Conference papers are a major source of information in postgraduate education and research. However, the quality of many practitioner-written conference papers describing their experiences is less than optimal. This paper suggests a template to try to improve the quality of practitioner presentations and papers in the Case Study genre (prototyped at SETE 2004) to format practitioner papers as a way to link their experiences into the literature to provide data to assist researchers improving the practice of systems engineering. Examples of the use of the template are included.

1. A Proposed Paper Template
for improving the Quality of
Practitioner Written Papers
at Conferences and Symposia
Joseph E. Kasser DSc, CEng, CM
Systems Engineering and Evaluation Centre
University of South Australia
Joseph.kasser@unisa.edu.au
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2. Topics
 Why we need one
 Process for writing the paper
 The Template
 Filling in the template
 Where to find an example
 Summary
 Conclusion
 Questions and discussion
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3. Why we need one
 Students use these papers for research and
education
 The academic quality of the published papers
is less than desired
 Papers repeat discoveries instead of
reinforcing theory
 It is difficult to find information in the papers
 There are few references to the literature
 We are not building a Framework of Ideas
 Critical to the development of a discipline
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4. Case studies and personal
experience papers
 Gather data about the case
 Organise the data to highlight the
focus of the study
 Develop the narrative
 Validate the narrative
 Compare the study with appropriate
others to identify areas of
improvement
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5. Requirements for Papers
 Shall be organized to facilitate the
writing of information
 Shall be organized to facilitate the
retrieval of information
 Shall indicate how the lesson(s) learned
from the story may also apply in other
situations
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6. Templates
 UMUC experience
 Leveraged research into development of
predictive metrics for project failure
 MIL-STDs
 MIL-STD-490 for requirements documents
 RFPs
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7. Process for producing the
paper
1. Decide on the point(s) to be made in the paper
2. Determine what data needs to be collected to
reinforce the point(s) to be made
3. Collect the data
4. Research the literature to determine if the
points have been made before
5. Write up the story
6. Analyse the story and document the analysis.
7. Write up the lessons learned
8. Summarise the Case Study
9. Develop and document the conclusions
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8. Template
1. Overview
2. Background
3. The Story
4. Analysis
 Lessons learned
 Summary
 Conclusion
 References
 Glossary of acronyms and corporate terms
 Questions and comments
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9. 1. Overview
 A one or two slide abstract of the
presentation that tells the viewer why
they should watch the presentation
 Think of this as the newspaper headline
that entices the reader to read the
section
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10. 2. Background
 This is where you describe the
background to the story you are about
to tell
 This should be one or two slides
 Use colour to stress or highlight points
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11. 3. The Story
 This is where you tell the story without
any comments, analyses, or references
to the literature
 Use as many slides as you feel are
necessary
 Remember the presentation does have a
time limit
 This is the part that most practitioner
case study papers tend to do well
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12. 4. Analysis
 Why what you did worked.
 Where you link the story to that knowledge (in the
form of the literature) and show that a (see
examples later)
 Section of the story is supported by or found
similar to a reference
 Section of the story is refuted found different
from a reference
 Use as many slides as you feel are necessary
 Standards, corporate handbooks, the INCOSE
systems engineering handbook, the proceedings of
past conferences, journals, web sites, and text books
that you may have on the shelves in your office
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13. 5. Lessons Learned
 This is where you itemise and briefly
discuss the lessons learned
 You may also reference them to the
literature if appropriate
 In the paper/presentation use indented
text for the discussion
 see example in paper
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14. 6. Summary
 Summarise the presentation here
 This could be as simple as a copy of the
Topics slide
 you’ll just talk it from a different
perspective
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15. 7. Conclusion
 State the conclusion here
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16. 8. References
 If there is no accompanying paper
 List the references in the same format as
for papers
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17. 9. Glossary/Acronyms
 If there is no accompanying paper
 List all the acronyms in alphabetical order
 Use as many slides as necessary
 Show the slide during the presentation but
don’t read them all!
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18. 10. Questions and discussion
 This is the last slide of the presentation
 Put an interesting graphic here
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19. Prototyping @ SETE 2004
 Non-refereed practitioner
presentation category
 Template and example
supplied to authors
 MCSS Case Study
 Papers that used the
template seemed better
than those that didn’t
 Anecdotal evidence
 General delegate impression
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20. Examples
 2005 MCSS
Upgrade Case
Study
 2006 Pacor
Upgrade Case
Study – in paper
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21. Summary
 Why we need one
 Process for writing the paper
 The Template
 Filling in the template
 Where to find an example
 Summary
 Conclusion
 Questions and discussion
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22. Conclusion
 Recommend to the Conference
Committee that the template be made
mandatory for case study and personal
experience papers.
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23. Questions and Discussion
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