Training Young Engineers on Soft Skills 39

[KernOily]

Good afternoon guys. I would like to hear from you supervisors and lead engineers on your ideas on training young engineers on soft skills. As you all know, the most difficult and most frustrating part by far of the real working world is working with other people. Also, as you all know, being technically proficient will only get you so far in the world.
In engineering school, students are largely isolated from this until perhaps their senior design seminar during which they are put on a small team to develop a project. Upon graduation, they get out in the real world and find out pretty quick that real life in industry ain’t too much like college, and one finds oneself unprepared for this reality thus forcing the learning of soft skills by hard knocks and OJT.

Some example “soft skills” might be these (a short list):
• How to communicate effectively with others
• How to select the best communication vehicle for a message, e.g. email, verbal, phone call, etc.
• How to manage your supervisor
• How to get work done by people over whom you have no direct reporting authority
• How to know when to cc your boss on emails and when you don’t need to
• How to work with other people who have communication styles different from your own

Just wondering how you all have managed this, if at all. Maybe hard knocks is the only way? I guess I could buy them all a copy of “How to Win Friends and Influence People” and The Golden Rule, as a starting point. I might still do that.

Thanks guys! Pete

 

[TheTick]

http://theartofcharm.com/

 

[tygerdawg]

I've been preaching this for years. I used to be invited by a Department Head friend to give a "what do engineers do?" presentation to Freshmen. In which, I listed all the needed skills. The first few were technical, the remainder were soft. I then explained the technical skills were needed for daily work and to keep your job. The soft skills were needed to grow one's career. They were almost always disappointed & depressed about that.

I do a lot of teaching of young folks now. I was getting savaged on my evaluations, so I researched "Teaching Millenials & Generation Z-ers". Great insights were gained and I overhauled my entire teaching style & expectations. Summary of findings:
[ul]
[li]All the gray-beards are totally screwed. Check back in 20 years to see if my opinion changes like all the other previous-generation doomsayers about them young whippersnappers. I wonder if it will.[/li]
[li]They've never been without internet/email/social media. This is how they learn/research/communicate. They influence other's behavior by flinging nasty comments (like on Facebook et al.)[/li]
[li]email & books are so 90's...get with it Grandpa...why read when I can Google / YouTube anything I need to know?[/li]
[li]Teamwork...they've been steeped in this since kindergarten. Never a problem. It's an amazing thing to see in action. No color, no disability, no creed...completely open socially.[/li]
[li]Padded playgrounds, bike helmets, and helicopter parents have protected them. They do not understand consequence.[/li]
[li]Entitled. I pay my tuition, you owe me. You hired me with the title of engineer, you owe me a fabulous lifestyle.[/li]
[li]Dedication & loyalty are for losers & dinosaurs. Let's go surfing.[/li]
[li]Technology: absolutely no fear. Dive in the deep end without testing the waters first. What's the worst that could happen?[/li]
[li]Mobile phones are so ingrained in their persona that telling them not to use it is like telling them not to use their right hand.[/li]
[li]Much more. See for yourself.[/li]
[li]When the grid goes dark and the zombies come out of hiding, these precious darlings will be dog food.[/li]
[/ul]

I try my best to influence these young people into the type of person I would want to hire. It's a darn tough job, though. It starts with the fundamental things (as related by our Advisory Board members) with such things as "teach them to show up on time" and "teach them to stay off their phones." I keep saying we're doomed if THESE are the ones that will be wiping the drool off my chin in the nursing home. Cynical, I know. But I sure hope I'm surprised.

TygerDawg
Blue Technik LLC
Virtuoso Robotics Engineering

http://www.bluetechnik.com

 

[CheckerHater]

I guess I could buy them all a copy of “How to Win Friends and Influence People” and The Golden Rule

Buy them Sliding rule. And turn off electricity, this way they won't have opinions.

"For every expert there is an equal and opposite expert"
Arthur C. Clarke Profiles of the future

 

[moltenmetal]

tygerdawg: apparently there are Sumerian clay tablets containing screeds about the decadence of the young...some of the earliest decipherable written language, so this complaint is very old indeed.

We heard this preaching about the generation just before this one and their "special needs"- how they need to be mollycoddled or else they'll leave, or how entitled they are etc. I hire young engineers and train them, and do not experience this sort of crap- at all. Nobody brings their mommy in to negotiate salary when they sign on. They're just as smart, independent, resourceful and loyal as kids ever were. Yes, they have a different work style and way of thinking because they were raised with different tools: just like I have never used a slide rule and hence any old guy who did can whip my ass with his knowledge of logarithms. With each new tool, some old skills die. So it goes. I don't doubt your teaching experience- I'm sure if I was being "evaluated" by these kids, they would find me lacking in many, many ways...

 

[Latexman]

The Unwritten Laws of Engineering

Good luck,
Latexman

Technically, the glass is always full - 1/2 air and 1/2 water.

 

[msquared48]

Buying the donuts.

Mike McCann, PE, SE (WA)

 

[fel3]

tygerdawg…

Great post. One of the things I have seen with quite a few young engineers who are overly steeped in teamwork (not all of them are) is their inability to work alone when that is required or even to think independent thoughts.

Another thing, the current generation seems to value relationships far more than career advancement. Few of them seem willing to invest their own time to learn more than is expected, let alone work more than is expected, because it reduces their quality of life. (Heck, I'm 56 and still learn on my own time.) I have seen very few young engineers willing to work even 41 hours per week. For most, it's in at exactly 8:00 a.m. and out at exactly 5:00 p.m. Unfortunately, the deadline-driven world that I live in doesn't usually permit this. The standouts among the young engineers I know are willing to learn on their own and to put in extra hours, but not so much as to ruin their life.

moltenmetal…

Another great post. You said, "With each new tool, some old skills die." I fully agree and don't have any problem with that. However, I do have a problem when understanding fundamental concepts dies with the old skills. Too many young engineers believe anything the computer spits out because they don't know GIGO. When I train young engineers, I make them do some simple calculations by hand so I can judge their level of understanding. hen I think they are ready, then I show them how we really do with a computer.

As an aside, several years ago a younger co-worker asked me for advice on how to help his 7th grader learn logarithms. I suggested buying a slide rule. He asked, "What's a slide rule?" I explained what a slide rule was and why I though it might help his son see what a logarithm looked like (i.e. how it plots on a scale) and see how they function (in the same way that teachers used to use a sliding number line to teach addition and subtraction). Then I showed him the slide rule I keep at the office (mostly for fun) and showed him how it worked. After buying his first one, he got so interested that he started collecting slide rules. (BTW, I went through the transition from slide rule to scientific calculator and was the first person at my high school to a programmable calculator, an HP-55. I have never shied away from adding technology, but I refuse to let understanding things get cast aside.)

==========
"Is it the only lesson of history that mankind is unteachable?"
--Winston S. Churchill

 

[KENAT]

fel3, I've actually know more older guys that were 'clock watchers' than youngsters. For what another anecdote is worth.

Posting guidelines faq731-376

http://eng-tips.com/market.cfm?

(probably not aimed specifically at you)
What is Engineering anyway: faq1088-1484​

 

[truckandbus]

I set the expectation early that the soft skills are needed

Go over the org chart to identify people they can trust and go to and those they can't

Review and edit their emails/memos and explain why changes are needed and why word choices matter until they can create a decent email/memo on their own

Assign benign tasks early on to confirm 'they get it' before assigning more significant tasks

I've also compiled a list of 'what they don't teach you in school' articles that I pass down occasionally

One-on-one feedback sessions monthly that are not project specific but rather focus on the soft skills

 

[urgross]

Make them watch Grandpa Simpson.

 

[SNORGY]

I've been spoiled rotten. Almost every single young person or engineering intern or student that I have met has been a great talent, with a good blend of balance, work ethic, integrity and smarts.

They aren't failing us. It's us who are failing them.

 

[Leftwow]

The sad reality of it all.... My wife's 3 year old brother can use an ipad efficiently... Never thought practically a baby could learn how to do this. He can get on netflix and find what movies he wants to watch. The exponential growth of the approaching generations will put not only YOU but ME out of a job. My thought is, you can either swim downstream or upstream. I learn from them, they learn from me... it should be a mutual learning. So old guys, get over yourself, because your hand calcs aren't as impressive as you think.

 

[berkshire]

The scary part of this is that now we have a generation that grew up with computers, cell phones, internet , online calculators and other electronic gadgets, and will not know what to do without them.
B.E.

You are judged not by what you know, but by what you can do.

 

[Trenno]

Playswow, I watched an interesting lecture on young engineers and the use of computer models on the weekend.

It's the 2015 Gold Medal Address from Istructe (Link)

But... it always comes back to "rubbish in, rubbish out."

 

[Leftwow]

Berkshire you grew up with microwave ovens, vacuum cleaners, Refrigeraters, coffee makers, helicopters and muscle cars. They are here to stay, what's the difference?

 

[Leftwow]

Just curious, why has thread about "strategies of teaching soft skills to junior engineers" turned into "let's bash their entire generation"?

 

[GregLocock]

Sensitive, much? I'd put the score at about 50/50.

Cheers

Greg Locock


New here? Try reading these, they might help FAQ731-376

http://eng-tips.com/market.cfm?

 

[berkshire]

Playswow,
The microwave oven did not come along until I was 25. The First domestic one Was the Amada Radarange. There were a few industrial ones before that from when I was a teenager. They cost a large fortune and did not interest the general public very much. My father sold Electrolux Vacuum cleaners, but sales were few and far between. We also sold television sets, Black and white, that cost 7 months wages to buy, they both were too expensive for the average Joe blow. The first Color set did not come along until I was 20 years old and it was still bloody expensive. The coffee maker was called a percolator and sat on the stove for 15 or 20 minutes until the coffee was done. Helicopters and muscle cars were outside my price range.
The items I mentioned in my post are in everyday use by todays generation, and the generation before that. And like I said if you take them away people would be seriously inconvenienced if not lost.
B.E.

You are judged not by what you know, but by what you can do.

 

[Leftwow]

I highly doubt that we wouldn't be able to adapt to our situation to survive.