Bad Engineering

Forget about it.  If you’re looking for recognition of your efforts you need to work someplace else than the engineering field.  And why is this?  Well, two reasons: the very nature of engineers, and lousy management.

Let’s face it, engineering, while still considered a professional profession, is not given much respect in the US society.  Or, rather, it isn’t given much thought here.  They all love their cars, planes, roads, and cell phones, but they don’t have much interest in who makes all that happen.  Unless something goes wrong, of course.  Then you’ll get plenty of recognition.  The kind you don’t want.

So if you can’t find recognition outside the organization, can you find it inside?  Well, pretty much no.  Engineers who are good engineers are, for the most part, pretty bad managers.  The idea of complimenting workers, or writing them up for awards, or singing their praises to the higher-ups is not really in their nature.  There is an implicit feeling that the work should be enough.  And that there should be no ego stroking in engineering.

And this sort of works.  After all, you don’t see a flood of engineers leaving the field for more sensitive fields of endeavor.  Of course you also don’t see the quiet desparation/apathy in many engineers since they, also because of their nature, don’t advertise their feelings.

So here does that leave us?  With lots of engineers who want and need recognition working in a system where they won’t get it.  And the solution?  Well, a wise man once said to us, “You need to let the work be your reward.”  If the work alone isn’t enough to carry you through, then you’re going to have a rough time of it.

I suppose this all comes down to the difference between self-satisfaction and outside recognition.  In a perfect world the former would be enough.  For many of us, me included, we aren’t yet wise enough to not want the latter.  I hope that changes with age since equating worth by others’ opinions and actions is, I think, foolish.

Here is a quote from David Wallace’s The Pale King that might help a little:

“Enduring tedium over real time in a confined space is what real courage is.  There is no audience.  No one to applaud, to admire. No one to see you. Do you understand?  Here is the truth–actual heroism receives no ovation, entertains no one. No one queues up to see it. No one is interested.”

I was watching the live web feed from NASA on the Messenger satellite achieving orbit of Mercury when I was struck by how engineers (and scientists) actually are versus how we are perceived by the public. The host of the webcast was in front of a live audience and the camera would periodically flip to a feed of the Command center which was a room with some large flat screens but mostly filled with some office chairs, desks, and a bunch of casually dressed engineers. A room most of us engineers can relate to – sort of our natural habitat.

The engineers in that room were calmly doing their job even though they were about to fond out if their twelve years of hard work was for nought or not. When the Messenger was in the middle of it’s burn and it appeared that orbit would be acheived, the host remarked – sarcastically – how excited everybody in the Command center was. That got a good laugh from the audience as they could see that little had changed in that room. The professionals were still going about their duties as before.

You see, the audience was there for that historic moment and were excited with that thought. They were seeing the last steps of a race and had little knowledge that it had been – like most big engineering efforts – a marathon, not a 100 meter dash.  And engineers are built for mental marathons. In my area, shipbuilding, you can spend an entire career on just one project. And that takes a great deal of effort and patience.

And, to the amusement of the audience, this doesn’t equate to great emotional displays from the runners. Yes, there were handshakes and a few pats on the back, but that was about it. And that’s fine for us engineers and scientists, but it doesn’t fo a whole lot for our public appearance as somewhat cold or boring nerds. Those people in the Command center were very pleased and proud of their successful work, but they were also just plain tired. I just don’t think the general public gets that.