Capabilities in Systems Engineering: An Overview

The concept of capability has been deemed relevant over the years, which can be attested by its adoption in varied domains. It is an abstract concept, but simple to understand by business stakeholders and yet capable of making the bridge to technical aspects. Capabilities seem to bear similarities with services, namely their low coupling and high cohesion. However, the concepts are different since the concept of service seems to rest between that of capability and those directly related to the implementation. Nonetheless, the articulation of the concept of capability with the concept of service can be used to promote business/IT alignment, since both concepts can be used to bridge different conceptual layers of an enterprise architecture. This work offers an overview of the different uses of this concept, its usefulness, and its relation to the concept of service.

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