The question reflects my thoughts, aimed at identifying new content that can and should be included in educational programs, especially technical universities, in connection with the challenges of modern times. I have practical experience related to presenting to students of all levels of education at the Faculty of Organization and Management at the technical university of issues, which is a peculiar environment of the "classic" teaching content of future engineers. In relation to issues falling within such concepts as innovativeness, Industry 4.0, BIG DATA or SMART CITY, I appreciate the importance of education in such issues as identification and assessment of needs (in terms of "Needs Engineering") or assessment of the effects of universal availability of new technology and products (in terms of "Technology Assessment"). The means and ways to include such issues in education, not just engineers, remain to be considered.
THIS WORK 'The Essential Skills and Attributes of an Engineer: A Comparative Study of Academics, Industry Personnel and Engineering Students'" by Duyen Q. Nguyen maybe useful. Fulltext is attached.
Yes, the engineer must know the non-technical issues, may be not that extent as technical issues are.
Yes, it is essential. For instance, nearly every modern business uses Outlook (part of MS Office), which comes with a great built-in calendar. The lack of non-technical skills and the high dependence on technical skills is the problem that should be overcome by skilled workers with appropriate consideration for public. health and safety, cultural, societal,. and environmental considerations.
This is an absolute requirement to go up the hierarchy and not be confined to a Technical Position.
Let me give a real life example. A engineer in a ship can only be the Chief Engineer, but never the Captain.
THIS WORK 'The Essential Skills and Attributes of an Engineer: A Comparative Study of Academics, Industry Personnel and Engineering Students'" by Duyen Q. Nguyen maybe useful. Fulltext is attached.
An Engineer needs to concern himself with non technical issues because, unlike a Scientist who can work individually and concern himself with laboratory and research issues, the Engineer needs a team comprising the Engineer, Technologist, Technician and Craft man, with the Engineer being the coordinator. Therefore non technical issues such as motivation, leadership and family issues would definitely come and the Engineer needs to be abreast of such matters so as to be able to be effective and efficient.
Yes indeed.
I think the most useful non-technical skill is the ability to problem-solve. Problem solving uses logic and analytical thinking. All engineers need to solve problems (that is technical, not people problems, which requires a different approach). You need to be able to clearly define the problem, think of possible solutions, follow a step-by-step approach to identify the evidence, analyse the results and choose the best solution. There are many complex problems in every engineering role that needs an approach like this. I've used it many times throughout my career.
It is not a technical skill because you can apply it to every single aspect of your life to help yourself in understanding responsibilities, relations and integrations between different stuff.
When you come to consider every item as a responsibility core which interacts with other cores by APIs then you open your mind to simplification of any kind of problem (which is not so math related I would say, math is hard man!).
As second skill I would add sketching. Being able to sketch diagrams (boxes, circles, arrows are enough) on almost every surface can turn very useful to implement the first point.
Negotiating, presenting, or such skills that help to share and explain what you do to other people.
Of course yes, a modern engineer is required to know non-technical issues in addition to technical one for becoming a successful engineer.
Dear Friends, thank you so much for your interest in my question regarding the need to "equip" a modern engineer with elements of non-technical knowledge and competences. Thank you also for your thoughtful, and at the same time, a brief answers to this question. By the way - sorry for the late reference to your thoughts, but last week I have been in a part of the world in which access to the Internet is somewhat difficult.
I am going now to ask the next question on the RG, "mirror" in relation to the previous one. It seems to be a natural consequence of previous bears and I will look forward to your answers with impatience.
There is no one simple answer, becasue there are different types of engineers, I mean different types of their jobs, duties, specialisation. But, I can also suggest one general answer ... he/she should be interested in behaviour of a final user of his/her job. Why? To improve his/her job, products, services, etc.
Secondly, they should improve their COMMUNICATION SKILLS with co-workers (non-engineers) and customers.
Moreover, I want suggest some business and strategic skill for those who want to function in business:
- building business relations and partnerships,
- developing business/company,
- project management,
- process optimalization,
- strategic marketing,
- agile methodology,
- business analytics,
- information management (first of all: gaining and interpreting!),
- learning skills,
- collecting money (!) from different sources,
- cash flow rules.
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