Stage 2 — Stakeholder Analysis
NGOs, MOEs, operational scenarios, HSI, enabling products.
The Stakeholder Analysis stage takes the seeds from the Brief Parser and produces the artifact set the rest of the pipeline anchors on.
What it outputs
| Output | Definition | Example |
|---|---|---|
| NGOs | Needs, Goals, Objectives | "The system shall provide near-real-time situational awareness to mission operators" |
| MOEs | Measures of Effectiveness | "% of targets detected with ≥ 95% classification confidence" |
| Scenarios | Operational scenarios | "Nominal day-1 operations: …", "Comms loss recovery: …" |
| HSI elements | Human Systems Integration considerations | "Operator workstation must support color-blind UI" |
| Enabling products | Supporting items required for the mission | "Ground station network", "Launch vehicle" |
| Additional stakeholders | Refined / added since Brief Parser | "Range Safety Officer" identified from launch scenario |
NGOs vs Requirements
A common source of confusion. NGOs are written from the stakeholder's perspective — what the stakeholder needs from the system. Requirements (stage 3) are written from the system's perspective — what the system must do to satisfy those needs.
Example:
- NGO (stakeholder): "Mission operators need to maintain situational awareness during a comms outage"
- Requirement (system): "The system shall retain the last 30 minutes of telemetry on-board and re-transmit on link restoration"
Every requirement should trace back to at least one NGO. The pipeline enforces this in stage 3.
MOEs vs MOPs vs TPMs
Three measure types, in increasing engineering specificity:
| Measure | Lives at | Owns the question |
|---|---|---|
| MOE — Measure of Effectiveness | Mission level | "Is the mission succeeding?" |
| MOP — Measure of Performance | System level | "Is the system meeting its spec?" |
| TPM — Technical Performance Measure | Component level | "Is this subsystem within its budget?" |
MOEs come from Stakeholder Analysis. MOPs and TPMs are generated in Requirements (stage 3).
What a good output looks like
For a typical run on a 1,500-word Brief:
- 4–8 NGOs
- 3–6 MOEs (each quantified with units + target)
- 2–4 operational scenarios (each a short narrative)
- 0–4 HSI elements (only if your Brief involves human operators)
- 2–6 enabling products
Failure modes
- Generic NGOs — "The system shall be reliable" is not a NGO. If you see these, the Brief lacked specificity; revise the Brief
- Missing MOE quantification — every MOE should have units + a target. If MOEs are unquantified, the downstream trade studies will have nothing to optimize against