The Systems Engineer as the Innovator

This talk will focus on the general aspects of the formal and informal methods used by the systems engineer at Bell Laboratories. Specifically, it will review some of the experiences of the author as a Transmission Systems Engineer, and will examine his role in the development of proposals for the access portion of the telephone network. Items to be covered are: the skills emphasized, scope of the proposals, steps used, the execution of these steps, pitfalls (or trials and tribulations of the proposer), and the results. The talk will conclude with an example of a recent proposal made by the author in the area of Integrated Loop Access.