The 21st Century Engineer
How do we as engineers, cope up with the ever increasing demands of consumption, cost-cutting measures, shorter life-cycle products and the numerous rapid changes taking place globally? As engineers, we’re at the forefront of change.
These were the opening words of Adrian Pais, an eminent IEEE member, while addressing the online IEEE GOLD seminar titled The 21st Century Engineer. He began by noting that the major use of technology means the future will be shaped by engineers, much more than others. "The picture of the world is to be painted by engineers, but it depends on what quality of paint and what quality of brush do we use, as engineers", he said.
In this post I will try to cover the key points and major issues discussed in the seminar, quoting the speaker’s words where appropriate.
"In today’s landscape, society continuously changes and engineering must adapt to remain relevant. Should we anticipate needed advances and prepare for a future where it will provide more benefit to humankind? How will engineering be positioned in the future? What values should the 21st century engineer have?" These are the questions that were given the most emphasis throughout.
The technology and society is changing. This change is constant, but the pace of change has increased continuously and will continue to increase further. We need a profession that is dynamic, adaptable to change, even though we cannot necessarily foresee those changes. Amid the continuous change, our values will always remain same.
Adrian then went on further to explain the six values of the 21st century engineer.
- Holism
- Leadership
- Continuous Learning
- Creativity and Innovation
- Entrepreneurship
- Ethics and Social Responsibility
Out of these, he devoted maximum time to the last one. During the discussion many interesting quotes and examples of success were presented.
While discussing holism, he pointed out the need of understanding the bigger picture and that monetary reward should not be the only driving force for engineers.
An important point discussed in leadership, was the future role of engineers in policy making. This is true because the defense weapons and the scientific exploration are all dependent on technology, and their use in future is bound to increase heavily. The engineers will be required because they’re the ones who actually know technology. A policy decision by an engineer is not a far-fetched vision anymore.
Continuous learning is something we’re all made aware of at school, but the need for its practical implementation is ever-important now.
The illiterate of the twenty-first century will not be those who cannot read or write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn.
He pointed out the need for continuous learning by emphasizing upon the fact that the scientific and technological knowledge doubles every 10 years, and that their half-life is continuously reducing.
Engineers have always been creative and innovative and must continue to be so in the future. This creativity and insatiable appetite for novelty has led to many inventions in the past that are at the discretion of our fingertips now. He said that the absolute adherence to the norms of society and fear of failure are major obstacles to creativity. And he quoted Edward de Bono:
It is better to have enough ideas for some of them to be wrong, than to always be right by having no ideas at all.
"In the 21st century, creativity will involve the synthesis of a much wider range of concepts and ideas from a vast array of disciplines."
Entrepreneurship is currently the buzzword and is often used loosely. The word is not attributed to the domain of engineering often and therefore modern engineers should be action-oriented individuals who have a desire for achievement that drives them to take risks.
And finally poverty, digital divide, fierce competition, globalization and the global impact of technology were discussed to point out the ethics and social responsibility that an engineer of the future must shoulder.
During the seminar a poll was conducted where about 45% people believed that the social responsibility is the most important value of the future engineer while 25% voted in favor of continuous learning.
At the end another poll was conducted to find out the views on the challenges of the future. An overwhelming majority of 60% believed it to be energy crisis, while some other votes came in for transportation. Interestingly, no one voted for planetary and space exploration, and the speaker left his e-audience to think why then such a hefty amount of money is being spent in this field when it’s importance is negligible given the challenges we can foresee in the future.
I attended this online seminar as an IEEE member on June 30, 2008. The report written above is a copyrighted material of AnasImtiaz.com. An attempt has been made here to quote the speaker where necessary given all due credit and emphasis to his words.
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