4.4.3 A Study of the Effects of Professional Society Development on the Advancement of the Profession: The Systems Engineering Example

The advancement of professions depends on global collaborations. Professional societies are enablers to this growth in a multitude of ways. Publication outlets to disseminate new ideas, collaboration mechanisms to form communities of interest and conferences to enable networking and recognition all play critical roles in defining and advancing disciplines. In response to this, INCOSE has made a conscious decision to hold its flagship event, the annual Symposium, at strategic locations around the world. At the moment, the majority of INCOSE members, approximately sixty percent, are based in the U.S. although the diversity of membership has increased over time. In this paper, we seek to analyze the impact of hosting a symposium in a particular location through the use of six retrospective case studies to determine how a professional society such as INCOSE can impact the systems engineering profession. We investigate the consequences of hosting a symposium in a specific region and analyze the impact of the symposium on the advancement of the profession of Systems Engineering