An Expert Judgment Approach for Addressing Uncertainty in High Technology System Design

Addressing uncertainty early in system design phase is a key task for project managers of high technology, one-of-a-kind systems. However, a primary challenge in quantifying and studying uncertainty during conceptual design of such systems is the lack of historical data. This study presents an expert-judgment elicitation methodology utilized to address uncertainty in conceptual launch vehicle design. The methodology seeks to obtain expert judgment opinion for quantifying uncertainties as probability distributions so that multidisciplinary risk analysis studies can be performed. Using the methodology, a set of questionnaires was developed to qualify and quantify uncertainty associated with design parameters as a set of probability distributions. Aggregation techniques are also presented as part of the methodology to provide an approach to aggregate multiple expert judgments into a single probability distribution. An application exercise for a launch vehicle is presented