Systemic analysis of the critical dimensions of project management that impact test and evaluation program outcomes

•Documented project management (PM) processes contribute to achieving customer satisfaction.•No PM supportive infrastructure was available to aid test program planning and control.•Critical dimensions of Test and Evaluation program management were identified.•The dimensions identified were unified into a holistic T&E PM model.•Coordination by technical and PM professionals are vital to deploying quality systems.

It is generally believed that adopting standard organizational project management (PM) practices enhances the capability of organizations to achieve program success and customer satisfaction. We asked what specific dimensions of PM practices have been most helpful to project and program managers of Test and Evaluation (T&E). This paper focuses on T&E PM within the Federal Aviation Administration, an agency of the US government. The objective was to identify the critical dimensions of PM that contribute to successful T&E execution and determine how these critical dimensions could be unified with technical processes to achieve customer satisfaction. By combining the expressive abilities of the Boardman Soft Systems Methodology with a case study approach, we identified a set of critical dimensions and created a conceptual model that unifies PM practices with T&E processes. We concluded with a set of critical project management practices that have impact for a T&E organization.