The Importance of communication skills for engineers

-
“I contend that we (engineers) are undervalued because of our widespread inability to explain what we do to the general public (and why it is so important). It is one of the hardest goals to accomplish, to be able to boil down difficult concepts into a short and easily understood presentation or elevator pitch.” Marybeth Miceli, President, Miceli Infrastructure Consulting, USA (2011)
I personally do feel that why engineers may struggle with soft skills compared to other people/profession could be due to engineers spending large amount of their time looking at problems, equations, how things work and studying them. Rather than 'studying' people. Which comes the risk of technically capable people not being able to communicate their technical understanding well. 

The engineering aspect is not just everything in the job. It is in fact people who decide what project or product gets built, how it gets built, when and where it gets into the ‘hands’ of people who uses it. Engineering involves working with other people to figure out what to build and what the right solution is.

To me, the best engineers there is are the ones who can express their thoughts just as well as technical concepts clearly to anyone. Even non-technical people/general public.

Comments

  1. Brad Blackstone27 September 2019 at 22:02

    Thank you for this insightful explanation of the Miceli statement.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

[Formal Email] Self Introduction

-
Subject: Self-introduction email Dear Professor Brad, I am writing this email to introduce myself as your student of Technical Communication 1. My name is Tay Wei Hao, a year 1 student at Singapore Institute of Technology (SIT), pursuing a degree in Telematics (Intelligent Transportation System Engineering). I have previously graduated with a Diploma in Electronics, Computer & Communications Engineering at Nanyang Polytechnic. With my diploma, I went on to work in the transport sector as an assistant project engineer for four years. The four years was an eye-opening experience for me. Dealing with multiple large-scale projects, I have experienced first-hand how projects are implemented and executed in a timely, safely and cost-effective way. Learning and understanding the importance of each project phase from requirements, design, installation, testing to opening was crucial as well. And that is just the tip of the iceberg. As not all projects are always smooth sailing, ...
Read more

Assignment #1 - Product Description Summary & Analysis

-
Draft #2 – Product Summary and Analysis GPS Insight (2019) states that Driveri 360 ° AI is a vehicle dash camera which bring solutions for an organisation to protect against false claims as well as a platform to improve driver management and training. Driveri 360° AI video captures 1080p HD video and full 360° view angles of traffic incidents. It processes them in real-time with its advanced technology of machine learning software to instant capture and review events, in turn reduces the user’s need to view hours of footage. It is also capable of providing an overall view of driver behaviour to pinpoint the responsible party. The telematics device improves safety, provides a wide range of data and analysis to help identify driver behaviour trends and stop reckless driving as it occurs. It is user friendly and no smartphone or WiFi is needed on board the vehicle. Built-in GPS, Global Navigation Satellite System (GLONASS) as well as 4G LTE connectivity gets everythi...
Read more