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Everyone's journey is different, small goals make up the larger ones!

Former Community Member over 4 years ago

I saw this on LinkedIn

I think of this great achievement that can inspire engineers.

David Gillespie CEng MIET SMIEEE

Dropped out of school at 15 to join the Army. Got a trade, then a job, then started taking my hashtag#professionaldevelopment seriously and joined the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET), started at the beginning. Lived the Engineering Council spec, saw the education and development gaps. Worked up from an open degree with The Open University to my current industrial PhD with University of Strathclyde. Everyone's journey is different, small goals make up the larger ones. Find a team that will lift you up and the sky is the limit.

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0 Roy Bowdler over 4 years ago

Well done David! It is always pleasing to see someone make a successful career journey over time, in this case supported by professional registration in all three categories.

However, other types of journeys and choices are possible which may be equally valid. The intent of each of the three categories of registration was to offer a respected career “destination”, not two “part-qualified” types.

The overwhelming majority of journeys to Chartered Engineer have been “direct” by virtue of gaining an accredited full-time degree, followed by a period of experience. Using this frame of reference, which gives primacy to academic achievement, the “levels” equated with Eng Tech and IEng are quickly by-passed by full-time students in preparation for their career. I won’t debate here, whether that is the most optimal approach for those engineers who operate at the more "scientific" or "intellectual" end of the spectrum. What is clear however, is that from the perspective of that “advantaged” academic pathway, the skills and attributes of Technician, or “Technician Engineer” (an earlier name of IEng), or a “Technologist” (an alternative name for IEng “type” in some countries), may seem “lower” or “inferior”.

I have posted this before in the context of an earlier thread discussing IEng, but set out below are the thoughts that a distinguished Professor sent to me in 2011, not intending for them to be published in this form. They have however guided my thinking on the issue.

I have always thought of the categories of registration as related to different sets of skills each deserving recognition and status. An Incorporated Engineer I would expect to be knowledgeable about specific engineering products or services, processes and machinery and able to explain things about them to people within his or her engineering organisation; I would expect them to be “streetwise” and able to supervise others confidently. An engineering or ICT technician I would expect to be a proficient user of particular tools, have patience and be thoroughly knowledgeable about the operation of a particular process or machine. A Chartered Engineer should have to be able at justifying engineering decisions to anyone especially themselves, be prepared to deliberate and research, set out an argument and work confidently in unfamiliar situations.

Because the skills required are different, anyone in one category does not automatically have the skills for another. Thus movement in any direction requires the honing of unrehearsed skills or their acquisition. Progress for an individual can be in any direction! It means Incorporated Engineers are not apprentice Chartered Engineers and to see them as such is to remove an important distinction. Nevertheless we should recognise that a competent Incorporated Engineer can through education and experience gain the skills of a Chartered Engineer so being an Incorporated Engineer is not a disqualification for later registration as a Chartered Engineer. Similarly being a Chartered Engineer is not a disqualification for becoming, with appropriate skill development, an Engineering technician.

It is the case that intellectual skills of deliberation and argumentation of a Chartered Engineer demand a longer time than the intellectual skills of an Engineering technician, however the technician has to develop “know how” for which an academic setting is not necessarily appropriate. And it is the case that there are some commonalities in the intellectual skill development of all categories but at some point they each go in a different direction to develop different portfolios.

We should be careful of the metaphors we use: words like “level” imply a hierarchy, “grade (as in “registration grade” ) implies a scale, “class” (at least for the English) implies a hierarchy, “progress” and “progressive” imply a forward movement and hence going the other way is backward!

Many careers still follow a very “traditional” hierarchical model with its origins in the military rank system. Academic qualifications also have a hierarchy, although for bachelors and masters its simply based on one step per year of study. However, I have seen many examples of young people pushed down the full-time student pathway for lack of a technician apprenticeship option, or influenced by social status/snobbery based arguments. We also need to recognise that for many people with engineering and technology knowledge and skills, careers and the nature of work is changing.
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0 Roy Bowdler over 4 years ago

Well done David! It is always pleasing to see someone make a successful career journey over time, in this case supported by professional registration in all three categories.

However, other types of journeys and choices are possible which may be equally valid. The intent of each of the three categories of registration was to offer a respected career “destination”, not two “part-qualified” types.

The overwhelming majority of journeys to Chartered Engineer have been “direct” by virtue of gaining an accredited full-time degree, followed by a period of experience. Using this frame of reference, which gives primacy to academic achievement, the “levels” equated with Eng Tech and IEng are quickly by-passed by full-time students in preparation for their career. I won’t debate here, whether that is the most optimal approach for those engineers who operate at the more "scientific" or "intellectual" end of the spectrum. What is clear however, is that from the perspective of that “advantaged” academic pathway, the skills and attributes of Technician, or “Technician Engineer” (an earlier name of IEng), or a “Technologist” (an alternative name for IEng “type” in some countries), may seem “lower” or “inferior”.

I have posted this before in the context of an earlier thread discussing IEng, but set out below are the thoughts that a distinguished Professor sent to me in 2011, not intending for them to be published in this form. They have however guided my thinking on the issue.

I have always thought of the categories of registration as related to different sets of skills each deserving recognition and status. An Incorporated Engineer I would expect to be knowledgeable about specific engineering products or services, processes and machinery and able to explain things about them to people within his or her engineering organisation; I would expect them to be “streetwise” and able to supervise others confidently. An engineering or ICT technician I would expect to be a proficient user of particular tools, have patience and be thoroughly knowledgeable about the operation of a particular process or machine. A Chartered Engineer should have to be able at justifying engineering decisions to anyone especially themselves, be prepared to deliberate and research, set out an argument and work confidently in unfamiliar situations.

Because the skills required are different, anyone in one category does not automatically have the skills for another. Thus movement in any direction requires the honing of unrehearsed skills or their acquisition. Progress for an individual can be in any direction! It means Incorporated Engineers are not apprentice Chartered Engineers and to see them as such is to remove an important distinction. Nevertheless we should recognise that a competent Incorporated Engineer can through education and experience gain the skills of a Chartered Engineer so being an Incorporated Engineer is not a disqualification for later registration as a Chartered Engineer. Similarly being a Chartered Engineer is not a disqualification for becoming, with appropriate skill development, an Engineering technician.

It is the case that intellectual skills of deliberation and argumentation of a Chartered Engineer demand a longer time than the intellectual skills of an Engineering technician, however the technician has to develop “know how” for which an academic setting is not necessarily appropriate. And it is the case that there are some commonalities in the intellectual skill development of all categories but at some point they each go in a different direction to develop different portfolios.

We should be careful of the metaphors we use: words like “level” imply a hierarchy, “grade (as in “registration grade” ) implies a scale, “class” (at least for the English) implies a hierarchy, “progress” and “progressive” imply a forward movement and hence going the other way is backward!

Many careers still follow a very “traditional” hierarchical model with its origins in the military rank system. Academic qualifications also have a hierarchy, although for bachelors and masters its simply based on one step per year of study. However, I have seen many examples of young people pushed down the full-time student pathway for lack of a technician apprenticeship option, or influenced by social status/snobbery based arguments. We also need to recognise that for many people with engineering and technology knowledge and skills, careers and the nature of work is changing.
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