6 Top Challenges for Engineering in the 1st Quarter of the 21st Century? 11

[spggodd]

Hey all,

This is a bit of a follow on from a previous post I made last week, I have an interview coming up and I have been asked to consider the following question:

"What are the top 6 challenges (technical, commercial, ethical, regulatory, etc..) facing the UK engineering profession in the first quarter of the 21st Century?"

I was hoping I could start some discussion and get your opinions of this, even if you're not from the UK there may be common issues in your country that you can share?

Thanks
Steve

 

[spggodd]

To kick things off my thoughts were:

- Energy Demands
- Growing and improving our high tech and space related industries
- Large EU/International collaborative engineering projects
- Plantetary Protection
- Cyber Defense
- Sustaining the growth of UK manufacturing.

 

[MikeHalloran]

Controlling the global oversupply of engineers.
... for a start, by starting some of those 'shovel ready' projects. ... or finding them.

Planetary Protection. ... from what?
Politicians and Thieves? Sorry, redundant.



Mike Halloran
Pembroke Pines, FL, USA

 

[SomptingGuy]

"facing the UK engineering profession" narrows the question down somewhat.

The English language is one. Engineering no longer means anything in it.


- Steve

 

[GregLocock]

The number one problem for the UK engineering profession is the utter disdain for engineering shown by the establishment.

The number two issue is the complete and utter abasement of the engineering institutions in the face of the establishment, in particular the way they have been compromised by an overenthusiastic alliance with academia. More engineering students is great for universities, but bad for working engineers.





Cheers

Greg Locock


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[moltenmetal]

I don't know anything about the situation in the UK, but here in Canada the #1 issue facing the profession of engineering is the disconnect between an engineering education and a career as an engineer. The fraction of engineering grads working as engineers, engineering managers or engineering inspectors has shrunk from 58% in 1996 to 31% in 2011. Despite this, we continue to have employers complaining of a "skills shortage" because they expect to find experienced employees who have been fully trained by others. The median level D engineer now earns approximately as much as the median schoolteacher in Ontario. It won't be long before we no longer have a profession if this keeps up.

 

[rb1957]

space elevator
fusion power
cheap clean water (for the billions that don't have it)
understanding how to work with off-shore resources (ie out-sourcing off-shore)

in my mind engineering should focus on getting things done .. leave the woolie stuff for the woolie people

Quando Omni Flunkus Moritati

 

[spggodd]

Controlling the global oversupply of engineers.
... for a start, by starting some of those 'shovel ready' projects. ... or finding them.

Planetary Protection. ... from what?
Politicians and Thieves? Sorry, redundant.

In the UK and in my company I always keep hearing about a shortage of Engineers and skills, are you saying the global market is saturated with engineers currently to the point where its one of the biggest challenges?

Also, when I mentioned planetary protection I was meaning things such like, astroid detection, global warming, nuclear disarment etc..

The English language is one. Engineering no longer means anything in it.

Hi, I'm from the UK obviously and I'm not really sure what you mean, I know we have different ways of spelling words than Americans do etc.. but can you expand on what you mean by this?
Or do you mean imperial style measurement as opposed to metric etc..?

I don't know anything about the situation in the UK, but here in Canada the #1 issue facing the profession of engineering is the disconnect between an engineering education and a career as an engineer. The fraction of engineering grads working as engineers, engineering managers or engineering inspectors has shrunk from 58% in 1996 to 31% in 2011. Despite this, we continue to have employers complaining of a "skills shortage" because they expect to find experienced employees who have been fully trained by others. The median level D engineer now earns approximately as much as the median schoolteacher in Ontario. It won't be long before we no longer have a profession if this keeps up.

This is very interesting, I guess you could say a similar thing about graduates in the UK, some leave university never to actually use the skills they have learnt and often a lot of topics are missed etc..

Would you say a solution would be to alter the course structures to provide a more general or more sopecific rwange of skills?

space elevator
fusion power
cheap clean water (for the billions that don't have it)
understanding how to work with off-shore resources (ie out-sourcing off-shore)

Some of those challenges sound quite far fetched, do you think a Space Elevator is something the UK can produce by itself or would this be the next large scale international space construction project?

Fusion power is another big challenge, I think I agree with you there, it ties nicely in with satisfying the countries/worlds energy demands, do you have any information on the current progress of this type of research?

Clean water for all is a BIG problem but I'm not sure this is a particular challenge for the UK in the next 25 years.

Can you expand on what you mean by understanding to work with off-shore resources?
-------------------


Thanks for your comments.

 

[ornerynorsk]

I'll second rb1957's suggestion of fusion power. It would be nice if we could functionally and politically extricate ourselves from the organized thuggery of the petroleum world.

It is better to have enough ideas for some of them to be wrong, than to be always right by having no ideas at all.

 

[rb1957]

if you think something is beyond your grasp, it is. if you reach for something, you might get there, you'll certainly get closer. but enough of the "Dr Phil"; if you want your UK centric focus then add "UK participation in ..." eg i don't think the UK is participating in ITER and the amount of funding/research would probably keep you in fags (ie cigarettes) for a month.

"understanding how to work with off-shore resources" ... you missed the most important word. it is a fact of life that you'll have to work with off-shore engineering resources; and in Europe I wouldn't include traditioanl EEC as off-shore as far as the UK is concerned. i've seen several company's attempts and most end in failure ... the work gets repatriated, duplicated, and the bridges are burned.

Quando Omni Flunkus Moritati

 

[spggodd]

Yup, Thanks Dr Phil!
I appreciate I could add the "UK pariticpation in.." part, I appreciate everything here discussed can be worldwise issues, just trying to keep focus on my original question which limits its to challenges for the UK.

Thanks for the ITER link, this is very interesting, could make a good talking point although I see the EU is involved which could mean the UK has some part to play..

What kind of offshore resources are you thinking about can you give any examples?

 

[rb1957]

design and analysis

Quando Omni Flunkus Moritati

 

[KENAT]

They'll probably want you to say something about Climate Change etc. but tread carefully.

Oh, and Sompting is UK born & bred so think a bit more deeply about what he put.

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[2dye4]

Diminishing need for advanced engineering as more and more things are
just plug and play, or bolt together, with the engineering of the components
being done at any remote location.

Things only need designing once and modified occasionally, the lowest competent
bidder will get the job and the rest of us will compete with just about
anybody who can point to where the piece fits and manage the project.

There use to be more math in engineering, now fewer and fewer need this skill.
The majority just manage the project and report the results.

How much in GDP does Apple create and how many engineers do they employ.

 

[beej67]

You can easily duck the climate change discussion by pointing out that most economic forecasts show a net economic benefit to the amount of global warming even the scariest models predict in the first quarter of the 21st century.



Hydrology, Drainage Analysis, Flood Studies, and Complex Stormwater Litigation for Atlanta and the South East -

http://www.campbellcivil.com

 

[TomDOT]

Apple has apparently been part of a wage-fixing cartel* for almost a decade to keep worker prices low. Along with Google, Intel, Lucasfilms, Pixar, Paypal, Comcast, Genentech, Intuit, Clear Channel, IBM, Virgin Media, Dell, Novell, Oracle, Sun, Microsoft, eBay, etcetera, etcetera.

*Slightly indirect. Basically, they all magically stopped hiring employees from each other. Some had agreements documented, some not. Employees got stuck and didn't get the wages they deserve.

 

[rb1957]

ebay ... wage-fixing ?

Quando Omni Flunkus Moritati

 

[msquared48]

Knocking off the bean counters.

Mike McCann
MMC Engineering

 

[Comcokid]

"What are the top 6 challenges (technical, commercial, ethical, regulatory, etc..) facing the UK engineering profession in the first quarter of the 21st Century?"

I think there is one challenge that will largely determine or influence all the others - solving the debt crisis at all levels of society - government debt, deficit spending, public sector debt, or personal credit debt. This comming challenge is true for the US, UK, or elsewhere.

 

[KENAT]

Globalization.

The UK is a bit further along the path of divesting itself of much of its manufacturing base. Initially it doesn't impact Engineering employment as much but at some point at least some of the engineering also gets outsourced.

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