Author: Stephen Armstrong is founder and president of amgimanagement.com and professor of innovation at the University of Toronto, Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering. He will be one of the main speakers at Engineers Ireland's annual conference in Hotel Kilkenny on April 15. Professional engineers must lead and drive strategic innovation and change at the societal level across many domains: energy; infrastructure; transportation; manufacturing; wealth creation; healthcare; and education. But for this to happen we must transform the role of the engineer in society and our expectations of their role.

First define innovation

Innovation happens at many levels: technical, organisational, and societal. Innovation is not R&D – it spans from ideation through to adoption, implementation and value creation. Not all innovation is good for society; there is destructive innovation – this is why engineers need a deep ethical and reflective dimension. Innovation and technological change are a combination of technology, social and cultural dimensions – they are inseparable. [caption id="attachment_27807" align="alignright" width="256"]aaaarm1 Stephen Armstrong[/caption] It’s not about status – the role and future work skills is about necessity – 50 per cent of the new engineer role is managing change. If engineers are to be more than technical specialists in the 21st century, there is a need to provide young engineers with an understanding of innovation within the social context in which they will work, together with skills in critical analysis, ethical judgment, and an ability to assess the long-term consequences of their work.

Technology development and implementation is a social activity

Engineering work is clearly a social and political activity, although this has been ignored in engineering education. There is never just one possible design: "engineering design is surprisingly open-ended”. A goal may be reached by adapting many different paths, some of which are better than others but none of which is in all respects the best way. Engineers must learn to deal with this ambiguity and the vested interests at the societal level. The public image of engineers and engineering is poor in some countries and very high in others - how about combining the best governance models from each. As a result of the past emphasis on technical skills and the consequent neglect by engineers of the social and environmental dimensions of their work, the image and status of the engineering profession is declining as the public identifies engineers with controversial and environmentally damaging technologies. And in other instances engineers are labeled as 'fixit' skilled trades, especially in the UK with little expectation of thinking at the strategic or policy level.

Selection and recruitment of engineers tied to poor image

Whatever the reasons, the poor image of engineering has consequences that go beyond the egos of engineers. If school students have a poor or non-existing image of engineering then they are hardly likely to choose it as a career and this is leading to a shortage of engineers and even a decline in engineering standards. The historical reasons for a technical focus are driven by status – but it has a big downside. Engineers have long been unhappy with their status in society - especially severe in the UK – at least for the past 50 years. There has been no significant improvement, with endless government petitions that go nowhere. They feel that they do not receive the social respect and financial rewards that people in other professions do, for example law, medicine, accounting, and management consulting. Practising engineers and professional engineering institutions and societies have traditionally been seen as emphasising science and mathematics as a means of gaining status. But this focus on science and even gaining a MBA still leaves a big gap in humanities and in strategic thinking. Engineers for the most part are poor communicators – poor at rhetoric and debate at the societal level when complex vested interests are part of the equation– an MBA is not enough. It has been designed and built to serve for the most part a capitalist model. Granted, courses have been developed in sustainability and so on in recent years. But it is still a 'business' centric ethos rather than a humanitarian centred ethos.

Conclusion

We need a new kind of engineer – rebranded with new societal expectations. Engineers are now keen to throw off the image of having a narrow technical focus and disinterest in how society works. Increasingly raising the status of engineering and the employability of engineers is seen to be dependent on fostering a broadened outlook. The role of the engineer:
  • Professional engineers play a central role in developing, operating and managing technological enterprises, systems and projects;
  • Engineers must be expected to lead and drive change across the total innovation spectrum from setting policy to implementation and ongoing operations;
  • Engineers as currently educated aren’t capable of doing this – they are weak at 'engineering' social and cultural change – their education is deep but in very narrow technical domains – add-on business or humanities courses are not enough;
  • Many universities have drifted to become ivory tower research institutions divorced from industry practice and societal challenges – many university professors have never practised real engineering;
  • We need an integration of the old rigorous five-year apprenticeship model tied to an engineer’s degree - it is starting in the UK with advanced and higher apprenticeships at NVQ level 5/6/7. This is a minimum of an eight-year process;
  • Organisational and societal innovation requires mastery of managing social and cultural change – this must be more than a feeble 'engineer in society' or a humanities course or the addition of some 'soft courses' mentality;
  • Engineering is not a scientific activity – science enables engineering – not the other way around – without engineering science is just philosophy;
  • Engineering is art, science and above all practice. Real practice is very understated in universities and this is a big gap in preparing engineers for the 'real world' and especially for independent practice.

Way forward

Engineering is an evolving profession that must adapt to suit its context and the needs of the community but the current context and expectation is far too narrow. I am calling for a total transformation to a new kind of 'innovation engineer' to ensure that the engineering profession will serve society at the strategic and humanitarian level as well as the technical and operational level. This requires the top tier professional engineers to move beyond the current functional disciplines to a new holistic governance model, a broader more integrative education model, and a redefinition of the symbiotic relationship between the engineer, the enterprise and the greater society. And law must underpin this new model. Without law it lacks traction. But we must not over-'engineer' the legal dimension. Stephen Armstrong served a five-year aeronautical manufacturing engineering apprenticeship at Bombardier (Shorts) Aerospace - Belfast. He has more 25 years' experience leading C-level strategic change initiatives (business transformation) initially in the aerospace and defence industry and spreading across many other industry sectors. He has built a portfolio of five masters' courses at the U of T in the areas of managing and applying innovation, strategic operations and production management, history and philosophy of engineering and organisational design. He is an author for Cambridge University Press and the Industrial Press New York.