This book aims to show how Human Factors and Ergonomics can be used to support system analysis and development. As part of the research work of the Human Factors Integration Defence Technology Centre (HFI DTC), we are often asked to comment on the development of new technologies. For some time now we have looked in-depth at Command and Control activities and functions. The reader is guided to our other books on Modelling Command and Control, Cognitive Work Analysis, Distributed Situation Awareness and Socio-Technical Systems (all published under the Human Factors in Defence series) for a fuller appreciation of our work. The research reported in this book brought all of these areas together to look in-depth at a proposal for a new digitised system that would support Command and Control at Brigade Headquarters and below. For us it was a good opportunity to apply the methods we had been developing to a system that was in development. The pages within this book show you how we went about this task and what we found.
It is often the cry of Human Factors and Ergonomics that we are not asked for our involvement in system development early enough. In the past we have written books on Human Factors Methods (published by Ashgate and others), which explain how to apply the methods to system design and evaluation. Here we were given the opportunity, although we also feel that involvement when the system was being tested was too late, as we would have preferred to have been involved in system concept, design and development. Nevertheless, it is pleasing to have been involved in the testing phase, so that any shortcomings could be addressed in subsequent design.
As with all projects of this nature, we have gone to great pains to disguise the system under test for reasons of commercial confidentiality. This means that we are not allowed to disclose the name of the products nor any screen shots of the equipment. We have redrawn all the pictures and removed any reference to the company involved. It is a pity that such steps are required and we wish organisations could be more open about the testing of their products. Any short-term pain would turn into longer-term gain for the products, the users and the organisations involved.
As the contents of this book show, we started our analysis by understanding how mission planning and battlespace management works with traditional materials. The research team not only observed people conducting the tasks but also undertook the training in those tasks themselves. There is much insight to be gained through participant-observation, more than mere observation allows. It also enhanced the understanding of our subsequent observations, because we had performed the tasks for ourselves.
People may approach this book with many different requirements, goals and agenda. For those who want an overview of Human Factors Methods, we recommend chapter two. For those who want to understand mission planning processes, we recommend chapter three. If you are interested in any particular method, read the overview in chapter two, then chapter four for Cognitive Work Analysis, chapter five for Hierarchical Task Analysis, chapter seven for Social Network Analysis, chapter eight for SCADA Analysis, chapter nine for Usability Analysis and chapter ten for Environmental Analysis. For those interested in collaboration and communication in military headquarters, we recommend chapters three, six and seven. Finally, for those interested in our recommendations for future design of digital Command and Control we recommend chapter eleven. We have tried to write each chapter as stand-alone, but accept that people may want to dip in and out of chapters to suit their particular needs. We also feel that this book serves as a perfectly compatible accompaniment to any of our other books on Human Factors Methods, Modelling Command and Control, Cognitive Work Analysis, Distributed Situation Awareness and Socio-Technical Systems. This book brings all of the topics presented in the previous books together to focus on the analysis of a mission planning and battlespace management system.