The Uncelebrated Engineer

1/11/2010 8:20 PM EST

I'd have to disagree on the tile. Engineers do get respect, it's just not as evident as say what a surgeon (who does a life saving procedure)does.But in any case, engineering is not about recognition, but having fun solving challenging problems in your area of interest :)

1/13/2010 2:30 PM EST

No respect?
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Try asking a Liberal Arts Major if they get more or less respect in the US than an engineer or business major!

1/14/2010 9:50 AM EST

I agree with this article. So many people mention other professions when they want a generic example of an esteemed profession. "I want my child grow up to be an accountant or doctor."

The one kind of respect we do get is that double-take you get at some business meetings when you say you're an engineer and describe what you do. They kind of look at you like you must be super-human and sometimes say something like "Oh my!".

1/14/2010 11:09 AM EST

Engineers don't get respect because they don't expect it. They too often defer to managers, politicians, and other "experts", who have drilled it into engineers' heads that they are social inadequates who can do least damage if kept inside their cubicles. Movements such as Engineers Without Borders are a direct reaction against this kind of thing. I am involved with an engineer-led organisation designing carbon-negative infrastructure component (yes, carbon-negative) for sale in developing countries. Why? Because the politicians, the managers, and the pundits have so little engineering knowledge that they don't understand that such a thing is possible. Therefore they won't do it. The politicians have their place - they have the people skills (engineers are social inadequates, remember?) and the PR savvy to get the interest and the funding flowing, but they need to understand that it's a team effort; without the engineers making things happen, they're just a nobodies with a nice suit. If engineers want respect, they need to learn to strut.

1/14/2010 10:33 PM EST

My relative engineer with a great job (who has worked for the same Canadian company since 1974) sent both of his kids through medical school. We don't have engineering equivalent of American Medical Association or Canadian Medical Association to protect our engineering profession (jobs). Doctors don't lose jobs, engineers frequently do. A bad doctor's mistake can kill one patient at a time but a bad engineer's mistake can kill hundreds at a time.

1/18/2010 9:49 AM EST

I think engineers get plenty of respect, they just don't get it in their face. All the tech-freaks constantly drooling over their latest phone, car, music system etc are constantly worshipping engineers. Alas, they direct their love straight to the dead material things created by the engineer - for natural reasons - the products can be shipped over the whole world. Pray that the engineer does not appear where the product is, that is typically not a good sign at all! :)

Actually there was a statistic research done here in Sweden just recently, over which professions that were most respected. If I remember correctly, engineer ended up on 4th place, after doctors, scientists and architects.

10/21/2010 4:46 AM EDT

If the world was run by engineers, instead of the dickhead politicians, managers and bean counters that end up doing it, the world might work properly. But how many engineers have ever ventured into politics. And yet engineers are such solution oriented people that they would make it work. They just don't have the politicians gift for self-promotion I think.

"How many teenagers ever stop to think about the design efforts poured into that iPod or Wii?"
Not many. 99% are quite happy to use technology that, for them, is indistinguishable from magic.
When I was a kid it was possible to learn how everything in a car, or a transistor radio, worked. These days it is well nigh impossible.

11/28/2010 10:00 PM EST

The Hindenburg crashed even more spectacularly and by modern standards would be a marvel of safety engineering. Oh well. . . actions (sometimes) speak louder than words. Engineers have a duty (from my perspective at any rate) to do good as it were. Recognition is not our reward, doing cool stuff with materials beats counting beans or the beans of the art school student loans of the cool chicks we get to date.

1/12/2011 11:59 AM EST

"How many teenagers ever stop to think about the design efforts poured into that iPod or Wii?"

I have a son near the age of entering college. He and a number of his friends are heading towards technical careers. One of the problems with young folks and engineering these days is the distance between the outside of an engineered product and the amount of work it takes to get there. Many of the young folks I've run across as a parent want to be video game designers.

Many years ago, it was exciting to get a computer to do anything, like display "hello world". But getting it to do so, and do a lot of other things, was in the reach of an individual. I don't think most people realize the amount of work that goes into creating a video game, iPod or cell phone.

New devices are so complex as to fall into the classification of "magic" and that can obscure the amount of work that goes into it. If someone thinks that being good at playing a game makes them qualified to create it, they obviously don't understand the scope of the project.

People as a whole likely look at technology products and just assume the someone "does some stuff" and then the thing works and you buy it for thirty bucks. That reduces the amount of respect given to the designers.