Some interesting thoughts from Moshe too. I'd be very interested to hear the answer to his question about employer surveys. In a different context, namely client relationship management, we used to conduct client surveys - always face to face from a leading professsional within the company - which not only captured client needs, perceptions, satisfaction, ways to improve, etc., but also gave the opportunity to provide persuasive responses, when appropriate, to try to change perceptions and expectations, mostly successfully, providing the reasoning was valid. It would be good to discover that the EC and IET used a similar approach.
I think the idea of a body within the institute that is specifically for the interests of I.Eng is an excellent one. Whether it is a society within the institute, or a board, as counter-suggested by Mehmood, is, in my view, not too important, though I would onliy say, in support of the "society" concept that this exists for Fellows, and I feel is overall a good approach, and I think would provide far greater personal ownership of goals, successes, etc., for individual I.Eng members than a board, which still has the feel, however democratically appointed, of their fate being determined by others.
Having said that, I agree with Mehmood's suggestion of vice presidents for each registration grade to provide high profile representation.
I kind of see where Moshe was going with the comparison thte CA degree accreditations, but personally, based on my experiences overseas, I do feel that the US system of degrees and registrations does in fact distort the international take on engineering registration because it is so poorly constructed, in my view. When I was working in the UAE and putting professionals, in particular C.Eng, forward for senior roles, I hit resistance initially because most of the client base had been educated in the US and had a US-centric view on engineering registration, so they initially tried to say that C.Eng was not a match for a US Registered Engineer. Only after I provided them solid evidence to show that:
a) C.Eng was recognised worldwide as the Gold Standard for Engineers, and certainly more highly respected than US Registered Engineer
b) The US Registered Engineer has its value highly diluted and unreliable simply because each state determines its own standards for registration, which are highly variable, with some being considerably less than the very I.Eng standard that we are debating here.
Only then did they accept that they were actually getting a more solid team by accepting my teams with Chartered Engineers in the Senior positions. That then enabled me to follow through with the value of I.Eng for the types of role for which I.Eng are so much more suited.
Prompted by Roy B's response, I'm inclined to say that, regardless of the whole debate within our community between "equal but different" and the progressive approach as I call it, with C.Eng at the pinnacle, I think he has a point about what the word Chartered means to people, and whatever the concensus within the IET and the wider engineering community may be on that topic, I do feel that trying to "sell" I.Eng as equal to C.Eng to employers, etc., may be self-defeating. I would suggest that, from their perspective, without the full appreciation of the subtleties in difference between the two "types" of engineer, they are likely to largel dismiss theword diifferent and ask the question "if it's equal, then why bother with it?" I believe the far stronger proposition, and one that I feel is highly valid, is that there is value in itself from having the I.Eng (and for that matter Eng Tech) registration available for appointing people who are most appropriate to their role.
Some interesting thoughts from Moshe too. I'd be very interested to hear the answer to his question about employer surveys. In a different context, namely client relationship management, we used to conduct client surveys - always face to face from a leading professsional within the company - which not only captured client needs, perceptions, satisfaction, ways to improve, etc., but also gave the opportunity to provide persuasive responses, when appropriate, to try to change perceptions and expectations, mostly successfully, providing the reasoning was valid. It would be good to discover that the EC and IET used a similar approach.
I think the idea of a body within the institute that is specifically for the interests of I.Eng is an excellent one. Whether it is a society within the institute, or a board, as counter-suggested by Mehmood, is, in my view, not too important, though I would onliy say, in support of the "society" concept that this exists for Fellows, and I feel is overall a good approach, and I think would provide far greater personal ownership of goals, successes, etc., for individual I.Eng members than a board, which still has the feel, however democratically appointed, of their fate being determined by others.
Having said that, I agree with Mehmood's suggestion of vice presidents for each registration grade to provide high profile representation.
I kind of see where Moshe was going with the comparison thte CA degree accreditations, but personally, based on my experiences overseas, I do feel that the US system of degrees and registrations does in fact distort the international take on engineering registration because it is so poorly constructed, in my view. When I was working in the UAE and putting professionals, in particular C.Eng, forward for senior roles, I hit resistance initially because most of the client base had been educated in the US and had a US-centric view on engineering registration, so they initially tried to say that C.Eng was not a match for a US Registered Engineer. Only after I provided them solid evidence to show that:
a) C.Eng was recognised worldwide as the Gold Standard for Engineers, and certainly more highly respected than US Registered Engineer
b) The US Registered Engineer has its value highly diluted and unreliable simply because each state determines its own standards for registration, which are highly variable, with some being considerably less than the very I.Eng standard that we are debating here.
Only then did they accept that they were actually getting a more solid team by accepting my teams with Chartered Engineers in the Senior positions. That then enabled me to follow through with the value of I.Eng for the types of role for which I.Eng are so much more suited.
Prompted by Roy B's response, I'm inclined to say that, regardless of the whole debate within our community between "equal but different" and the progressive approach as I call it, with C.Eng at the pinnacle, I think he has a point about what the word Chartered means to people, and whatever the concensus within the IET and the wider engineering community may be on that topic, I do feel that trying to "sell" I.Eng as equal to C.Eng to employers, etc., may be self-defeating. I would suggest that, from their perspective, without the full appreciation of the subtleties in difference between the two "types" of engineer, they are likely to largel dismiss theword diifferent and ask the question "if it's equal, then why bother with it?" I believe the far stronger proposition, and one that I feel is highly valid, is that there is value in itself from having the I.Eng (and for that matter Eng Tech) registration available for appointing people who are most appropriate to their role.
