating graphical CONOPS are presented. SUMMARYAs the bioterrorism program lead for a federal agency, you have been asked to draft a concept of operations (CONOPS) for an emergency response grid (ERG) that allows ...

Concepts of Operations (CONOPS) are documents describing the characteristics and intended usage of proposed and existing systems. They provide information about the requirements and future desired states the project aims to achieve. We reviewed 22 recent CONOPS from government and private sector institutions to ascertain the current approach to CONOPS development. Based on the CONOPS review and research literature, we highlight three key areas, stakeholder involvement, shared mental models, and visualization, through which the development process may be improved. Moreover, we suggest that the development process itself may be transformed into an agile process that addresses current shortcomings in the key areas. To do so, we propose an agile CONOPS development process conducted through three iteration-driven phases and present corresponding research and commercial tools that may be leveraged at each phase. As such, putting this agile process into effect may reduce development time, improve effectiveness, and change the perception of the CONOPS from a burdensome documentation procedure to an invaluable resource throughout the system lifecycle.

UNCLASSIFIED 12 Furthermore, when systems have tens of millions of lines of software code, it is physically impossible to develop and then test all the possible paths with current reductionist and deterministic practices and tools.

Background. Extensive research exists in the application of gaming simulation to education, experimentation and policy. Systems engineers have begun to utilize gaming simulation during design. However, such applications have not extended to early design activities and have provided little evidence of value to systems engineering. Aim. The purpose of this research is to test the hypothesis that the use of gaming simulation will improve an artifact created early in the design process, the Concept of Operations (CONOPS). The aim of this article is to provide an update to work in progress towards testing this hypothesis. Method. A gaming simulation was developed that allows system stakeholders to interact in an immersive environment and develop CONOPS. Results. As the research has matured, informal free-form testing has been conducted. Debriefing has shown that players perceive value from this gaming simulation and yielded observations relative to fidelity, validity, and usability. Conclusion. The conclusion of this article points to preliminary acceptance of the use of gaming simulation towards CONOPS development. Future work will validate this assertion using quantitative data collected from controlled experiments.

This report summarizes the second phase of CONOPS development where the goal was to develop an initial set of primitives (core terms) organized into a taxonomy that is reusable when creating a collection of future scenarios for different domain. Here, scenarios like the Noncombatant Evacuation Operation Intelligence Gathering Scenario (NEO) and news agencies were investigated where operations like cognitive task analysis and decomposition of terms and concepts used in the scenario were performed. While each new domain requires an expansion of the taxonomy with new terms and concepts, many are common. The notion of transporting objects between locations, information gathering, communications, etc. are core to many actions that can be modeled and if represented graphically, the definition of new scenarios can be accomplished quicker and easier to understand. This research report also examines an easy to understand graphical modeling approach of snap together pieces associated with the developed taxonomy to aid the creation of scenarios, or operational concepts and proposes the development of a system that will aid the concept engineering process to produce graphical operations concept building on the reusable taxonomy developed in the research conducted in this phase. Recommendations for follow-on research in this area are also provided.