Engineering as a commodity: Can we reverse the trend? 38

[lacajun]

--
From Engineering News-Record, 4/23/2012, Gary J. Tulacz:

This view is hurting the designers, too. "Engineering has always been a problem-solving profession," says Giorgio. "When you treat design like a commodity, it will be managed that way, without regard to the value-added capabilities of the top problem-solvers."

Pamela K. Quillin, P.E.
Quillin Engineering, LLC

 

[JohnRBaker]

In my 45+ year career as a professional (from when I co-opted summers during school to my current situation) I have NEVER worked where signing a 'patent agreement' was NOT a condition of employment, period! At least from my experience I can't see how anyone could set-up an arrangement where he could retain 'ownership' of the work he did for his employer.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that you couldn't negotiate some sort of deal where you get to share in the benefits derived from your 'inventions'. My first employer, for whom I worked 14 years (this included my summer co-opt time), offered an incentive program which encouraged it's engineers to come-up with new ideas which could be patented. For each idea submitted which, upon research, was deemed beneficial to the corporation and which proved to be unique enough that it actually COULD be patented, you would receive $100 (after taxes), and for each idea for which a patent was subsequently issued, another $100 (after taxes). Now remember, this was back in the 60's and 70's when a $100 could actually buy you something ;-)

BTW, this was a much better deal than a friend of mine who worked for Dow Chemical, also a company in Michigan, who eventually had 23 patents issued while he was there, for which he received 23 Silver dollars encased in Lucite (all Patent Agreements must provide a minimum payment of one dollar to make it a legal transfer of ownership since patents are real property). Granted, if he's still alive (he was much older than I) those 23 silver dollars may be worth much more than a dollar today, but I know back then he wished he could have gotten a $100 like I was getting where I worked.

And as for my current employer, I don't really know if there is any additional remuneration since I've never had anything patented since I started to work here (I had 2 patents at that original company along with 4 other ideas which were never patented but for which I did collect my $100), however I do know that you at least get a plaque to hang in your office since one of guys I work with has had a patent while working here.

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Engineering Software
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA
Siemens PLM:
UG/NX Museum:

To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

 

[Maui]

Berkshire, perfect! How can we incorporate it directly into our replies on this website?

Maui

http://www.EngineeringMetallurgy.com

 

[TomDOT]

Those complaining about all of the humanities courses may not have been looking at it creatively enough. I ended up taking 12 credit hours (4 semesters, each with a 3-hour course) of Art.

The attitude mostly expressed here would be Bah! Not Engineering, Math or Hard Science! Waste Of Time!

All 4 classes I selected were metals/jewelry. Torches, soldering, cutting, rolling, surface treating, heat treating, bending, pickling, drilling, punching, embossing, stamping, forging, riveting, casting, anodizing, designing, et cetera. Tons of practical materials experience - albeit mostly on a small scale.

Heck, I would have had an Art minor, but refused to take the worthless Art History class.

 

[imcjoek]

Those complaining about all of the humanities courses may not have been looking at it creatively enough.

We had a list of courses that qualified for the humanities requirements. I assure you, none of them could be skewed into being useful. These courses are designed to be inexpensive to run, while still fetching the usual $/credit hour fee. Then make every major require to take them. Cynical? No, just accurate.

 

[berkshire]

Maui,
Find out how TGS4 did it, he put it right on the forum here.
B.E.

The good engineer does not need to memorize every formula; he just needs to know where he can find them when he needs them. Old professor

 

[zdas04]

Quote of the thread:

They have been replaced entirely by pure academic professors- fine researchers no doubt, some with an earnest desire to be good teachers too- but with no experience working as engineers.

That is what I see as well. My fluids professor had a grant to work on a mechanical pump to recirculate blood out of body. Consequently at least half of the course focused on shear forces. That has been marginally useful a couple of times when people were pumping an oil/water mixture and getting an emulsion, but I probably could have figured it out without the pain. People teaching "book learning" who learned it from people who only knew "book learning" are just not effective.

David Simpson, PE
MuleShoe Engineering

"Belief" is the acceptance of an hypotheses in the absence of data.
"Prejudice" is having an opinion not supported by the preponderance of the data.
"Knowledge" is only found through the accumulation and analysis of data.

 

[Maui]

TGS4, how did you do it?

Maui

http://www.EngineeringMetallurgy.com

 

[DRWeig]

For those who like the dead-horse-beating emoticon, the gif file is attached. Courtesy of

http://deephousepage.com/smilies.htm,

whose author says "use freely".

Good on ya,

Goober Dave

Haven't see the forum policies? Do so now: Forum Policies

 

[SnTMan]

And don't forget, "There is no horse so dead that it cannot be beaten further."

Regards,

Mike

 

[berkshire]

As evidenced by 100 plus postings on ENG tips
B.E.

The good engineer does not need to memorize every formula; he just needs to know where he can find them when he needs them. Old professor

 

[TGS4]

[deadhorse]

It's in the smileys, under animals.

 

[JohnRBaker]

We had a list of courses that qualified for the humanities requirements. I assure you, none of them could be skewed into being useful.

You mean there was not a single psychology class on that list? Anyone who has ever had to manage other people will tell you the some basic understanding of psychology is absolutely necessary. I know that the psych class I took my senior year counted toward one of my non-core electives.

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Engineering Software
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA
Siemens PLM:
UG/NX Museum:

To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

 

[Maui]

TGS4 Thanks!



Maui

http://www.EngineeringMetallurgy.com

 

[Maui]

It looks like the American Engineering Association already exists. And they express many of the concerns described in this forum on their opening page.

http://www.aea.org/

Maui

http://www.EngineeringMetallurgy.com

 

[TomDOT]

I had Psych, Econ (micro and macro) a (decent) writing class and a foreign language requirement - in addition to my metals stuff to fill out humanities requirements.... all of those were pretty useful stuff. I did also have a "womens studies" class I considered pretty worthless*, but not much else. I must have picked a reasonable school or something.

*except for the entertainment value of arguing with the militant vegan. That all ended the day she wore leather shoes to class and I pointed out they came from an animal.

 

[cranky108]

I bet those shoes looked nice.

Some of the art classes may have come from people who think engineers are to dull. Those people just never seem to understand the simple beauty of a 60 Hz hum..

However I to was required to learn a second language. Strange that I did not see at the time that FORTRAN was a second language. It also seems to be mostly dead right now.

 

[JohnRBaker]

I also took Economics, both Micro and Macro, as well as one course geared explicitly to engineering, but these were all required courses, as was Statistics, English Composition, First Aid and 2 years of Physical Education (I was on the ARMY ROTC Drill Team so we got 'varsity credit' and were therefore exempt from taking 'Phys-Ed').

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Engineering Software
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA
Siemens PLM:
UG/NX Museum:

To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

 

[zdas04]

John,
That was my experience as well--about as many required classes in Arts & Science and Business as in Engineering. My problem was that I couldn't take Econometrics or Physics III as my non-engineering electives. The choices were things like "World Religions" and "Movie Appreciation". No numbers. Just opinions. I did enjoy a Logic class, but mostly because the guy teaching it didn't speak English at all and we made fun of him a lot (not a good course for even a smart guy to take on without being able to comprehend sarcasm).

David Simpson, PE
MuleShoe Engineering

"Belief" is the acceptance of an hypotheses in the absence of data.
"Prejudice" is having an opinion not supported by the preponderance of the data.
"Knowledge" is only found through the accumulation and analysis of data.

 

[JohnRBaker]

The non-core electives open to me, at least as best that I can recall, were in areas such as History, Literature, Languages, Psychology, Physiology, Archaeology, etc. And while it was true that we were required to take several non-core classes in areas like Economics and English Composition, first as an Electrical and then finally as a Mechanical engineering undergraduate, there were some people who made the same argument about Chemistry, non-Newtonian Physics, Statistics, etc. But as I stated a while ago, I did choose to attend a UNIVERSITY. Now it is true that since it was a Technological University, there wasn't much of an opportunity for a so-called 'politically correct' curriculum. For example, with a male to female ratio of over 20 to 1, there was not a lot of interest in things like 'women studies' (that may no longer be the case since the ratio is now down to something like 5 to 1 as the university has been on a longterm campaign to increase the enrollment of girls in STEM-oriented programs of study and since I have 4 granddaughters, one of which is just starting high school, we're keeping in mind that if she and her sisters, keep their grades up, since I'm an alumni in good standing, they could enroll and pay in-state tuition despite the fact that they live in Texas and we live in California).

But back to the issue of additional non-core classes, in my case it was 4 years of ARMY ROTC Military classes, which while they did count toward grade-point and I did get academic credit for them, they were considered 'above and beyond' when it came to be used to fulfill elective requirements needed to earn my degree.

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Engineering Software
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA
Siemens PLM:
UG/NX Museum:

To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

 

[lacajun]

I took a few humanities courses and found them of some use. Yet, it is appalling that a university would make DE an elective for a Mechanical Engineering program.

In dealing with people, I found my own brain through Bible study and prayer providing a better foundation than psychology and sociology courses. Engineers are not complete social boobs emotionally disconnected from others and the world we also inhabit. For anyone to think yet alone to voice that displays a high degree of ignorance of engineers and the profession as well as pomposity. May we all avoid that trap re: other professions and each other.

As for this issue beating a dead horse, if that is the way we view it, we are defeated already. Since we, as a profession, continue to see a decline in many areas, e.g., pay, prestige, promotions, challenge, work conditions, etc., the horse is still alive to some degree. I've learned in my career some enemies will not cease and desist until you are completely and thoroughly annihilated.

At some point in my undergrad education, a journalism major interviewed some of us girls majoring in engineering. He began his interview with a statement then a question. "When you graduate, you are going to make 2-3 times the starting salary of me, a journalism major and a man. Does that bother you?" Why ask such a question?

As a young engineer, a designer bluntly said engineers do not deserve the pay they get and don't deserve to make the same money as doctors and lawyers. We don't have much value for some. True, we don't get near the education of those professions; however, you cannot become licensed to publicly practice those professions with a 4-year degree. Engineers can and do. We touch people's lives just as broadly and intimately as doctors and lawyers.

How many US citizens are members of AEA? I am not and was unaware of it until Maui's post. How many of us will join AEA and its effort to improve our direction?

SNORGY, I agree that engineers need to start their own companies. I very much enjoy what I am doing but it is incredibly difficult and expensive. I may not make it. I haven't found any willing to take the risk with me. They will share in the reward but not the risk.

I recently had a young ME grad of a very good program say to me that maybe I could do controls and maybe I was just claiming to be able to do controls. I said nothing. This young man didn't remember LaPlace Transforms to any degree. It is odd to be 4 years out and forgetting already.

Congratulations to moltenmetal for running his own company and doing it right. I wish you all the best!

graybeach, I've been pushed by management to "just get it done" and don't worry about whether it's right or not. That is a big part of the problem for many companies. It does nothing more than get you a bad reputation.

Pamela K. Quillin, P.E.
Quillin Engineering, LLC