Post by thread:[OT] What Makes an Engineer Succesful

"What Makes an Engineer Successful", by Walter W. Frey IEEE Potentials, Volume 16, Issue 5, December 1997 - January 1998 After working as an engineer for over 35 years, I now conclude that a successful career depends on understanding what engineering is, academic performance, and personality. And these considerations are not all important for the right reasons. Engineering is the art of applying scientific principles to solve a problem. It is not a separate area of science such as physics. Engineering projects are bound by three variables: the number of problems to solve, the funds available to solve these problems, and the delivery date of the finished items. The catch is you can only fix two of the variables, while the third is determined by the others. Although a modicum of academic performance is necessary to graduate, a high GPA does not predicate a successful career. The real indicators for engineering performance reside in a person's personality traits, ability to think innovatively, and skill in interacting with others. Personnel departments (often for legal reasons) stay away from trying to rate these subjective areas and stick to easily quantified areas, i.e., "GPA, class standing, etc." Thus, many potentially good engineers are turned away due to poor grades. The following subjective areas also are necessary for a successful engineering career: Curiosity - The desire to find out how things work, or why they don't. The engineer notes the good and the bad approaches to the problem. Perseverance - This trait is needed to stay with a problem even though the solution is not adequate or eludes or seems to fight the engineer. However, this must be not be carried to an extreme, i.e., it becomes a futile obsession. Also, oftentimes a problem will have to be temporarily shelved to work on projects which will produce more immediate results. Self-confidence - The engineer knows his or her capabilities and problem areas; for example, he or she has a tendency to settle on the first solution that presents itself. Common sense - The ability to make decisions on partial or contradictory information. It is also used to balance perseverance against what is best for the overall program. Sense of humor - This trait is necessary to keep from getting depressed when the solution has been elusive and all sorts of irrelevant problems are obscuring the answer. Humor is also very useful in handling personality problems with subordinates and/or superiors. Ingenuity - This means the engineer is not limited to the "by the book" way of doing things. This person is open to unique or unproved solutions to difficult problems; he or she is willing to take a chance if the potential gains are great. Communication - Engineering is an occupation that depends on the exchange and interpretation of ideas. An engineer must be aware of how others have tried to solve a problem. This knowledge often presents itself when engineers get together arid talk shop. Very often, the solution requires merging the best parts of competing solutions into a unified approach. However, this is not the same as when, stuff is included just to keep everyone happy. This "team approach" typically results in mediocre products. Luck - Luck is always useful since "no amount of planning will replace dumb luck." However, good planning and contingency planning often help or are confused with luck. Altogether, these eight attributes will more greatly affect one's performance as an engineer than his or her GPA. About the author - Walter W. Frey is an IEEE Life Senior.

Gökhan SEVER wrote: > Engineering is the art of applying scientific principles to solve a > problem. I think that engineering is about more than science. Ever heard of the black arts of engineering? Like high-frequency PCBs or network configuration? Having a good intuition is crucial, too :) And this leaves out all the more mundane aspects of realization of anything: planning, dealing with suppliers, contractors, team members, juggling conflicting priorities etc. I'd say the process of "applying scientific principles" is probably not more than 20% to 50% of a typical engineer's work. It's higher for the ones that work in pure R&D jobs in big organizations, and it's usually pretty low for the ones who try to do it on their own. > Engineering projects are bound by three variables: the number of problems > to solve, the funds available to solve these problems, and the delivery > date of the finished items. The catch is you can only fix two of the > variables, while the third is determined by the others. This sounds as if the author equalized e.g. available resources with available funds. That's not the same. To paraphrase a common saying: there are things money can't buy. It's not always only a question of money. So I'd definitely add the non-monetary resources to the constraints. > The real indicators for engineering performance reside in a person's > personality traits, ability to think innovatively, and skill in > interacting with others. Right... this kind of contradicts the above statement about application of scientific principles as primary activity. These here ("think innovatively", "interact with others") don't sound like primarily being application of scientific principles... :) > Personnel departments (often for legal reasons) stay away from trying to > rate these subjective areas and stick to easily quantified areas, i.e., > "GPA, class standing, etc." Thus, many potentially good engineers are > turned away due to poor grades. It's called "politically correct" for a reason (like if there was anything that could be "political" and "correct" at the same time :). I really wonder if there ever will be a stable balance between social peace and individual freedom. Gerhard

This discussion suggests that academic performance is not necessarily an indicator of future success. Many have based their predictions on measured academic performance. However, I remember once when I had advertised for a technician (Electronics Tech) a resume came across my desk that made me chuckle. I asked for a 4 year college degree and the applicant had dropped out in the first year, with poor grades. Furthermore, he had none of the experience I was looking for. To make a long story short, he pestered me until I hired him on condition he prove himself. I was surprised to find that he was the best tech I ever hired. He was able to somehow troubleshoot successfully, build prototypes successfully, and coordinate the installation of complex control systems. He eventually decided that music was his passion and went off to pursue that. I lost touch with him but I learned something about academic performance and ability. It may be the general rule but it is not likely the cardinal rule. {Original Message removed}

Rich Graziano wrote: > To make a long story short, he pestered me until I hired him on condition > he prove himself. This shows something they also state in the article: perseverance :) > I was surprised to find that he was the best tech I ever hired. He was > able to somehow troubleshoot successfully, build prototypes > successfully, and coordinate the installation of complex control > systems. I'm currently working closely with a young guy who also doesn't have any degree. But a willingness to learn and the right attitude (as in "I'm here and doing it anyway, so I just as well might do it right" :) is something that's hard to beat -- and having sat through four years of college without it isn't going to have much effect. > I lost touch with him but I learned something about academic performance > and ability. It may be the general rule but it is not likely the > cardinal rule. Many of the good ones (in every field) are not only good in one field. So it's not surprising that at least some of them tend to move between fields a bit -- which often doesn't look "good" on a resume, if you look at it with the normal HR eyes. It's important to distinguish the undecided who never gets really into anything from the one who just can't do the same thing all life long (but nevertheless does well whatever she does). Gerhard

I've known very talented designer from Microchip's bbs. I was very amazed of his high quailty responses and wrote him my thoughts and offered co-working through the net. So he responded back three pages long reply plus two pages of his resume. Those conversations hangs near my monitor. The weird side is he has no degree but i'm sure that he has much better than our profs. Here is right place to cite some from his replies... "I don't have a University degree. Actually, I never set foot in a University as a student, although I have worked on a few post-grad research projects as a collaborator, under invitation. Currently I work as a Electronics Design Engineer, although I don't have a EE degree, nor any other degree actually. The point here is that I lack the necessary academic credentials (those letters like MSEE, PhD, et cetera)... Medical electronics is as vast a field as any ee broad field. You have from relatively simple measurement and control circuitry (like neonatal thermo regulation using infrared imagery), to vital signals monitoring like oxymetry, EKG, EMG, EEG, pH, blood pressure, insulin monitoring, to clinic diagnostic equipment (like a myriad of sensors and analysis procedures applied to all areas of diagnostic medicine), to high-end imaging and state of the art visualization and processing (like computer graphics 3D realtime modelling and visualization from datasets derived from ultrasound, thermal, impedance, acidity, radiology, CAT and MRI data), to robotic manipulation for remote surgical procedures, to body-implanted intelligent sensors and actuators, to embedded drug dispensers for chronic treatment and pain control, to sensory and motor intelligent bionic prostetic devices that interface directly with neural tissue and muscle tissue for limb rehabilitation/substitution, to personal intelligent assistant devices that augment the capabilities of handicapped persons, to electronic safety devices for debilitating illnesses such as dementia, allzheimer, epilepsy, to cardiac implanted devices like pacemakers and artificial blood pumps, to digital hearing implants, to artificial sensors for personal safety like thermal damage warning for hansen disease patients, to name just a few areas." His no degreed abilities goes on and on...I'm still half of the way in contrast to him and i have degree but my experience is just like a sand on the earth... Anyway, although Albert Einstein wasnt an engineer did he get a degree before explaining "special relativity" phenomenon

In our days engineering is the art of working as less as possible for good results. Which of course is not possible without background knowledges and tons of fortune. A succesfull engineer is an engineer which is doing exactly what is want, and the term "success" has absolutely no connection with "money". A happy engineer it's a succesfull engineer. A succesfull career could be a career reasonable paid when you're not sleeping, eating an making love in the office with your osciloscope, but at home with your family. greetings, Vasile On 6/23/06, Gökhan SEVER <spam_OUTgstr2005TakeThisOuTgmail.com> wrote: {Quote hidden}> "What Makes an Engineer Successful", by Walter W. Frey > > IEEE Potentials, Volume 16, Issue 5, December 1997 - January 1998 > > After working as an engineer for over 35 years, I now conclude that a > successful career depends on understanding what engineering is, academic > performance, and personality. And these considerations are not all important > for the right reasons. > > Engineering is the art of applying scientific principles to solve a problem. > It is not a separate area of science such as physics. Engineering projects > are bound by three variables: the number of problems to solve, the funds > available to solve these problems, and the delivery date of the finished > items. The catch is you can only fix two of the variables, while the third > is determined by the others. > > Although a modicum of academic performance is necessary to graduate, a high > GPA does not predicate a successful career. The real indicators for > engineering performance reside in a person's personality traits, ability to > think innovatively, and skill in interacting with others. Personnel > departments (often for legal reasons) stay away from trying to rate these > subjective areas and stick to easily quantified areas, i.e., "GPA, class > standing, etc." Thus, many potentially good engineers are turned away due to > poor grades. > > The following subjective areas also are necessary for a successful > engineering career: > > Curiosity - The desire to find out how things work, or why they don't. The > engineer notes the good and the bad approaches to the problem. > > Perseverance - This trait is needed to stay with a problem even though the > solution is not adequate or eludes or seems to fight the engineer. However, > this must be not be carried to an extreme, i.e., it becomes a futile > obsession. Also, oftentimes a problem will have to be temporarily shelved to > work on projects which will produce more immediate results. > > Self-confidence - The engineer knows his or her capabilities and problem > areas; for example, he or she has a tendency to settle on the first solution > that presents itself. > > Common sense - The ability to make decisions on partial or contradictory > information. It is also used to balance perseverance against what is best > for the overall program. > > Sense of humor - This trait is necessary to keep from getting depressed when > the solution has been elusive and all sorts of irrelevant problems are > obscuring the answer. Humor is also very useful in handling personality > problems with subordinates and/or superiors. > > Ingenuity - This means the engineer is not limited to the "by the book" way > of doing things. This person is open to unique or unproved solutions to > difficult problems; he or she is willing to take a chance if the potential > gains are great. > > Communication - Engineering is an occupation that depends on the exchange > and interpretation of ideas. An engineer must be aware of how others have > tried to solve a problem. This knowledge often presents itself when > engineers get together arid talk shop. Very often, the solution requires > merging the best parts of competing solutions into a unified approach. > However, this is not the same as when, stuff is included just to keep > everyone happy. This "team approach" typically results in mediocre products. > > > Luck - Luck is always useful since "no amount of planning will replace dumb > luck." However, good planning and contingency planning often help or are > confused with luck. > > Altogether, these eight attributes will more greatly affect one's > performance as an engineer than his or her GPA. > > About the author - Walter W. Frey is an IEEE Life Senior. >

I like your philosophy Vasile. I think you also have a good sense of humor. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Vasile Surducan" <.....piclist9KILLspam@spam@gmail.com> To: "Microcontroller discussion list - Public." <piclistKILLspammit.edu> Sent: Saturday, June 24, 2006 2:49 PM Subject: Re: [OT] What Makes an Engineer Succesful In our days engineering is the art of working as less as possible for good results. Which of course is not possible without background knowledges and tons of fortune. A succesfull engineer is an engineer which is doing exactly what is want, and the term "success" has absolutely no connection with "money". A happy engineer it's a succesfull engineer. A succesfull career could be a career reasonable paid when you're not sleeping, eating an making love in the office with your osciloscope, but at home with your family. greetings, Vasile On 6/23/06, Gökhan SEVER <.....gstr2005KILLspam.....gmail.com> wrote: {Quote hidden}> "What Makes an Engineer Successful", by Walter W. Frey > > IEEE Potentials, Volume 16, Issue 5, December 1997 - January 1998 > > After working as an engineer for over 35 years, I now conclude that a > successful career depends on understanding what engineering is, academic > performance, and personality. And these considerations are not all > important > for the right reasons. > > Engineering is the art of applying scientific principles to solve a > problem. > It is not a separate area of science such as physics. Engineering projects > are bound by three variables: the number of problems to solve, the funds > available to solve these problems, and the delivery date of the finished > items. The catch is you can only fix two of the variables, while the third > is determined by the others. > > Although a modicum of academic performance is necessary to graduate, a > high > GPA does not predicate a successful career. The real indicators for > engineering performance reside in a person's personality traits, ability > to > think innovatively, and skill in interacting with others. Personnel > departments (often for legal reasons) stay away from trying to rate these > subjective areas and stick to easily quantified areas, i.e., "GPA, class > standing, etc." Thus, many potentially good engineers are turned away due > to > poor grades. > > The following subjective areas also are necessary for a successful > engineering career: > > Curiosity - The desire to find out how things work, or why they don't. The > engineer notes the good and the bad approaches to the problem. > > Perseverance - This trait is needed to stay with a problem even though the > solution is not adequate or eludes or seems to fight the engineer. > However, > this must be not be carried to an extreme, i.e., it becomes a futile > obsession. Also, oftentimes a problem will have to be temporarily shelved > to > work on projects which will produce more immediate results. > > Self-confidence - The engineer knows his or her capabilities and problem > areas; for example, he or she has a tendency to settle on the first > solution > that presents itself. > > Common sense - The ability to make decisions on partial or contradictory > information. It is also used to balance perseverance against what is best > for the overall program. > > Sense of humor - This trait is necessary to keep from getting depressed > when > the solution has been elusive and all sorts of irrelevant problems are > obscuring the answer. Humor is also very useful in handling personality > problems with subordinates and/or superiors. > > Ingenuity - This means the engineer is not limited to the "by the book" > way > of doing things. This person is open to unique or unproved solutions to > difficult problems; he or she is willing to take a chance if the potential > gains are great. > > Communication - Engineering is an occupation that depends on the exchange > and interpretation of ideas. An engineer must be aware of how others have > tried to solve a problem. This knowledge often presents itself when > engineers get together arid talk shop. Very often, the solution requires > merging the best parts of competing solutions into a unified approach. > However, this is not the same as when, stuff is included just to keep > everyone happy. This "team approach" typically results in mediocre > products. > > > Luck - Luck is always useful since "no amount of planning will replace > dumb > luck." However, good planning and contingency planning often help or are > confused with luck. > > Altogether, these eight attributes will more greatly affect one's > performance as an engineer than his or her GPA. > > About the author - Walter W. Frey is an IEEE Life Senior. >

On 6/24/06, Gökhan SEVER <EraseMEgstr2005spam_OUTTakeThisOuTgmail.com> wrote: > I've known very talented designer from Microchip's bbs. I was very amazed of > his high quailty responses and wrote him my thoughts and offered co-working > through the net. > ... > > "I don't have a University degree. Actually, I never set foot in a > University as a student, although I have worked on a few post-grad research > projects as a collaborator, under invitation. Currently I work as a > Electronics Design Engineer, although I don't have a EE degree, nor any > other degree actually. The point here is that I lack the necessary academic > credentials (those letters like MSEE, PhD, et cetera)... > > Medical electronics is as vast a field as any ee broad field. That is interesting. He is an excellent engineer. Moreover he is also very very nice... That being said, I think he is one of the exceptional cases. It is harder and harder for an engineer without a degree to climb the corporate ladder. For example, there are so many steps to be called an engineer in some companies for a non-degree holder. An example, a diploma holder will join the company as Technicial . After that, there are Senial Technician, Technical Specialist, Senior Technical Specialist, Associate Engineer, Senior Associate engineer. Afer that he can be promoted to be an engineer... Regards, Xiaofan

When I worked for the NZ Post Office many years ago they ran all postal and telephone services. Engineer's were required to hold a Bachelor of Engineering degree. The highest position in the organisation was "Engineer in Chief" this man (invariably) had a number of direct report underlings titled 'Assistant Engineer in Chief'. Men of great power and authority. However, the title given to engineering graduates fresh out of university was "Assistant Engineer". The apparently un-noted near equality of job title with the men at the top was no doubt a psychological boost. To get from one position to the other one would have had to traverse Engineer, Senior Engineer (I think), Supervising Engineer, Divisional Engineer, a side branch of Regional Engineer (one in each of about 6 Regions), superintending Engineer and finally Assistant Engineer in chief. Over time they split up the organisation, corporatised it, corporatised it again, sold it and sold it again. Along the way the understanding that engineers were valuable (let alone in charge) vanished and a woman was appointed to the top position (no correlation claimed for these events :-) ). Main requirement to successfully run a Telecom company is now, according to a recent speech she made, the ability to scare and confuse your customers into believing that it is a good idea to pay unjustifiably inflated prices for your service. Seems to work. RM

Yes, but at the end, he lamented not having completed his degree. Maybe I'm impatient, but why should an employer be concerned with interviewing non-degreed people for a degreed position? There are enough applicants these days to find good candidates among those that have enough drive to (at the very least) complete the educational requirement. I see a lot of posts that declare over and over the virtues of finding that "great guy who taught himself without the need for school". Thats all well and good, but it bugs me that there seems to be an expectation that employers should automatically "grandfather in" non-degreed people into engineers. "Engineer" suggests a level of formal education, not just technical abilities. I know it's weird to suggest, but those that want to be called an "Engineer" could actually pursue a degree in it. I've done it while working and trying to have a family life, so I know it can be done. Maybe I'm the only one, but it bugs me when someone who didn't earn it calls themselves an engineer. And, no, I don't have some kind of inflated ego because of a stupid degree; it's just that I know how much work went into getting it. I think I might be channeling Olin tonight. > Do You Need a Degree? > http://www.ganssle.com/articles/Doyouneedadegree.htm > > An excerpt from that article.. > > "Book learning is very important, but in the end we're paid for what we can > do." >

Rich Graziano wrote: > He eventually decided that music was his passion and went off to pursue > that. I lost touch with him but I learned something about academic > performance and ability. It may be the general rule but it is not likely > the cardinal rule. Personally I've seen a lot of this in my career. In fact, I'd say right now that at my current employer, the non-degreed techs ALL outshine the performance of the degreed techs and Engineers, and have orders of magnitude more passion for their work than many of the long-term degreed engineers. My personal belief is basically that if you WANT to do something bad enough or WANT NOT to go back to your former "life", career, or lower rung on the ladder -- you typically value your job more and do better at it. Far too many degreed Engineers treat that degree like a mandate and walk around with an entitlement attitude a mile wide that says they truly believe they're entitled to their pay, perks, and work conditions JUST because they went the academic route through life. And many of them didn't even pay for that route. If they worked their way through, that usually shows up in their character also, positively. The sad part is, lack of management knowing how to REALLY measure true performance, and the silly HR practices mentioned already -- PROTECT that belief in many degree-holding Engineers, and keep the numbers of non-degreed people that worked their way up "the hard way" who truly want the jobs, from ever getting them. Any company that has hard requirements for degrees based on anything other than law (say, Civil Engineering and a PE for certain roles), is missing out on a LOT of GREAT technicians and people who are far more capable as "Engineers" than some of their dull daddy-paid-for-a-good-school counterparts who fondly remember their frat-party days and couldn't care less about building or fixing things, other than it brings them a nice paycheck to take home to their huge mortgage, er... house in the 'burbs. Nate

dal wheeler wrote: > Maybe I'm impatient, but why should an employer be concerned with > interviewing non-degreed people for a degreed position? I don't think they should be concerned with that, and I don't think anybody really said that they should. You may be barking up the wrong tree... :) I don't think we are talking about "degreed positions" in the sense that a degree is required. This are a few, and usually it's required by law. I think those positions were meant to be excluded from the discussion. This is about positions that require adequate knowledge, and are more "knowledge positions" than "degreed positions". I think in general, requiring a specific degree is not a good way to filter people for a job. (This may be tainted by working a lot in software development, where it's more common than in other areas to find good people that don't have a degree of the correct type.) Knowledge and experience are better criteria; the degree is one indication towards knowledge, but as pretty much all agree, not a good one, and certainly not a specific one. At least for me, I can say that my working knowledge for the type of work I generally do is probably around 90% post-degree. If I had studied biology and then done the same jobs I did, I'd probably be just as good (well, or bad :) as I am now. And my EE degree could have just as well been in HVAC design, which possibly would have helped less in many of my jobs than a degree in math, tilted towards computing. I think the thing is that if you have an applicant that strikes you as interesting, discarding that person for the lack of the specific required degree may not be a wise choice. > There are enough applicants these days to find good candidates among > those that have enough drive to (at the very least) complete the > educational requirement. I'm not so sure. There may be many applicants, but I think finding the "right" person is still not easy. And as the first article cited in this thread explains, there are many other criteria besides the degree. You (almost) never get the ideal candidate, so you have to prioritize. And here comes the question: say you have two top candidates, one with and one without degree. The one without degree can show that she has the required knowledge, maybe the one with degree can't show that otherwise. And the one without degree seems to be a much better team player. So should it be the degree? I think the discussion was more along these lines. Of course, once you get into HR departments that receive thousands of applications for a single job, they'll probably do a pre-filtering based on formal criteria like a degree. And they don't care whether they miss out on the "right" applicant, because in such an organization, it's not about the "right" person, it's about reaching efficiently a sufficient average. > Thats all well and good, but it bugs me that there seems to be an > expectation that employers should automatically "grandfather in" > non-degreed people into engineers. "Engineer" suggests a level of > formal education, not just technical abilities. Since you seem to be from the US... It seems there are some (not usually enforced state) laws that restrict the term "engineer" to people who passed the PE exam. I think they are the minority among the "engineers". So in the same way that you get angry when someone who doesn't have a college degree in engineering calls himself engineer, a PE could get angry when someone with just a college degree calls himself engineer... At the informal end (of what is an engineer) are the criteria of knowledge and experience, at the formal end is the law. Most use the term somewhere in between... > I know it's weird to suggest, but those that want to be called an > "Engineer" could actually pursue a degree in it. I don't think the discussion was about people who "want to be called an engineer"; it was about applicants for jobs that are usually held by people with a degree who don't have one. Or who have the wrong one. My father doesn't have an engineering degree. Nevertheless he worked the latter two thirds of his working life in engineering positions. Not because he thought to "shortcut" any engineers (IMO he has even too high an opinion about what a degree really means), but because he believed in doing things well, and wanted the job. I think that was always a win-win situation for him and his employers, and it would have been sad if both had to miss out on this because of them (stupidly) insisting on a degree in a situation where really knowledge, experience and all the other qualities already mentioned count. Gerhard

Hmmm... I guess I didn't go to a engineering "party school". It's a difficult for me to imagine engineers as "partying on daddy's money" while still graduating with good grades. I too have seen great techs that would easily cross into design. I've also seen some pretty gifted engineers that could also out solder a Chinese assembly line worker. I've seen more than a few lazy slobs in both. I think that if you are passionate about something you will find a way to do it. But, if you make it difficult for yourself, don't expect a lot of understanding from those doing the hiring. That said, we've got a pretty good NDE here; but he'd be the first one to tell you its not the easiest way to maintain a career. I've seen these people in other companies and it is very difficult for them to change jobs, because it would require working from the bottom up again (typically). Management is aware of this so they can get dumped on as a result. I think talent and passion will keep you employed regardless. Good people generally find work fairly quickly. But around here, the degree will open your options a good deal more if you gravitate towards R&D or design. BTW, I'm still waiting for my nice paycheck to afford the huge house in the 'burbs. :) {Quote hidden}> > Any company that has hard requirements for degrees based on anything > other than law (say, Civil Engineering and a PE for certain roles), is > missing out on a LOT of GREAT technicians and people who are far more > capable as "Engineers" than some of their dull > daddy-paid-for-a-good-school counterparts who fondly remember their > frat-party days and couldn't care less about building or fixing things, > other than it brings them a nice paycheck to take home to their huge > mortgage, er... house in the 'burbs. > > >

On Jun 25, 2006, at 8:43 PM, dal wheeler wrote: > he'd be the first one to tell you its not the easiest way to > maintain a career. I've seen these people in other companies > and it is very difficult for them to change jobs... That matches the experience of assorted friends and relatives. In times of significant company loyalty to the employees, a non-degreed engineer can do fine. But if, say, the Internet Bubble pops, your company goes Poof! (and with it your chances of glowing recommendations and identifiable accomplishments), and you find yourself with a mortgage and kids to support at the same time as thousands of people with similar skills, similar resumes, AND college degrees... Well, you'd better have a good nest-egg or many and/or wealthy friends. A 4 year college degree is probably worth 2 or 3 years worth of "real" experience (of the sort that it is very hard to get when you're 18.) It doesn't exercise the SAME skills as actual work, but the skills it does imbue aren't as worthless as some people think. BillW

In today's context it seems that we are chasing for more paper qualification. It is true that with that paper makes us more knowlegable but does it weigh so heavily until I don hire the others that are less qualified? So far the argument is this. No degree not easy to find job - true. No PHD no do research - true. But no PHD in business management can run multinational company. Funny that technical ppl are subjected to such guidelines........ John --- William Chops Westfield <KILLspamwestfwKILLspammac.com> wrote: {Quote hidden}> > On Jun 25, 2006, at 8:43 PM, dal wheeler wrote: > > > he'd be the first one to tell you its not the > easiest way to > > maintain a career. I've seen these people in > other companies > > and it is very difficult for them to change > jobs... > > That matches the experience of assorted friends and > relatives. In > times of significant company loyalty to the > employees, a non-degreed > engineer can do fine. But if, say, the Internet > Bubble pops, your > company goes Poof! (and with it your chances of > glowing recommendations > and identifiable accomplishments), and you find > yourself with a mortgage > and kids to support at the same time as thousands of > people with similar > skills, similar resumes, AND college degrees... > Well, you'd better have > a good nest-egg or many and/or wealthy friends. > > A 4 year college degree is probably worth 2 or 3 > years worth of "real" > experience (of the sort that it is very hard to get > when you're 18.) > It doesn't exercise the SAME skills as actual work, > but the skills it > does imbue aren't as worthless as some people think. > > BillW > > --

>Maybe I'm impatient, but why should an employer be concerned with >interviewing non-degreed people for a degreed position? There are >enough applicants these days to find good candidates among those that >have enough drive to (at the very least) complete the educational >requirement. I see a lot of posts that declare over and over the >virtues of finding that "great guy who taught himself without the need >for school". Thats all well and good, but it bugs me that there seems >to be an expectation that employers should automatically "grandfather >in" non-degreed people into engineers. "Engineer" suggests a level of >formal education, not just technical abilities. I know it's weird to >suggest, but those that want to be called an "Engineer" could actually >pursue a degree in it. I've done it while working and trying to have a >family life, so I know it can be done. Maybe I'm the only one, but it >bugs me when someone who didn't earn it calls themselves an engineer. >And, no, I don't have some kind of inflated ego because of a stupid >degree; it's just that I know how much work went into getting it. I do get the feeling that you are equating "lack of a degree" with "dropped out of school". Possibly not, but that is how it does come across to me. There is room for calling non-degreed people "engineers", and I do consider myself in this group, having completed a polytechnic course as part of my apprenticeship, and receiving a certificate to the effect that I have a "New Zealand Certificate of Engineering". As a person that now has something in the region of 40 years experience in a wide range of electronic equipment, I can see no reason to not be called an engineer. However what I cannot do in NZ is call myself a "Registered Engineer", a title that requires one to have completed a suitable project that meets the requirements of an engineering professional body, that then vets the work done and decides that one is of a suitable calibre to be registered with them. In the UK this same status is called a "Chartered Engineer", and appears to be the title that is slowly growing in use world wide for a person in this position. I do remember at one stage working in a government laboratory, where one of the guys who had his PhD quite openly admitted that he relied on some of the non-degreed technicians to keep him out of trouble, which they could do because of their practical experience, which he didn't have. This is as much engineering as anything taught on a degree course. Similarly I got my present job because I knew practical things that I could demonstrate by sketching circuits and giving reasons for use of things like balanced lines, which people straight out of university with a masters degree couldn't do. These are all just as much engineering as the book learning - if not more so. >Yes, but at the end, he lamented not having completed his degree. Which is why I am doing one now ... but really only because of the artificial "glass ceiling" against those without degrees - which in reality has made the "chartered engineer" status the "new degree" that employers use to sort job applications.

Dal: There are different levels of engineering. I think it may have been Gerhard that mentioned it. Some levels of engineering require ability in very advanced mathematics. These positions are typically not open to engineers who do not have the math that comes at the graduate or post grad level. I had the impression that we were considering those positions where fundamentals of circuit theory, digital and analog design techniques at typical engineering levels were required. There are numerous areas of design where intuitive understanding and creative thinking are sufficient. But if you are designing something like a 15 GHz multiplexing system on a PCB, that includes the oscillator and multipliers, a lot of math analysis is essential? There are some research engineering positions that require going beyond, Fourrier or LaPlace, L'Hospital, etc. But the great majority of engineering position, I think, are not in these areas. I see no real reason why those should not be open to anyone who can be creative enough to do the work. I think it can perhaps be somewhat problematic if or when an engineer has had to work hard to get his or her degree and competes with a non-degreed engineer that eventually becomes the lead engineer or the manager. I am not sure what to say about that except in my organization, I would not consider moving a non-degreed engineer in a supervisory position over a degreed engineer even if the non-degreed engineer was a better organizer and administrator. Keeping peace is important also. I once had two excellent engineers. They were both technically outstanding. But they couldn't stand one another. They would get downright nasty to one another and I had to reprimand them both regularly. But I did not want to loose either so I kept them on projects that did not connect and I would invite them to meetings alternately so they were never in the conference room together. This went on for years. I never could understand what it was that evoked such animosity. But I learned that ill feelings between employees could be very counter productive. So, I would not open up the kind of resentments that could be destructive by placing a non-degreed person over a degreed person. I am sure some will disagree. {Original Message removed}

On Sun, Jun 25, 2006 at 10:19:36PM -0700, William Chops Westfield wrote: {Quote hidden}> > On Jun 25, 2006, at 8:43 PM, dal wheeler wrote: > > > he'd be the first one to tell you its not the easiest way to > > maintain a career. I've seen these people in other companies > > and it is very difficult for them to change jobs... > > That matches the experience of assorted friends and relatives. In > times of significant company loyalty to the employees, a non-degreed > engineer can do fine. But if, say, the Internet Bubble pops, your > company goes Poof! (and with it your chances of glowing recommendations > and identifiable accomplishments), and you find yourself with a mortgage > and kids to support at the same time as thousands of people with similar > skills, similar resumes, AND college degrees... Well, you'd better have > a good nest-egg or many and/or wealthy friends. > > A 4 year college degree is probably worth 2 or 3 years worth of "real" > experience (of the sort that it is very hard to get when you're 18.) > It doesn't exercise the SAME skills as actual work, but the skills it > does imbue aren't as worthless as some people think. I'm in the middle of a 4-year arts degree, every single thing I make uses stacks of complex technology in the fields of electronics, computer science, and machining. Add in some contract work and I've got a few years of "industry" experience. At my school people who have already gotten engineering degrees, even in electrical engineering and computer science and who worked in industry for awhile, ask me for advice on building things all the time. That said, I'm still very seriously considering getting a second degree once I graduate. It'd be worth it just to get a better understanding of math for one. And this is my thinking *regardless* of if I can launch a successfull arts career, if I do, I'll just get my degree part time. What can I say, it took me a good 4 days of solid work to to figure out the math needed to display and rotate a wireframe cube on a PIC chip. That's just basic high-school matrix math. If I'm going to ever be able to write something like a PID algorithm I've got a lot of studying ahead of me. -- spamBeGonepetespamBeGonepetertodd.ca http://www.petertodd.ca

Rich Graziano wrote: > I think it can perhaps be somewhat problematic if or when an engineer > has had to work hard to get his or her degree and competes with a > non-degreed engineer that eventually becomes the lead engineer or the > manager. I am not sure what to say about that except in my organization, I > would not consider moving a non-degreed engineer in a supervisory position > over a degreed engineer even if the non-degreed engineer was a better > organizer and administrator. I think this is possibly common and possibly necessary to keep the peace with all the egos floating around in the workspace, but in essence, it's counterproductive. As is that the one higher up in the management chain has to make more money than the lower ones. I've been in charge of projects with /very/ good specialists on board; they were much better than I was in certain fields, they sometimes had higher degrees, and they sometimes made more money than I did. But my job wasn't to be better than everybody on my team, my job was to make the team work, to make sure everybody has everything she needs to be productive, provide the infrastructure, coordinate the work of every individual with everybody else and the client, and so on -- project management work. And for every single of those very good specialists it would have been a big mistake to put him in charge of the project -- that's /not/ what they were good at. And they knew that. So we got along quite well. > I am sure some will disagree. Here you got it... :) Gerhard

William ChopsWestfield wrote: > That matches the experience of assorted friends and relatives. In times > of significant company loyalty to the employees, a non-degreed engineer > can do fine. But if, say, the Internet Bubble pops, your company goes > Poof! (and with it your chances of glowing recommendations and > identifiable accomplishments), and you find yourself with a mortgage and > kids to support at the same time as thousands of people with similar > skills, similar resumes, AND college degrees... Well, you'd better have > a good nest-egg or many and/or wealthy friends. I think nobody suggested it wouldn't be better for the individual to get a degree, as a career fertilizer, so to speak. But that's a different perspective than the hiring person looking at a few resumes and maybe not discarding the one that's not degreed. Here comes also the question how you treat foreign degrees. Most degrees are not valid outside of a certain area. Like mine (German) is not valid neither in the USA nor in Brazil. So what does that mean when I'm in Brazil? I'm not an engineer? A Brazilian engineer can rightfully claim that, and I don't call myself an engineer here (nor in the USA). But I don't think I lost it all when I moved across the border... :) Gerhard

On Mon, Jun 26, 2006 at 09:35:01AM -0300, Gerhard Fiedler wrote: > > What can I say, it took me a good 4 days of solid work to to figure out > > the math needed to display and rotate a wireframe cube on a PIC chip. > > That's just basic high-school matrix math. > > Don't kid yourself into thinking that this might go faster for every > engineer out there... Well, I can add it took me a good 3 days on top of that to figure out I needed matrixes to do proper rotations, I had some pretty funny looking results before that... > Seriously, many haven't use more math than is required to check a bill > since they got their degree. The selection that's active here is probably > not representative. Oh that's definetely true I'm sure. It was amusing watching my boss try to remember the math behind IIR filters last time he needed it... This is from someone with a PhD specificly in computer audio. Hadn't touched the stuff in years. > > If I'm going to ever be able to write something like a PID algorithm I've > > got a lot of studying ahead of me. > > Knowing you, I'd say "another 4 days"... :) I hope... Nah, what I'm really worried about for that wireframe project is I have to figure out the math to take a x,y,z reading from an acellerometer and convert it into a two part roll (whatever is the proper terminology for that) to rotate my wireframe model. Don't have the clue how I'm going to do it. Don't even know if it's an easy problem or a hard one. At least with an education that touched it I'd have a vague memory of where to start, even if it took me another 4 days to relearn all the details I'd forgotten! -- TakeThisOuTpeteEraseMEspam_OUTpetertodd.ca http://www.petertodd.ca

On Jun 26, 2006, at 1:05 AM, John Chung wrote: > > But no PHD in business management can run > multinational company. Heh. Cisco's first CEO (the one you've never heard of) had a PhD in Physics. When we got venture funding, one of the first things the VCs did was to fire him, since "Physicist" were NOT the sort of image they wanted "company about to go public" to project. In the realm of college classes I didn't have, I wish there had been one or two semesters about MONEY, both from a personal (investing) and a business (invest-ee) perspective. In between personal, small business, medium business, venture capital, evaluating compensation packages, business internal accounting (capital expenditure spending limits and their abuse), signs that the company you're working for is going broke, etc, there should be plenty that everyone should know at least a little bit about... (of course, ignorance has its own rewards. Conventional advice for people who were working at cisco when we went public was to sell all the stock options you could and diversify. I suspect some people did just that (at an equivalent price of about $0.10)) BillW

On 6/27/06, William Chops Westfield <westfwEraseME.....mac.com> wrote: > > On Jun 26, 2006, at 1:05 AM, John Chung wrote: > > > > But no PHD in business management can run > > multinational company. Actually this is not true. http://www.siemens.com/index.jsp?sdc_p=ft4mls4uo1042401i1030112pcz3&sdc_bcpath=1327885.s_0,:1030112.s_4,&sdc_sid=16802762616& Klaus Kleinfeld, Dr. rer. pol., Dipl.-Kfm. President and Chief Executive Officer of Siemens AG He earned a Master's degree in Business Administration/Economics from the University of Goettingen (Germany) in 1982, followed by a Ph.D. in Strategic Management from the University of Wuerzburg (Germany) in 1992. > Heh. Cisco's first CEO (the one you've never heard of) had > a PhD in Physics. When we got venture funding, one of the > first things the VCs did was to fire him, since "Physicist" > were NOT the sort of image they wanted "company about to go > public" to project. > That is a bit odd. There are many CEOs with Engineering degree and start as an engineer. A physicist can be a good engineer. Regards, Xiaofan

William ChopsWestfield wrote: >> But I don't think [a German degree] isrecognized for anything >> formal -- anything where a degree is really /required/. > > You keep talking about those positions, but I don't know that I've ever > seen such a position in the US within the realm of EE/CS, except for > university professors... IANL, but here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_Engineer they say: "The exact licensing procedure can vary from state to state, but the general process is: 1. Graduate with a degree from an accredited four-year university program in engineering. [...]" "The title "Engineer" is legally protected in many states, meaning that it is unlawful to use it unless permission is specifically granted by a state, through a professional engineering license, an industrial exemption, or certain other non-professional engineering licenses such as Operating Engineer." I think I have said before that I never have been in a situation where something like this was important, and I probably could get my degree recognized somehow if it was... at least by paying a university for it :) Gerhard

On 6/27/06, Gerhard Fiedler <EraseMElistsconnectionbrazil.com> wrote: {Quote hidden}> William ChopsWestfield wrote: > > >> But I don't think [a German degree] isrecognized for anything > >> formal -- anything where a degree is really /required/. > > > > You keep talking about those positions, but I don't know that I've ever > > seen such a position in the US within the realm of EE/CS, except for > > university professors... > > IANL, but here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_Engineer they say: > > "The exact licensing procedure can vary from state to state, but the > general process is: 1. Graduate with a degree from an accredited four-year > university program in engineering. [...]" > > "The title "Engineer" is legally protected in many states, meaning that it > is unlawful to use it unless permission is specifically granted by a state, > through a professional engineering license, an industrial exemption, or > certain other non-professional engineering licenses such as Operating > Engineer." > > > I think I have said before that I never have been in a situation where > something like this was important, and I probably could get my degree > recognized somehow if it was... at least by paying a university for it :) > > Gerhard > "Professional Engineer" is not equal to "Engineer". In order to be a PE, even a US graduated engineer needs to go for some tests. And actually one of my university classmates is now trying to pass the test in Canada (Toronto area). His degree (BS and MSc) were earned in China.

On Jun 26, 2006, at 5:57 PM, Gerhard Fiedler wrote: > "The exact licensing procedure can vary from state to state, > but the general process is: 1. Graduate with a degree from > an accredited four-year university program in engineering. I think you gloss over the rest of the requirements, which I include below: The exact licensing procedure can vary from state to state, but the general process is: 1. Graduate with a degree from an accredited four-year university program in engineering. 2. Complete a standard Fundamentals of Engineering (FE) written examination, which tests applicants on breadth of understanding of basic engineering principles, and optionally some elements of an engineering specialty. Completion of the first two steps typically qualifies for certification in the U.S. as an Engineer-In-Training (EIT). 3. Accumulate at least four years of engineering experience under the supervision of a P.E. 4. Complete a written Professional Engineering Examination, testing the applicant's knowledge and skills in a chosen engineering discipline (mechanical, electrical, civil, etc.), as well as engineering ethics. Of these, I think (1) is the easiest to accomplish, and the most likely to be flexible... > I think I have said before that I never have been in a > situation where something like this was important, and > I probably could get my degree recognized somehow if > it was... at least by paying a university for it :) > I have little doubt that your German Engineering degree would be accepted as step 1 here (I could be completely wrong.) That means you just have to take those tests and get the four years "journeyman" experience under an existing PE, which is likely to be the tough part. The "profession engineer" is sort of the official union-style apprentice/etc track, that has been rejected as inefficient by most of the high-tech industries. I've never seen a job that required "professional engineer" status, nor offered professional engineer as a potential perk after the four years experience had been garnered. Such things might still happen in SOME fields of engineering ("public works" like power station and grid engineering? Designing nuclear power plants?), but like I said, I haven't seen in in the computer or electronics industry. (Ok, I surfed over to jobs.com and typed "professional engineer." The results pretty much match my expectations: professional civil engineer, professional structural engineer, power systems engineer, etc. It's actually a sort of interesting list...) BillW

On 6/26/06, Wouter van Ooijen <RemoveMEwouterEraseMEEraseMEvoti.nl> wrote: > > A 4 year college degree is probably worth 2 or 3 years worth of "real" > > experience (of the sort that it is very hard to get when you're 18.) > > That is probably true in some fields, but in my experience (IME?) the > reverse can also be true. Hard mathematical/statistical/theoretical > stuff is difficult to get in a practical environment, just as the > reverse (practical expericence) is hard to get at any sort of school. These are both true as forward and reverse equation. Unfortunately a pretty good graduating student with his brain full of math is unable to make any difference between a thyristor and the doors knob. If he wants to become a teoretician, will be a perfect choice, but he has no chance as practical (meaning design, manufacturing, repairing etc) engineer. Unfortunately the actual school (at least in Romania) prepare the engineers for anything else than real life, because the teachers are also very good teoreticians, and just that. Vasile

One could make the case in America that a good technician makes a successful engineer :-) ----- Original Message ----- From: "Xiaofan Chen" <RemoveMExiaofancTakeThisOuTspamgmail.com> To: "Microcontroller discussion list - Public." <EraseMEpiclistspamspamBeGonemit.edu> Sent: Monday, June 26, 2006 10:52 PM Subject: Re: [OT] What Makes an Engineer Succesful {Quote hidden}> On 6/27/06, Gerhard Fiedler <RemoveMElistsKILLspamconnectionbrazil.com> wrote: >> William ChopsWestfield wrote: >> >> >> But I don't think [a German degree] isrecognized for anything >> >> formal -- anything where a degree is really /required/. >> > >> > You keep talking about those positions, but I don't know that I've ever >> > seen such a position in the US within the realm of EE/CS, except for >> > university professors... >> >> IANL, but here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_Engineer they >> say: >> >> "The exact licensing procedure can vary from state to state, but the >> general process is: 1. Graduate with a degree from an accredited >> four-year >> university program in engineering. [...]" >> >> "The title "Engineer" is legally protected in many states, meaning that >> it >> is unlawful to use it unless permission is specifically granted by a >> state, >> through a professional engineering license, an industrial exemption, or >> certain other non-professional engineering licenses such as Operating >> Engineer." >> >> >> I think I have said before that I never have been in a situation where >> something like this was important, and I probably could get my degree >> recognized somehow if it was... at least by paying a university for it :) >> >> Gerhard >> > > "Professional Engineer" is not equal to "Engineer". In order to be a > PE, even a US graduated engineer needs to go for some tests. And > actually one of my university classmates is now trying to pass the > test in Canada (Toronto area). His degree (BS and MSc) were > earned in China. > --

{Quote hidden}>From: "Xiaofan Chen" <xiaofancSTOPspamspam_OUTgmail.com> >Reply-To: "Microcontroller discussion list - Public." <spamBeGonepiclistSTOPspamEraseMEmit.edu> >To: "Microcontroller discussion list - Public." <KILLspampiclistspamBeGonemit.edu> >Subject: Re: [OT] What Makes an Engineer Succesful >Date: Tue, 27 Jun 2006 10:52:04 +0800 > >On 6/27/06, Gerhard Fiedler <EraseMElistsEraseMEconnectionbrazil.com> wrote: > > William ChopsWestfield wrote: > > > > >> But I don't think [a German degree] isrecognized for anything > > >> formal -- anything where a degree is really /required/. > > > > > > You keep talking about those positions, but I don't know that I've >ever > > > seen such a position in the US within the realm of EE/CS, except for > > > university professors... > > > > IANL, but here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_Engineer they >say: > > > > "The exact licensing procedure can vary from state to state, but the > > general process is: 1. Graduate with a degree from an accredited >four-year > > university program in engineering. [...]" > > > > "The title "Engineer" is legally protected in many states, meaning that >it > > is unlawful to use it unless permission is specifically granted by a >state, > > through a professional engineering license, an industrial exemption, or > > certain other non-professional engineering licenses such as Operating > > Engineer." > > > > > > I think I have said before that I never have been in a situation where > > something like this was important, and I probably could get my degree > > recognized somehow if it was... at least by paying a university for it >:) > > > > Gerhard > > > >"Professional Engineer" is not equal to "Engineer". In order to be a >PE, even a US graduated engineer needs to go for some tests. And >actually one of my university classmates is now trying to pass the >test in Canada (Toronto area). His degree (BS and MSc) were >earned in China. >

Darrell Wyatt wrote: {Quote hidden}>> From: "Xiaofan Chen" <@spam@xiaofanc@spam@spam_OUTgmail.com> >> Reply-To: "Microcontroller discussion list - Public." <spamBeGonepiclistKILLspammit.edu> >> To: "Microcontroller discussion list - Public." <.....piclistspam_OUTmit.edu> >> Subject: Re: [OT] What Makes an Engineer Succesful >> Date: Tue, 27 Jun 2006 10:52:04 +0800 >> >> On 6/27/06, Gerhard Fiedler <TakeThisOuTlists.....TakeThisOuTconnectionbrazil.com> wrote: >> >>> William ChopsWestfield wrote: >>> >>> >>>>> But I don't think [a German degree] isrecognized for anything >>>>> formal -- anything where a degree is really /required/. >>>>> >>>> You keep talking about those positions, but I don't know that I've >>>> >> ever >> >>>> seen such a position in the US within the realm of EE/CS, except for >>>> university professors... >>>> >>> IANL, but here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_Engineer they >>> >> say: >> >>> "The exact licensing procedure can vary from state to state, but the >>> general process is: 1. Graduate with a degree from an accredited >>> >> four-year >> >>> university program in engineering. [...]" >>> >>> "The title "Engineer" is legally protected in many states, meaning that >>> >> it >> >>> is unlawful to use it unless permission is specifically granted by a >>> >> state, >> >>> through a professional engineering license, an industrial exemption, or >>> certain other non-professional engineering licenses such as Operating >>> Engineer." >>> >>> >>> I think I have said before that I never have been in a situation where >>> something like this was important, and I probably could get my degree >>> recognized somehow if it was... at least by paying a university for it >>> >> :) >> >>> Gerhard >>> >>> >> "Professional Engineer" is not equal to "Engineer". In order to be a >> PE, even a US graduated engineer needs to go for some tests. And >> actually one of my university classmates is now trying to pass the >> test in Canada (Toronto area). His degree (BS and MSc) were >> earned in China. >> --

{Quote hidden}> -----Original Message----- > From: TakeThisOuTpiclist-bouncesKILLspamspammit.edu > [.....piclist-bouncesRemoveMEmit.edu] On Behalf Of Gerhard Fiedler > Sent: Monday, June 26, 2006 6:58 PM > To: RemoveMEpiclistspamBeGonemit.edu > Subject: Re: [OT] What Makes an Engineer Succesful > > William ChopsWestfield wrote: > > >> But I don't think [a German degree] isrecognized for anything > >> formal -- anything where a degree is really /required/. > > > > You keep talking about those positions, but I don't know > that I've ever > > seen such a position in the US within the realm of EE/CS, except for > > university professors... > > IANL, but here > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_Engineer they say: > Comments on PE licensing, since it was brought up. http://www.ncees.org/ is the organization which handles most (all?) EIT and PE testing in the US. It has plenty of information on the process and links to all of the state licensing boards. I just got notice that I passed the FE exam that I took last April, which makes me an Engineer-in-Training. As much as anything I took it as a mental exercise, just to see if I could, almost 30 years after my BSEE degree. Was interesting, as probably the oldest person sitting in the exam room with ~50 undergraduates - many didn't seem well prepared. I hadn't prepared as well as I thought I should, but the test really turned out to be pretty straightforward. The part I don't understand is the low pass rates (posted on the ncees site) for EE's, just about the lowest of all disciplines. Overall the pass rates for the FE and PE exams are only about 2/3, so the exams really aren't a walk. Maybe the EE's tend to slack more in the mechanical, chemical and other subjects that are on the general part of the exam. At the moment I'm filling out the application for the PE exam. I might as well since I've come this far. Employer pays for it anyway. Although, I have never had a need for a PE, or even known an EE PE. The prestige thing may be part of it, but who knows? It might be handy to have in the future. Gary Crowell Micron Technology

Two things that are vital to focus missed for sure :) ( on top of all those brain, brave & black magic things ) 1. Cool & quite climate in the "think tank" room 2. "Endless" cup of good strong tea or coffee ( who prefers what :) WBR Dmitriy. GÃkhan SEVER wrote: {Quote hidden}> > "What Makes an Engineer Successful", by Walter W. Frey > > IEEE Potentials, Volume 16, Issue 5, December 1997 - January 1998 > > After working as an engineer for over 35 years, I now conclude that a > successful career depends on understanding what engineering is, academic > performance, and personality. And these considerations are not all important > for the right reasons. > > Engineering is the art of applying scientific principles to solve a problem. > It is not a separate area of science such as physics. Engineering projects > are bound by three variables: the number of problems to solve, the funds > available to solve these problems, and the delivery date of the finished > items. The catch is you can only fix two of the variables, while the third > is determined by the others. > > Although a modicum of academic performance is necessary to graduate, a high > GPA does not predicate a successful career. The real indicators for > engineering performance reside in a person's personality traits, ability to > think innovatively, and skill in interacting with others. Personnel > departments (often for legal reasons) stay away from trying to rate these > subjective areas and stick to easily quantified areas, i.e., "GPA, class > standing, etc." Thus, many potentially good engineers are turned away due to > poor grades. > > The following subjective areas also are necessary for a successful > engineering career: > > Curiosity - The desire to find out how things work, or why they don't. The > engineer notes the good and the bad approaches to the problem. > > Perseverance - This trait is needed to stay with a problem even though the > solution is not adequate or eludes or seems to fight the engineer. However, > this must be not be carried to an extreme, i.e., it becomes a futile > obsession. Also, oftentimes a problem will have to be temporarily shelved to > work on projects which will produce more immediate results. > > Self-confidence - The engineer knows his or her capabilities and problem > areas; for example, he or she has a tendency to settle on the first solution > that presents itself. > > Common sense - The ability to make decisions on partial or contradictory > information. It is also used to balance perseverance against what is best > for the overall program. > > Sense of humor - This trait is necessary to keep from getting depressed when > the solution has been elusive and all sorts of irrelevant problems are > obscuring the answer. Humor is also very useful in handling personality > problems with subordinates and/or superiors. > > Ingenuity - This means the engineer is not limited to the "by the book" way > of doing things. This person is open to unique or unproved solutions to > difficult problems; he or she is willing to take a chance if the potential > gains are great. > > Communication - Engineering is an occupation that depends on the exchange > and interpretation of ideas. An engineer must be aware of how others have > tried to solve a problem. This knowledge often presents itself when > engineers get together arid talk shop. Very often, the solution requires > merging the best parts of competing solutions into a unified approach. > However, this is not the same as when, stuff is included just to keep > everyone happy. This "team approach" typically results in mediocre products. > > Luck - Luck is always useful since "no amount of planning will replace dumb > luck." However, good planning and contingency planning often help or are > confused with luck. > > Altogether, these eight attributes will more greatly affect one's > performance as an engineer than his or her GPA. > > About the author - Walter W. Frey is an IEEE Life Senior. >

gacrowell@micron.com wrote: > The part I don't understand is the low pass rates (posted on the ncees > site) for EE's, just about the lowest of all disciplines. Overall the > pass rates for the FE and PE exams are only about 2/3, so the exams > really aren't a walk. Maybe the EE's tend to slack more in the > mechanical, chemical and other subjects that are on the general part of > the exam. One reason may be that there is a very small number of EEs that need the PE. This is different in other disciplines. A friend of mine is a French chemist specialized on waste treatment; she has to take certification exams whenever she moves to another country (first to the US, then to Canada), as she's working mostly on public waste treatment plants. For such people, these certifications are essential, for most EEs they are a "prestige thing" or "maybe handy sometime" as you say -- so maybe on average they don't take it as seriously. Gerhard

Yes. Hard theoratical stuff are required to be studied extensively. There are times when education give a upper hand but still require testing of one's knowledge as how much did he/she understand in Uni :) John --- Wouter van Ooijen <TakeThisOuTwouterspamvoti.nl> wrote: {Quote hidden}> > A 4 year college degree is probably worth 2 or 3 > years worth of "real" > > experience (of the sort that it is very hard to > get when you're 18.) > > That is probably true in some fields, but in my > experience (IME?) the > reverse can also be true. Hard > mathematical/statistical/theoretical > stuff is difficult to get in a practical > environment, just as the > reverse (practical expericence) is hard to get at > any sort of school. > > Wouter van Ooijen > > -- ------------------------------------------- > Van Ooijen Technische Informatica: http://www.voti.nl > consultancy, development, PICmicro products > docent Hogeschool van Utrecht: http://www.voti.nl/hvu > > > --

On Jun 25, 2006, at 11:19 PM, William Chops Westfield wrote: > > On Jun 25, 2006, at 8:43 PM, dal wheeler wrote: > >> he'd be the first one to tell you its not the easiest way to >> maintain a career. I've seen these people in other companies >> and it is very difficult for them to change jobs... > > That matches the experience of assorted friends and relatives. In > times of significant company loyalty to the employees, a non-degreed > engineer can do fine. But if, say, the Internet Bubble pops, your > company goes Poof! (and with it your chances of glowing > recommendations > and identifiable accomplishments), and you find yourself with a > mortgage > and kids to support at the same time as thousands of people with > similar > skills, similar resumes, AND college degrees... Well, you'd better > have > a good nest-egg or many and/or wealthy friends. Been there, done that. Lost the nest egg, after being employee #42 of over 500 at a company that built very nice data centers. Was the first "engineer" assigned to maintain a site while we built 18 of them, and was the 3rd hired into the Corporate HQ Operations group after we built #3. At the pop (literally two months after 9/11), I was the second most expensive "Operations" person -- but they never asked if I was interested in staying to maintain what I built and knew like the back of my hand at a lower salary... so the nest egg I thankfully built with the bubble money was *poofed*, as you say. > A 4 year college degree is probably worth 2 or 3 years worth of "real" > experience (of the sort that it is very hard to get when you're 18.) > It doesn't exercise the SAME skills as actual work, but the skills it > does imbue aren't as worthless as some people think. I'm having a hard time deciding what it's worth in my mid-30's though. Another "poof" and I could find myself eating up another nest egg I've been slowly working on. The market is due for a very long prolonged downturn in the U.S. as the Baby Boomers retire without enough money in savings to keep the government from taxing the beejeezus out of us "young-uns"... I can already see that coming from a macroeconomic perspective (yes, I do have SOME college courses done), so I'm hunting around for what Boomers will by paying for with that government money (long-term care, home health care, stuff they get to write off on their taxes -- because they'll all be trying to hold on to the little that they've bothered to save) and of course, secondary things like "Who's going to make money when the Boomers SELL OFF major things and who's going to lose money on them (short 'em)." I guess I'll know if my strategy worked in 30 or so more years... First Warren Buffet stops investing stating that cash is more worthwhile to his shareholders, and then he starts giving all his personal cash away -- a sure sign the world is coming to an end, eh? Heh heh. :-) But back to the topic at hand... what's adding a degree to a resume' worth to a 30-something who's been supporting and building stuff for his entire career? I certainly don't need the "3 years experience" to tack on at this point. But I do need that "foot in the door in bad times". It's a harder analysis than watching Boomer's slide through their natural economic life-cycle! :-) In down times, it's key. In "normal" times or good times, worthless... so it's really hard to do an Opportunity Cost analysis. Not enough data. Can not compute. Heh ... such is life. Nate

On 6/28/06, Gerhard Fiedler <listsEraseMEconnectionbrazil.com> wrote: > Alan B. Pearce wrote: > > > I do remember on my CV when I went for my current job "fiddling" it by > > saying "nearly 30 years experience" for something like 28 years, to get > > it that bit more noticed. > > I don't know... I get the feeling that in EE/CS, focusing on more than ten > years experience may not be that good -- having it or not :) The industry > is moving fast, and hirers (more often than not with less experience than > 30 years) may associate long experience with outdated knowledge. > That depends on the field, CS perhaps will always moving very fast. In EE, some of the fields are not moving that fast. For example, analog electronics engineer do needs a lot of years to get the experience. I will soon go for a training and there are plenty of engineers there with 20+ years of experience in hardware/firmware. This is a big industrial automation company. In this industry, Ethernet is considered quite new. In fact, fieldbus technologies are all quite new. Regards, Xiaofan

Peter, On Mon, 26 Jun 2006 09:23:18 -0400, Peter Todd wrote: {Quote hidden}>... > Nah, what I'm really worried about for that wireframe project > is I have to figure out the math to take a x,y,z reading from an > acellerometer and convert it into a two part roll (whatever is the > proper terminology for that) to rotate my wireframe model. > > Don't have the clue how I'm going to do it. Don't even know if it's an > easy problem or a hard one. At least with an education that touched it > I'd have a vague memory of where to start, even if it took me another 4 > days to relearn all the details I'd forgotten! Isn't it fairly straightforward Trigonometry? Solve the vector for x & y then for this and z? Where: x is the magnitude of the x-axis movement (have to resolve the previous speed and the current acceleration into a distance moved in a fixed, small, time period) y is the magnitude of the y-axis movement z is the magnitude of the z-axis movement By Pythagoras: A = SQRT(x^2 + y^2) this is the magnitude of the resultant of x and y. The angle between this resultant and the x axis is arcTan(y / x) B = SQRT(A^2 + z^2) this is the magnitude of the final resultant. The angle between this and the x-y plane is arcTan(z / A) So you now know how far to move (B), and the direction to move (the two angles). You'll have to work out the signs to get the overall direction right, but a quick test should soon solve that - probably quicker than thinking it through! :-) Of course, it's over thirty since I did this stuff, but it flashed back to me. Hopefully correctly, but you never know! :-) As for the matrix calculations, you're on your own - I haven't done those since I was 11... Cheers, Howard Winter St.Albans, England

On Fri, Jun 30, 2006 at 04:24:13PM +0100, Howard Winter wrote: {Quote hidden}> Peter, > > On Mon, 26 Jun 2006 09:23:18 -0400, Peter Todd wrote: > > >... > > Nah, what I'm really worried about for that wireframe project > > is I have to figure out the math to take a x,y,z reading from an > > acellerometer and convert it into a two part roll (whatever is the > > proper terminology for that) to rotate my wireframe model. > > > > Don't have the clue how I'm going to do it. Don't even know if it's an > > easy problem or a hard one. At least with an education that touched it > > I'd have a vague memory of where to start, even if it took me another 4 > > days to relearn all the details I'd forgotten! > > Isn't it fairly straightforward Trigonometry? Solve the vector for x & y then for this and z? > > Where: > x is the magnitude of the x-axis movement (have to resolve the previous speed and the current acceleration > into a distance moved in a fixed, small, time period) > y is the magnitude of the y-axis movement > z is the magnitude of the z-axis movement I think those definitions are incorrect. x, y, and z are acellerations along their respective axises. However I think to try to integrate them into a distance moved isn't possible. Essentially, take the device and orient it with z perpendicular to gravity. Now rotate it around the x axis. The y value will look like a sign-wave as it's value is essentially something based on sin() So how are you going to know if that is meaning accelleration, or rotation, without a gyroscopic component to directly measure rotation? {Quote hidden}> By Pythagoras: > > A = SQRT(x^2 + y^2) this is the magnitude of the resultant of x and y. > The angle between this resultant and the x axis is arcTan(y / x) > > B = SQRT(A^2 + z^2) this is the magnitude of the final resultant. > The angle between this and the x-y plane is arcTan(z / A) > > So you now know how far to move (B), and the direction to move (the two angles). You'll have to work out the > signs to get the overall direction right, but a quick test should soon solve that - probably quicker than > thinking it through! :-) As above, if I'm not mistaken your approach may work, but I think only if the orientation of the device is fixed. My problem is the opposite. My intuitive thinking on it is essentially that if I were trying to calculate small angular movements, say +-10degrees on x and y, it'd be some simple trig to convert that into "rotate about x, then rotate about y" angular co-ordinates. But given that I have three coordinates, x, y, z, my intuition tells me that turning that into two values will be tough. Especially given that one of the two value's, y, has a meaning that changes depending on what the other is because of that "rotate about x, *then* rotate about y" meaning. Oh well, I'm sure reading up on more angular coordinate math will help. > Of course, it's over thirty since I did this stuff, but it flashed back to me. Hopefully correctly, but you > never know! :-) As for the matrix calculations, you're on your own - I haven't done those since I was 11... Damn smug and lazy child prodigys! :) -- RemoveMEpeteEraseMEspam_OUTpetertodd.ca http://www.petertodd.ca

On Sat, Jul 01, 2006 at 01:51:38AM -0300, Gerhard Fiedler wrote: > Peter Todd wrote: > > > I think those definitions are incorrect. x, y, and z are acellerations > > along their respective axises. However I think to try to integrate them > > into a distance moved isn't possible. > > I'm not sure about your setup, but it seems to me that without additional > assumptions you can't convert acceleration into rotation. Think about it: > you can rotate a point as long as you want, it won't accelerate. You only > get acceleration along a line (of movement) -- which requires a defined > distance from the center of rotation. If you don't know the distance (and > direction) from the center of the rotation to the point where you measure > the acceleration, I'm not sure you can know what you are measuring. I think you're right, but fortunately I have a very important assumption I'm depending on, I'm only looking for the static angular position of the cube and I happen to be near a couple quintillion tonnes of mass, IE earth. So the only accelleration present is that due to gravity and I only care about the cubes angle in reference to gravity. I'm also assuming that it's ok if rotations perpendicular to gravity, ie rotations about z, get ignored. Of course if someone moves the device I'll get some funny "banking" effects, due to the non-gravitational acelleration, but that's no big deal in this application. > To me it seems your problem is physical/mechanical before mathematical. > Matrices are just a more generic way to deal with vectors -- but first you > have to know which vectors :) Agreed! -- EraseMEpete@spam@petertodd.ca http://www.petertodd.ca

Peter, On Fri, 30 Jun 2006 21:51:28 -0400, Peter Todd wrote: {Quote hidden}> On Fri, Jun 30, 2006 at 04:24:13PM +0100, Howard Winter wrote: >... > > Isn't it fairly straightforward Trigonometry? Solve the vector for x & y then for this and z? >... > > Where: > > x is the magnitude of the x-axis movement (have to resolve the previous speed and the current acceleration > > into a distance moved in a fixed, small, time period) > > y is the magnitude of the y-axis movement > > z is the magnitude of the z-axis movement > > I think those definitions are incorrect. x, y, and z are acellerations > along their respective axises. However I think to try to integrate them > into a distance moved isn't possible. I can't see how else you'd do it - take a sufficiantly small time period and any movement, even rotation, looks like a straight line. I was then resolving these into a single vector that points in the direction of rotation at that moment in time. > Essentially, take the device and orient it with z perpendicular to > gravity. Now rotate it around the x axis. The y value will look like a > sign-wave as it's value is essentially something based on sin() Yes, but only because the Earth's gravity is acting on it. You couldn't detect rotation about the vertical axis from acceleration because it's constant all the way round in the two sensors in the plane of rotation, and zero in the other. Unless the object is contrained to *only* rotate, and not move in space - I don't remember if this was part of the problem definition. > So how are you going to know if that is meaning accelleration, or > rotation, without a gyroscopic component to directly measure rotation? I can't, because at step 1 I used a timescale short enough to mask the rotation. In fact if you only have one accelerometer in each plane, I'm not sure you can tell rotation from linear acceleration in a reasonably short time anyway, (if x and y are showing the same acceleration it may be rotating about z, or it may be accelerating in a straight line at 45 degrees to x and y). Only by looking at the signals for some time would you see the sine wave, and I'm not sure if you have that much time to react? >... > > As for the matrix calculations, you're on your own - I haven't done those since I was 11... > > Damn smug and lazy child prodigys! :) Quite the reverse! (Well, I am lazy :-) I went to a primary school that did what was later called "Modern Maths" - Matrices, Venn diagrams, different number bases, and so on. When I went to Grammar school (at age 11) they did Traditional Maths, with lots of arithmetic, "Problems", and so on. In my first Maths test there I scored zero! And I never had a decent Maths teacher from that point on (they were all teachers of something else, pressed into doing Maths because of a shortage of "proper" Maths teachers). I have to understand things to work with them, and it seems there are some things in Maths that you just have to accept without really understanding them, and as a result I never "got" some vital parts (complex numbers, Integration beyond it being the reverse of Differentiation...), and ended up failing Maths "A Level". But Geometry, I get! :))) Cheers, Howard Winter St.Albans, England

{Quote hidden}>-----Original Message----- >From: spamBeGonepiclist-bouncesEraseMEmit.edu [piclist-bouncesspamBeGonemit.edu] >Sent: 04 July 2006 13:00 >To: Microcontroller discussion list - Public. >Subject: Re: [OT] What Makes an Engineer Succesful > >Quite the reverse! (Well, I am lazy :-) I went to a primary >school that did what was later called "Modern >Maths" - Matrices, Venn diagrams, different number bases, and >so on. When I went to Grammar school (at age >11) they did Traditional Maths, with lots of arithmetic, >"Problems", and so on. In my first Maths test there >I scored zero! And I never had a decent Maths teacher from >that point on (they were all teachers of something >else, pressed into doing Maths because of a shortage of >"proper" Maths teachers). I have to understand things >to work with them, and it seems there are some things in Maths >that you just have to accept without really >understanding them, and as a result I never "got" some vital >parts (complex numbers, Integration beyond it >being the reverse of Differentiation...), and ended up failing >Maths "A Level". Howard, All the best people fail their maths A level! Like you I had an awful time trying to grasp some of the more abstract theories, and my teachers response was: "I've told you once, if you don't understand it find out for yourself as I don't want to waste the rest of the classes time". I've always tried to dsicover and learn things for myself, but sometimes you need a nudge in the right direction. I was very smug when I got a B in Physics though, much to the maths teachers disbelief. Physics had some fairly heavy maths, but you got to see the maths working in the real world! When I went to Uni, I took extra maths classes, and the lecturer was simply a revelation. Things that I had never understood through high school suddenly clicked into place when she explained them. Regards Mike ======================================================================= This e-mail is intended for the person it is addressed to only. The information contained in it may be confidential and/or protected by law. If you are not the intended recipient of this message, you must not make any use of this information, or copy or show it to any person. Please contact us immediately to tell us that you have received this e-mail, and return the original to us. Any use, forwarding, printing or copying of this message is strictly prohibited. No part of this message can be considered a request for goods or services. =======================================================================