During a recent conversation around manufacturing, my sister recently reminded me of the end value of engineering, and the power of words – both in the same 3-word sentence: “Wash and repeat”. She challenged me to consider the value I add in the work that I do, and how I believed this is assessed in the greater scheme of things – Profit for the companies we serve (or for some, monies to themselves). What was the single highest value act that I have been personally responsible for innovating, and how that compared to that single 3-word phrase “Wash and repeat”?
Having considered works back over the last 20-or-so years, I’d expect that some of the pipeline commissioning and decommissioning works – specifically degassing one particular UKCS gas pipeline via the platform’s RB211 power turbine – were the “big value” items when considering purely cost savings. The monetary value of such project cost savings seems small peanuts in comparison to that simple little phrase “Wash and repeat”; for that little 3-word phrase “wash and repeat” doubled shampoo and hair conditioner sales… at least for a time until people saw this sales gimmick for what it was worth. The power of words and the value of engineering…. Perhaps we Engineers aren’t as “valuable” as some would lead us to believe? It is probably no surprise to many that across the wider community, “Engineering” isn’t even considered a profession, let alone one that is respected or understood outside of a very narrow band of people (mostly us and our immediate interfaces!).
So, when I received an unsolicited email from a person titled “Head of Engineering” enquiring as to my interest in a job unrelated to what I (or any of my peers) do as a day job, and at a junior level to what I’d normally expect to be engaged at 30 years into my career, I did take note – and not in a good way. Whilst I have no personal beef with this person in particular; if I was any other profession than an Engineer (say, Lawyer, Medical doctor, Architect, etc) would I receive such calls from people with apparently so little understanding of what I do for a living? Would these other professorial bodies be so unwilling to support the correct use of professional titles – as appears the case with the various professional engineering bodies that we all pay vast sums of fees to? Given what I pay yearly for maintaining the title of “Fellow of the IChemE”, what real value is this to me or the profession of Engineering? Is this true value of “FIChemE” adequately summed by the act of so many recruiters having no issues with cold calling me and enquiring about work better suited (and remunerated) for an engineer closer to being a graduate, than one 30 years into their career? I would expect that one only has to try corresponding with your local doctor or hospital with using the title of “Head of Medicine” to have an answer to that question….. unless you also happen to be a qualified medical doctor!!
I personally believe that someone with no background in Engineering, no qualification in anything Engineering related, and having (as far as I can see) spent their career thus far in recruitment should not lay claim to the title of “Head of Engineering” – especially if there is no associated engineering executable. Whilst I did my best to not give specifics as to the person, or the company, or specifics of the situation; an employee representing this recruitment company decided to berate me very publicly on LinkedIn (reference here); and tell me that the title of “Head of Engineering” is appropriate “recruitment title”. That’s part of the point – it isn’t a “recruitment title”, it is an “Engineering title”. Clearly.
Sorry, I didn’t let that genie out of the bottle, nor did I want to – they did. As above, I have no beef with this person – it just cases the point as to the often-indiscriminate use of the title of “Engineering” in the wider community, and the total lack of anything proactive from our professional engineering bodies to address how regularly “Engineer” is used by persons not qualified nor experienced to be engineers recognised by any of the professional engineering bodies.
I have no interest to pick a fight with the recruitment industry, nor individuals within it. I am not the one filling their email in-box up with offers to consider junior, low paid engineering task work in places I have no interest in living. Nor am I the one cold calling them late in an evening to discuss yet another opportunity that happens to have “Engineering” somewhere in the description. Nor am I the one banging out requests to “Join your network” in LinkedIn. I don’t invite this – many recruitment “professionals” invite themselves. It is unwelcome. I am not the one accusing recruitment professionals of “astonishing ignorance” of engineering.
For many of us, technical recruitment becomes very much part of the role when serving at Engineering manager level. I found that this was often because we aren’t offered the resources we need or want, thus it forces us to step in and directly recruit the people we need with the skillset we require. I would very much like to “stay in my lane” (refer to LinkedIn post) and leave recruitment to those working specifically in that particular field; given I have technical work to do – however as Sean Moran’s initial LinkedIn post highlighted – I would at times be looking for a PrinciPAL Engineer with Principles… and not a “PrinciPLE Engineer” (whatever that is?). I would also challenge the recruitment industry to at least have a cursory understanding of the various professional levels within engineering – and what they mean. I wouldn’t expect a recruiter to be able to build a HYSYS model; or understand the differences between Redlich-Kwong or Peng-Robinson Equations of State – especially given many engineers claiming to be experts in “HySIS” don’t even get the spelling correct (unless in reference to the India’s Hyperspectral Imaging Satellite)!! . Sean’s posting had a wealth of useful advice for any recruitment professional who would choose to read and digest – rather than to take it with same contempt so often shown towards our profession.
Words here are important, especially when one chooses to use their title(s) in a public space. It is a shame that our various professional engineering bodies don’t seem to support such a view. Words, and titles do matter – or they do not. It as a binary answer.
In my opinion “Head of Engineering” is an engineering title, inferring “Engineering” as the executable rather than recruitment. “Head of Engineering Recruitment” being a somewhat more appropriate title and one with a very different inference to “heading” engineering or engineers. The power of words cuts both ways as does the title you may accept and choose to use -especially when choosing to interface with professionals within that specific industry. I would very much challenge that it is those within in the recruitment industry that treat professional engineers with contempt that is the issue at hand, rather than the reverse. No doubt the reverse is also true, but then few of “us” sign off with the title “Head of Recruitment”, even though technical recruitment is a task many of us have done throughout the various projects and departments we have managed and/or built. Does that make us “Recruitment Professionals”? I am not claiming that it does… just that we are engineering professionals who sometimes happen to do technical recruitment…. Words.. again. Do we do it better? Now there is a question!
Whilst not attributing this to anyone in particular; I’ll be taking the advice set out in Proverbs 26:4-5:
“Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest you be like him yourself. Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own eyes. The self-confident fool thinks too highly of himself and his opinions, and he shares them freely”.
Perhaps I took this biblical advice a bit too late? At the end of the day, it is only words and the waves that crash upon the social media shores rarely wash upon me as I am not on social media…other than the occasional toe dipped into LinkedIn…. With that seeming becoming more and more like Facebook, I may well be doing even that less and less.
