Title: Defining Enterprise Systems Engineering

Authors: Oscar A. Saenz, Chin-Sheng Chen, Martha Centeno, Ronald E. Giachetti

Addresses: Department of Industrial and Management Engineering, Universidad del Turabo, P.O. Box 3030 Gurabo, PR 00778-3030, USA. ' Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, College of Engineering and Computing, Florida International University, 10555 West Flagler Street, EC 3110 Miami, Florida 33174-1630, USA. ' Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, College of Engineering and Computing, Florida International University, 10555 West Flagler Street, EC 3145 Miami, Florida 33174-1630, USA. ' Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, College of Engineering and Computing, Florida International University, 10555 West Flagler Street, EC 3145 Miami, Florida 33174-1630, USA

Abstract: This paper proposes a precise definition of Enterprise Systems Engineering (ESE), recognising it as an independent discipline and putting forth a new theoretical foundation to create or change enterprise systems. This paper proposes and demonstrates an approach to formulate and validate definitions grounded in the philosophy of science and product development theory, which starts with a set of specifications and uses the synthesis technique for defining. Using the proposed approach a comparative analysis of different definitions of the same subject was performed and the results shed light on how attempts to define a field of study contribute to differentiate it from or confound it with other fields.

Keywords: ESE definition; enterprise systems engineering; enterprise engineering; industrial engineering.

DOI: 10.1504/IJISE.2009.024155

International Journal of Industrial and Systems Engineering, 2009 Vol.4 No.5, pp.483 - 501

Published online: 27 Mar 2009 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article