 |
|
« From Dictator to Dimwit: 12-½ Types of Bosses | Main | 5 Ways to Manage Your Boss »
February 5, 2008
Can Good Engineers Make Good Managers?
The world today needs creative leadership and technological entrepreneurship. So why do so many companies still believe that effective, science-minded engineers invariably will fail as good managers?
"Most engineers become managers in their careers, and typically they are unprepared for the transition," according to a paper that appeared in Engineering Management Journal in 2002.
Why, after all these years, is this view so widely held? Especially in large corporations?
Perhaps this view flows from an assumption that engineers prefer working with things (materials) and the laws of physics rather than managing people with their complex mix of emotions, passions, habits and some logic. Those who hold this perspective may not realize that many engineers enter the profession to help people meet their basic needs for lodging, food preparation, mobility, communication and health. Architectural engineers, food-processing engineers, transportation engineers, biomedical engineers and many others simply wanted to solve human problems technologically.
Engineers can make good managers as long as they are willing to continue enhancing their skill-set beyond academic study. On the job, an engineer can develop "a broad understanding and a clear vision of various administrative, financial, and psychological issues," regardless that some people feel an engineering education hinders such learning, says Manufacturing Engineering Magazine.
"Understanding how to recognize and evaluate market opportunities has become crucial," according to a 2005 editorial in the magazine. It lists many management skills in which engineers must excel, including (edited):
• Ability to deal with uncertainty and ambiguity;
• Possessing effective lateral (functional) thinking and vertical (in-depth) thinking;
• Maintaining a team player's attitude;
• Explaining and persuading;
• Thinking internationally;
• Flexibility;
• Taking reasonable risks and responsibilities;
• Possessing knowledge of foreign values, attitudes and customers;
• Communicating well orally and graphically;
• Using various types of software and hardware; and
• Having a quick grasp of new approaches and ideas.
Perhaps most important, however, is passion and the ability to lead.
Let's start with leadership, because "leadership is moving beyond management," as the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) puts it.
In a 2007 Engineers & Technology paper, Robin McGill described some steps he took between engineering and becoming chief executive at IET, an international society for the engineering and technology community. He got through his first experience of supervising by "engaging people and not being frightened to ask for help."
The real challenge, he said, "was getting people aligned, getting them to function at the highest possible level and getting them to identify with the strategy we were following."
Ou Shian Waei, managing director of IBM Malaysia, recently told The Edge Daily:
You need to know where the company's and even the staff's weaknesses are — you can't be shy and defensive about that. It needs to be properly conveyed to the staff. You can then identify your strengths and preserve as well as build them at the same time. It's all about trust, which eventually leads to the formation of passion. With passion, opportunities could be found whenever a problem occurs.
This leads us to passion in problem solving.
"The root of passion comes from understanding," Waei said. "You must have interest in the subject and want to explore it – and that's where your passion comes from – exploring," Waei said. He added, "it's passion that drives people to success."
Have you ever known an incurious engineer?
History is on the side that engineers can evolve into roles of managerial responsibility.
After all, it was a young engineer named Kiichiro Toyoda who some 70 years ago founded the Toyota Motor Company. And today's Toyota Production System, not to mention a very strong management philosophy that exemplifies the success of engineers as managers, emerged from Toyoda's Company.
Since then, engineers have proven time and again that those in their profession possess the characteristics necessary to lead, never mind to manage. Why, then, does the view that good engineers invariably will fail as managers continue to be held?
We've only scratched the surface here. And while the question can only be answered based on the individual engineer, there is no good reason for professional engineers to imagine a glass ceiling holding them back in a management position as long as they can prove that when they take responsibility, success will follow.
Resources
Do Great Engineers Make Good Managers?
by S. Rao Vallabbaneni
IEEE, Nov. 7, 2002
The Passionate Manager
by Joyce Au-Yong
The Edge Daily, Jan. 7, 2008
Inventive Leadership
by Ephram Suhir
Manufacturing Engineering Magazine, Nov. 2, 2005
Leaders Lead
by Luke Collins
Institution of Engineering and Technology, February 2007
Trackback Pings
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://news.thomasnet.com/mt41/mt-tb.cgi/1385
|
Advertisement
|
Comment
8 CommentsCompanies need to make sure to send Engineers to seminars or some kind of schooling before just tossing them into the job title of a supervisor. Not to be mean, but engineers make great supervisors but need to make sure they have good people skills. Some can't change over to working well with people and a title doesn't certify that they will do good at a certain job.
February 6, 2008 7:44 AMAs a construction electrical engineer coming out of school, I took a job with an electrical contractor and learned the trade in the office at first, then on the job to supervise why the office work did not transmit my ideas to the field. Getting the experience of actual installation work, the electrical codes, and the information gleaned from the workmen made me able to start an engineering business that has been successful for the past forty years.
February 6, 2008 9:59 AMIt is sort of funny thinking that a "business" school graduate makes a better manager than a engineer, especially in any industry that is technology-based.
Yes, not all rank-and-file employees in any profession (medicine, law, gov't) is qualified to move along into a leadership role. But to assume a profession where problem solving and creative thinking are corner stones is plain short-sighted.
All of the problems the US economy is now experiencing is because Harvard Business School "bean counter" types are in charge. They have done more to destroy our competitiveness than any other group. We need more leaders like Hewlett,Packard, Henry Ford & others of their kind. They may of been tough but also had vision (and reasoning ability!).
February 6, 2008 11:14 AMI work for the government, US Air Force. Of late, there is a huge push on to recruit and grow many more managers. Why? Many of those in upper management positions are rapidly approaching retirement. So, much of what Dept of Defense (DoD) is now doing with management is to encourage those in many professions to seek management positions. Engineers, of course, are some of the most sought-after. Why?
The answer seems to be that engineers often seem considerably more organized in their thinking, and thus are considered more logical in their decision making. Engineers are trained to take a look at the whole situation when trying to come up with a solution of how to fix or build, or preventively maintain one thing or another. The analytical thought process is part of our nature, and it's quite adaptable to many things, such as managing difficult or unpredictable people. Or just any average staff of personnel.
There are also those who can't imagine why in the world that a guy like me with the wealth of experience I have both as Active Duty Air Force (Officer) and Civil Service would not be pushing to get into management, and thus that higher pay bracket that I could have there. The answer to me is simple. I know where I can be of the most value, and I am happy to remain in that job. I studied to be an engineer. I am one, and am happy at that. Management is not what I intended to be, pushing papers instead of building materials.
If I became a manager, as I could have at least twice, I am certain I would have been quite unhappy with that position. Not to mention probably being fired because of a hard-headed attitude and a certain lack of tolerance in dealing with the occasional dullard who has the power to affect what goes on without much of a clue as to why some things must be done a certain way. I, personally, have little skill in managing people, even though I can manage multi-million dollar construction projects. I can easily interact with others on the job and get things done, but as for being the boss.... Let those who have the aptitude for it do that job.
On the other hand, I have met any number of successful engineering managers with degrees and Professional Engineer or Architect licenses who have been marvelous managers. The bias against having engineers as managers is likely unfair, but it, like other sorts of preconceptions, will remain until a later time when general opinions in the business hierarchy become more enlightened and fair.
February 6, 2008 2:50 PMIf you are a young successful engineer, you grow in your field and see sometimes the administration failure; and you registrate these from time to time. Further on, people trust you as project manager with limited responsibility, but you are not only managing the technical aspect, also the timing and be in the budget.
Collecting all this knowledge over the years and you are still a respected and well-known person, you could take a higher management range, and you should be able to fulfill the position with all the adapted skills as a leader in general management.
Regards,
Werner M.Caspari Hinz
It is like Enzo Ferrari supposedly once said : An Engineer can become a Manager, a Manager can never become an Engineer.
February 13, 2008 5:08 PMI am an engineer who took it upon myself to go back to school and get an MBA to position myself for a management position.
Unfortunately I have found myself working under "managers" with absolutely no management skills, background or experience in management who have no idea about basic management techniques or people skills. These people are engineers and poor managers. This happens all the time. Most leaders are not born but have worked to educate themselves in order to lead. My thinking completely turned around from the lessons received in my MBA classes. I don't know how a company of any stature can allow engineers to go into management without the slightest level of managerial training.
Management is a learned process just as much as any engineering field.
February 14, 2008 11:34 AMWhat ultimate "managers", i.e. the President of the US have had engineering training? George Washington, Herbert Hoover, and Jimmy Carter. Were they more sucessful than the business school graduate we have now?
February 15, 2008 11:20 AM
