August 20, 2025—Model-based systems engineering (MBSE) is a decades-old, formal methodology for improving communication, productivity, and quality during the development of complex systems. While MBSE has gained ground in government settings, its adoption faces organizational and expertise obstacles. A new report from the Software Engineering Institute (SEI) captures feedback from MBSE practitioners in the Department of Defense (DoD) and the intelligence community (IC) and calls for actions that can expand the adoption of this crucial practice.

A 2018 DoD strategy called for the modernization of defense systems by leveraging digital engineering (DE) techniques. The subsequent DoD Instruction 5000.97, Digital Engineering said the use of digital models and data should “enable faster, smarter, data-driven decisions throughout the system life cycle,” including weapons systems, to “enable more rapid delivery of warfighting capabilities to the field.” MBSE is a core DE practice that anchors the engineering of a complex system around a common system model, rather than descriptive documents.

Despite the DoD’s policy support for MBSE and the method’s track record in industry, programs in defense and intelligence have been slow to adopt it. The SEI’s recently released Report on the First MBSynergy Workshop outlines five major barriers to MBSE implementation in the DoD and IC:

• a mismatch between the program management perspective and the knowledge, expertise, and tooling needed to perform MBSE
• definitions of correct MBSE implementation that are vague or ill-suited to a program’s setting
• MBSE adoption being driven not by the adopting organization’s mission and the capability they are delivering, but by existing tools, training, and policy
• unclear ownership of the MBSE approach within a program
• a lack of a community of MBSE practice to exchange experiences directly

These impediments are cultural, not technical, said Nataliya Shevchenko, one of the report’s coauthors. “It's not about the technology, it's about how you do things. This is the biggest change.”

Since 2017, SEI experts have been helping software-intensive DoD programs implement MBSE, only to see organizational missteps impede progress. “We help them figure out how to connect the technology to what they’re doing in that last mile of the transition path,” said Will Hayes, another report coauthor and one of the workshop’s organizers. “But the predominant limiting factor in adoption is the culture of disciplined engineering.”

Changing culture means building community. In November 2024, the SEI convened a two-day workshop so that programs could talk face-to-face about how to get more value from MBSE and DE. Twenty-five participants from major military and intelligence programs and commands that develop and acquire complex software systems attended the MBSynergy Workshop.

The event, organized by the SEI’s Jérôme Hugues, Hayes, Shevchenko, and Peter Capell, gave participants the rare opportunity to share their MBSE challenges and solutions. The SEI’s experience researching, applying, and developing policy for MBSE in defense acquisition programs provided a framework for the event.

Beyond exchanging tips, the participants identified the five major barriers to implementing MBSE in DoD software system development and, crucially, 19 ways to overcome them. These calls to action target the MBSE community, emerging MBSE technologies, DoD and IC policies, the DE environment, training, and MBSE processes. The breadth of these recommendations signals a need for a holistic approach, said Capell. “It's not possible to pick a technology and go fast with it. You have to optimize the entirety of your enterprise, not just the low-hanging fruit.”

The workshop was part of the MBSynergy project, led by Hugues, which combines different areas of SEI expertise to define and execute MBSE strategy within the DoD. “By mixing our understanding of models, MBSE, enterprise architecture, and organizations, we can work with the DoD to do measurably better MBSE,” Hugues said. After the first in-person workshop, SEI researchers held virtual workshops with other MBSE practitioners. In the coming year, the MBSynergy team will take the lessons from these interactions into software-intensive programs to refine MBSE processes and tools.

Capell believes that MBSE and DE are a sea change that will speed decision making and capability delivery in the DoD. “In the meantime, there are a whole lot of small problems,” he said, which can overwhelm engineers, architects, and acquisition personnel. “We help them understand the changes while holding onto the vision.”

To continue the progress made at the MBSynergy Workshop, the organizers invite those in defense and intelligence software programs to grow the MBSE community of practice. “Hear what others in your role are doing with MBSE, both their frustrations and their successes, and share your own experiences,” said Hayes. Those interested in building this community should email info@sei.cmu.edu. They can also attend the SEI’s free MBSE in Practice 2025 conference, August 21 in Arlington, Virginia, where practitioners, researchers, and thought leaders will bridge the gap between MBSE theory and its real-world practice.

Read Report on the First MBSynergy Workshop. Subscribe to the SEI Blog to catch a forthcoming post from the MBSynergy team and read previous MBSE posts. Follow the SEI Podcast Series for an upcoming episode on the MBSynergy Workshop. Visit the SEI’s MBSE page to learn more about our work, including the development of the SAE Architecture Analysis & Design Language (AADL).