Transition Edge - 3 Engineering Blind-Spots

Published: Thu, 09/01/22

Transition Edge

September 2022 - The disrupted decade

3 Engineering Blind-Spots

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I’m Grant Symons. I convene Transition Edge to help us understand how we can transition to a low carbon sustainable world using leading thinking and practices.

This week is a shout out to a profession that we all need to rise to the societal and global transition challenge.

We try to highlight what we think are some Engineering Blind-Spots and perhaps what we can all start doing about them.

Common knowledge...we need to achieve the BIG 3:

Reduce green house gas emissions
Reduce consumption of materials
Reduce consumption of energy

To achieve a significant and sustainable transition by 2050, every sector, community, region, business, family and individual is going to experience real change.

Our transport, energy and communications networks will need to evolve, along with a load of other infrastructure, housing and food production. There are questions about the progress planned or being made on this - how sufficient, prioritised and feasible is it? And will it deliver a viable future?

Moving from the system we have now, to a system in the future where we have achieved the 'BIG 3' is going to need significant engineering.

This fact is not widely understood and stems from a number of problems that engineering has.

Problems such as: lack of visibility, lack of influence and lack of a coherent value proposition.

Today we begin with my own Engineering blind-spot #1.

It was 1979 when I started work with a construction company in Wellington. In those days the company had a mix of commercial and civil works projects around New Zealand and engineers made up a high proportion of the staff. Many of the executives in head office had engineering qualifications and most projects had at least an engineer assigned to it.

The world of commercial projects and programs has never been for the sensitive or faint of heart, and through years of toil, in the heat of project life, enduring friendships were forged along with the innate understanding that if you want to build or create things, whether they are temporary or permanent, you need to get the engineering right. Failure to do so can be fatal.

Whether it was civil works, commercial construction, telecommunications networks or mass scale state housing, working shoulder to shoulder with engineers of all descriptions was and still is a way of life. And in recent years, working in the field of Transition within our own THQ community, there are numerous engineers. This is the reality and also a blind spot.

Blind spot #1 - Being so close, you are part of the problem

It is a blind spot because thinking that the average person understands what engineers do, is a mistake. Apparently about 14% of the population are very familiar with what engineers do, while that number is 49% for doctors and dentists.

The truth is that all of us, including engineers themselves, fail to realise that what engineers do is somewhat invisible to the masses.

Blind spot #2

In the 1980's in New Zealand the government disestablished its own internal and independent (from commercial forces) 'Engineering brainpower' when it closed the Ministry of Works and Development during the Rogernomics era. This was the end of a collective and integrated engineering capability dedicated to national good, including long-term planning and investment in a systemic way.

And consultancy owners, manufacturers, producers, construction firms and local authorities all tend towards keeping the profession somewhat hidden. Good honest thinking and frank advice is often shoved into the back room while, directors, shareholders, management executives, marketing and sales teams much prefer taking the credit for the advice, products and solutions delivered by engineering, while collectively fostering the reputation of engineers as being:

Poor communicators lacking soft skills
Geeks that enjoy complicated stuff for the sake of it
Inflexible - black and white types
Lacking empathy - too confronting with reality
Lacking creativity
Not good with clients or schmoozing

There are exceptions now, with an ecosystem of small to medium sized engineering firms around, that provide wonderful services and great places to work for engineers who want to be appreciated for working honestly and ethically on things that matter. A preferred existence compared with being a cog in the wheel in a corporate type of organisation. But these are exceptions.

So blind spot #2 - Engineers have tended to allow themselves to become invisible and leave their reputation and value proposition to be shaped by others.

Here are some statistics from a Canadian 2017 survey of the general population awareness of Engineers.

So, on the one hand, engineers and those associated with them tend to overlook the importance of their own role, while on the other, there are those who seem intent on keeping the profession hidden or captive, as it were. If this is correct, then this might bring us to another conclusion.

Blind spot #3 - thinking that people will understand that engineering is required to enable the Big 3 transition.

How many engineers do we see in politics, leading a government agency, running a bank, or in the community services sector? Not many. Do any of these folks care about the reality of the Real Transition? Probably not. Where are the leaders that understand the need for Engineering?.

Most leaders do not understand the role of engineering and are probably already consumed or overwhelmed with their work, and are unlikely to be interested in how or why engineers are crucial in creating a safe and sustainable future.

And there are those who would prefer that engineers just do what they have to, in the background, and leave the rest of the world to carry on doing what it wants to.

Engineers are not explaining what role they can play in the Transition. They are not doing the work that grabs leaders imaginations and helps clients understand what issues and opportunities they should be thinking about.

What can be done about these Blind-Spots?

Here are some suggestions:

Lobby government to increase visibility of the necessity of Engineering at the national system level
Govt to provide additional funding for Engineering education
Support the accelerated development of young engineers
Support the rapid development of small to medium sized engineering firms
Support the development and uptake of emerging engineering methods / techniques
Enforce requirements that require clients and purchasers to consider whole system approaches to transition
Engineering peak bodies stepping up to an increasingly prominent role in the Transition - Big 3.

It you are an engineer, or know an engineer or someone that could be needing some support or taking some decisive action on growing the profile of engineering in transition - then lets get together and continue the conversation.

Grant Symons - The Transition Guy

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