Reviewing the work of another engineer 11

[Anon732]

What is the thinking behind this part of the NSPE's Code of Ethics?

http://www.nspe.org/Ethics/CodeofEthics/index.html

a. Engineers in private practice shall not review the work of another engineer for the same client, except with the knowledge of such engineer, or unless the connection of such engineer with the work has been terminated.​

Consider a client who lacks the background to evaluate a design which has been done by them for others. Why is it unethical for a private engineer to provide a discreet second opinion?

If a potential client comes to me and says, "Will you take a look at this?", am I supposed to agree to do so only on the condition that either:
1. They agree to my contacting the other engineer and let them know what I am doing, or
2. The client has already fired the other engineer?

Why should I decline the work if they say, "No, we don't want the other engineer to know that we are getting a second opinion"? I don't know why they might say that, but why should it matter to me whether the other engineer knows what I am doing?

If the design is sound, then whatever criticism I might have would be merely "another way to do it". If the design is flawed, then the client is doing a smart thing by getting a second opinion.

No one wants to be second-guessed, but a client is within their rights to do as much second-guessing as they want to.

There are exclusions in the code of ethics for second-guessing by engineers who are employees of an entity that is large enough to have its own engineering staff:

b. Engineers in governmental, industrial, or educational employ are entitled to review and evaluate the work of other engineers when so required by their employment duties.​

So why isn't it ethical for engineers in private practice to do the same for an entity that is not large enough to have its own engineering staff?

Thanks.

 

[DRC1]

This is a very interesting thread. Anon732 obviously raises an itresting point. Once personal view of right & wrong are defined by their life experiences and are unique to each individual. Situations where ethics are to be applied are never as black and white as in the examples that are provided with the code of ethics. Thus the question is rasied - who decides how we to decide what is the proper way to act and who gives these pepole the right to make these judgements?
One standard that might be applied is that we do not want to unfairly damage someone. By applying the code of ethics, Anon732 feels he may be unfairly damaged by losing work from a client and worse having the client see him as non responsive. the easy answer is that we should explain our code to our clients and if they don't support us, then we should find more ethical clients. In truth we don't find clients, they find us, and losing a client, espeacily a major client can be devistating. On the the other hand say Anon 732 is hired to review my work for a plant I have worked at for several years. I do not know my work is being reviewed. I have calculations, but the notes are sketchy at best. I have done this for years and know why I do what I do. Anon reviews it and finds several code violations and reports back to management. They look at the report and say we are not using DRC1 again. Now I may have very good reasons why the code did not apply, and if I knew I could have explained. Now I have lost a major client. Anon is corect that we can not expect or non engineering clients to adopt our ethic code. Although I generally favor less government over more, perhaps we should expand the code to state that we will welcome or even encourage clients to have a peer review of our work, and that we will cooperate with a 2nd party review. There should be guidelines established on how both parties should act.
Just some thoughts

 

[melone]

If there are code violations, then you should have clearly documented it. You SHOULD be called on this type of thing.

What bothers me most, is the perceived "boys club" aspect of this rule. Some claim that this is a way to regulate common decency, others may view it as a way for PE's to stick together. I guess it depends on your ultimate view of people.

 

[eliebl]

Some codes have methods to override requirements.

 

[Amphoteric]

There is a similar rule where I work, and it cheesed me off too. Why can't a client get their own independant review whenever they want? And what exactly is meant by "terminated?" Do I have go tell my coworker who got moved to a different project that I'm looking at his calcs?

This thread has motivated me to get a "textbook" answer to Anon's question, to at least see the reasoning behind the rule. See

http://www.niee.org/pdd.cfm?pt=NIEE&doc=EthicsCases

The NSPE commentary for Case No. 79-7 states:

the purpose of 12(a) is to provide the engineer whose work is being reviewed by another engineer the opportunity to submit his comments or explanation for his technical decisions,thereby enabling the reviewing engineer to have the benefit of a fuller understanding of the technical considerations in the original design in framing his comments or suggestions for the ultimate benefit of the client. (See Cases Nos. 68-6 and 68-11.)

The Utopian implication is that you'll want to give your reviewer every assistance possible, so that the two of you can work together make the best design possible. But even if the other reviewer is an "adversary," this gives you the option of providing some extra information and context. You might want to - even if only to head off some possible complaints.

There are similar ethical rules in Canada. I once read some solved case studies from British Columbia that seem to support this justification for the reviewing rule: the cases studies included examples where an engineer makes an embarrassingly wrong conclusion because they fail to make a courtesy call and get all the necessary facts:

-In one case, an engineer asks to review some building plans, hoping to find fault and then steal the job. He criticizes the unecessarily thick walls as wasteful, without realizing that the walls are thick because the client intends to add additions to the building 5 years later. It's an egg-on-the-face moment that a phone call could have avoided.
-In another case, a software engineer writes a public letter criticizing a goverment water pumping scheme as over-sized, without realizing that design codes require sizing for a 10-year storm event. The engineer is almost sued for liable.

I don't live in the US, but personally I would interpret the big-industry/government "course of employment" waiver as: if you submit your work to a government agency or a company, knowing in advance that a review is intended, the individual worker who reviews your work doesn't have to call you. The point is that you are expecting the review and so will include all the information you want to in your submission package.

...at least, I hope that's what the intent of that wording is.

If an engineer gets offended at a review and starts attacking the reviewer, as in zdas04's case, then that's childish and unethical.

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If that's the intent, we're still left with the valid question of if this rule is right or not. The code of ethics has some provisions to protect the public, some the client, some other engineers, and some yourself.

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P.S. Two interesting NSPE cases:
-Case 83-6: The engineer sues the client, so the client hires a second engineer before the case is settled in court. The NSPE acknowledges that the engineer-client relationship is probably irreparably damaged, so even though the suing engineer is not yet 100% officially/completely terminated from the project, another engineer can come in and review without notification (although notification is still "encouraged.")
-Case 91-2: the client fires engineer A, and then hires B to look for faults in A's work. B's fee will be dependant on the court case against A. This doesn't run against the reviewing clause, but is against taking contingent fees that can impair your impartial professional judgement.

 

[DRC1]

Melone, granted that code deviations should be clearly documented, but they are not always. For example, we are working on a site that has a tight schedule. Codes and specifications clearly prohibit placing frozen ground. We were asked what could be done to improve the schedule. One suggestion was to use limited frozen materials in areas that were only going to be landscaped. If you were reviewing the project, you may not have had the documentation as this was communicated seperately. My point is that as elieble pointed out, the re are often places were the code is not or should not be applicable, I should have an opertunity to explain what was done.
My other point is that peer review should be much more common than it is. It would a. gives us more work and b gives us a better quality product for our clients.

 

[dik]

IRStuff... if my client doesn't want me to advise the other engineer, I would refuse the assignment...

Dik