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Engineering management - the Australian experience
Engineering
Elsevier
Management
Science
Publishers
International,
199
2 (1984)
B.V., Amsterdam
199-207 - Printed in The Netherlands
ENGINEERING MANAGEMENT -THE AUSTRALIAN EXPERIENCE A SURVEY OF THE NEEDS AND A PROPOSAL FOR TRAINING ACTION L.A. Baker Chairman, manufacturing
and Management Group, The
P. 0. Box 123, Broadway,
New South Waies
N.S. l4, 2007
institute
of Technology,
(Australial
ABSTRACT The extent to which engineers perform a management role in Australia is investigated and quantified. The need for formul postgraduate training in engineering management is established and the distinction between an Australian Master of Business Administration programme and a Master
of Engineering Management suitable for Australian conditions is delineated. A possible Master of engineering Management degree is then developed. The findings of a survey of major employers of engineers are referred to at appropriate points.
INTRODUCTION
and social status by practising the profession of engineering are much less in Australia than in some other countries, such as the U.S.A. The purpose of this paper is then to examine the significant involvement of engineers in management in Australia and to establish the most effective methods of training such engineering managers.
Professional engineering involves a wide range of technical activities. However, an Australian Department of Labour and Industrial Relations survey (1973) of over 20,000 engineers shows that management and supervision is the major area of work for over 40% of all Australian engineers. The reasons why management and supervision are of such signifi~~ce in the work patterns of engineers in Australia are numerous and complex. Clearly the application of modern technology to the process of resource development and manufacturing requires a sensitive mix of both technical and managerial skills. Also, the opportunities for attaining the highest economic
0 1984 Elsevier
Science
INDUSTRIAL
NEEDS
Survey data In addition to the Department of Labour and Industrial Relations survey (1973), a further survey was devised and carried
Publishers
B.V.
200
out for the author by Garland (1978). The survey consisted of in-depth interviews (each of 2--3 hours), with a sample of senior staff with either an interest in or responsibility for training of engineers from the private and public sectors, professional bodies and the educational sphere. The organizations represented in the sample employ over 1600 engineers. These organizations are listed in the Appendix. During each of the interviews, a 27 page questionnaire covering employer characteristics, attitudes to management training and the relative importance of recognised management subjects was completed. Further details are given by Garland (1978). Further significant sources of information on professional management were the Australian Institute of Management 1972) and the Committee of In(Boyce, quiry into Postgraduate Education for Management (Cyert et al., 1970). Management
performed
by engineers
An obvious fundamental question is whether engineers should be involved in management. The New South Wales Institute of Technology (N.S.W.I.T.) survey showed that over 80% of the respondents thought TABLE
that engineers make good managers. Also 35 of the 70 pioneers in management recognised by Urwick (1961) in “The Golden Book of Management” were engineers. However, a more pragmatic and important question relates to the extent of actual involvement of engineers in management. As noted in the Introduction, the Department of Labour and Industrial Relations survey of 20,818 engineers showed that management and supervision are the major area of work for over 40% of Australian engineers. This figure is twice that for the next highest area, namely engineering design. Other individual areas rate less than 10%. Details are given in Table 1. The Department’s findings also reveal that almost 60% of all engineers spend more than 50% of their time functioning as managers for 20-25 years of their professional careers. The profile against age is shown in Fig. 1. For those engineers whose management activities account for less than half of their time, the N.S.W.I.T. survey indicates that less than 50% of them perform no managerial functions. Furthermore, over 90% spend at least 10% of their time on managerial tasks and approximately 75% of them spend at least 25% of their time on such activities.
1
Major areas of work for Australian Major area of work
engineers
All engineers
Chemical
Civil
Electrical
Industrial
Mechanical
1%)
(%I
(%I
(%I
(a)
(%l Management/supervision Engineering design Construction/installation Research and development Planning and evaluation Maintenance engineering Teaching/training Sales/marketing Production/industrial eng. Other Totals
41.6 20.4 7.9 7.2 5.7 4.7 4.5 2.7 2.3 3.0 100.0
33.0 10.2 2.2 22.9 6.0 1.2 7.9 3.9 8.0 4.7 100.0
44.6 26.1 13.1 3.3 5.6 0.7 3.1 0.9 0.3 2.3 100.0
36.0 21.7 8.8 7.9 6.5 6.5 5.0 3.3 1.4 2.9 100.0
44.9 6.7 1.4 3.2 7.7 2.4 7.1 3.0 20.0 3.6 100.0
41.2 20.2 4.2 7.9 4.4 7.1 5.0 4.2 3.1 2.9 100.0
201
TABLE
2
Academic Vocational
backgrounds and Tertiary
of Australian education
managers Proportion (%)
Economics, Commerce, Accounting Engineering Science and Applied Science Arts, Philosophy, Humanities Law Other None or no answer
, 5
20
30
Fig. 1. Percentage versus age.
A$ of engineers
Relative involvement management
I
100.0
60
50 (YEARS) working
Total
34.9 21.9 9.9 3.3 1.4 18.4 10.2
as managers
of engineers in
All of the preceding information confirms that a large proportion of the Australian engineer’s work is management. A relevant converse question relates to the percentage of Australian management performed by people trained as engineers. A survey of 424 members of the Australian Institute of Management (A.I.M.) by Mills (1971) showed that the Engineering profession was the second largest source of Australia’s professional managers. Table 2 shows that its contribution is twice as great as that of the next largest contributor and not far behind the combined category of Economics, Commerce and Accounting. (Many engineers with professional recognition as engineers might not seek further professional recognition as managers through the A.I.M. Hence they might be underrepresented.) In summary, the preceding information demonstrates that, in Australia, management forms a significant proportion of the work of most engineers, that most engineers will spend a substantial proportion
of their careers performing tasks that are predominantly management and finally, that the Engineering profession is the second largest source of professional managers in Australia. A continuing need for management training for engineers is clearly established. Mills (1971) observes that: ‘Some three quarters of the companies interviewed have moved or are moving toward a ‘flatter’, or more decentralised structure, whereby line managers at lower levels in the organization are responsible for more important activities (than previously). ” Combining this with an increasingly complex technology and an increasingly complex business involvement, a continuing and expanding need for training engineers in management is clear.
Need for formal postgraduate training Whilst experience is invaluable, it should not become the only source of management training. The General Manager of one of Australia’s largest companies comments (Jackson, 1976): “ quite of ten rein forces pre. . . experience conceived ideas. These may be wrong. Some
202
managers might never discover what others, through luck, greater intelligence or an imaginative insight, might have unearthed, polished and found to be of great value. Learning by experience alone may not only take up a lot of time; it may well waste a lot of time unnecessarily. . . . Much of the management education burden, theremust fall upon formal education. ” fore, The N.S.W.I.T. survey showed that over 90% of the respondents felt that management performance was improved by academic training and that nearly as many believed a trend toward academically trained managers was in progress. Since 32% of Australian post-graduate management students are engineers, it would appear that they have a similar view of formal training. An undergraduate course entirely oriented to engineering management is generally considered to be undesirable in Australia. Our view is that a person can only be an effective engineering manager if he is a competent engineer first. The expectation and demands by Australian employers regarding the breadth, depth and completeness of an engineer’s technical training are such that the time available during an undergraduate degree in engineering management would not be sufficient to present the basic core of essential engineering. A similar situation appears to exist in Britain where an undergraduate engineering management course has been offered by the University of Swansea with a singular lack of success and has been discontinued. The growth of such courses in the U.S.A. indicates that a different situation applies in that country. For the Australian engineering environment, the current engineering management elective strand in the Bachelor of Engineering at the N.S.W.I.T. offers a suitable balance between the competing requirements at the undergraduate level. This programme, which allows up to 18% of the coursework to be taken in engineering management subjects, received over 90% support in the N.S.W.I.T. survey. So did
the proposition that all engineers require some management training. Consequently, the bulk of engineering management education must be conducted at a postgraduate level. Whilst continuing education courses can play a valuable role, they do not allow sufficient coherence of presentation or total quantity of material to be presented to train a well rounded engineering manager. A postgraduate degree course is the only satisfactory alternative. Since the aim is to provide an opportunity for the entrant to extend his undergraduate training in engineering management to a significantly superior level of accomplishment, seems a masters degree to be most appropriate. Moreover, the practice of engineering management is very much an art which is learnt by doing. Acquisition of management science without integration or application should not be the aim of any course. The presence of a preferably employer-based major project in the final year is seen as an essential and integrating feature of the development process for an engineering manager. This feature is considered to be vital to such a course and might be allocated 30% of the total semester hours in the programme. Distinction between Master of Engineering Management and Master of Business Administration Titles and content of masters degree programmes vary considerably around the world. Consequently, it is important to clarify what a Master of Business Administration (M.B.A.) is interpreted to denote in Australia. Furthermore, and perhaps surprisingly, there are no masters degrees in engineering management on offer here. The closest, in concept, is a Master of Engineering Science in Industrial Management at the University of New South Wales. Hence it is also important to clarify the concept of a Master of Engineering Management (M.Eng.Man.) suitable for Australia.
203
A Master of Engineering Management should complement and not compete with existing or proposed Master of Business Administration degrees. The philosophies of the two degrees and the nature of their graduates would be different. The most definitive description of an Australian M.B.A. programme is that given by Cyert et al. (1970) in the Report of the Committee of Inquiry into Post-Graduate Education for Management: “An M.B.A. programme attempts to produce general managers rather than specialists, and practitioners rather than reseachers. should encourage . . . An M.B.A. programme the development of general management skills required for successful decision-making at high levels in the organization. ” This is a worthwhile and very valuable approach and produces a high quality general manager. On the other hand, an Australian M.Eng. Man. programme would aim to produce an equally high quality specialist manager; namely a person who is trained to manage the normal range of engineering activsuch as construction, installation, ities, design, maintenance, production, manufacturing, engineering R&D, etc.; activities which could not be managed without initial training in engineering. Usually engineers do not become involved in general management situations until late in their careers and then only when or if they reach senior management levels. In their early to middle careers they are involved in engineering activities; initally as technologists then progressively, more and more, as managers of that technology. To train all of them in general management is to deprive them of much specialised knowledge regarding the management of their detailed technical activities. For some, this would be a deprivation which would last over a large proportion of their careers; for others, all of their careers. In more general terms, the community would be deprived of more efficient management of
engineering activities and of the benefits which would result. By limiting the more general material which is present in M.B.A. courses by virtue of the greater diversity of interest of the students but which is not essential to engineering managers, greater depth in and breadth of topics of special relevance to engineers can be pursued, thereby rendering different the whole emphasis of the course. Those engineers who do eventually become involved in general management could follow one of many possible paths. For example, they could attend one of the local or foreign management development programmes, which aim to convert specialists to generalists (e.g. the Australian Graduate School of Management, The Australian Administrative Staff College at Mt. Eliza, one of the short Harvard programmes, the Sloan Programme at the London Business School, etc.). Many companies not only encourage but sponsor senior staff to attend such courses. An M.Eng.Man. programme should not replace an M.B.A. for all engineers. Many engineers would still opt for an M.B.A. because it suits their expected (or aspired) career paths better than an M.Eng. Man. The Master of Engineering Management would provide a needed alternative and would fill a significant gap in educational opportunities in Australia. Need for M.Eng.Man. The need for specialist vocationally oriented postgraduate education is well recognised in North America. There are now more than 70 masters degree programmes in engineering management on offer in the U.S.A. and Canada. The extremely rapid growth in recent years has been reported by Kocaoglu (1980). Put bluntly, if Australia is not to miss the boat, it must act quickly. Activity in this area in Britain is minimal due to the lack of acceptance of course-
204
work masters degrees by the bulk of British industry. A favourable response from both industry and academe to a draft Australian M.Eng. (Engineering Management) proposal was received by the author during a recent sabbatical at the London Business School. Locally, in the N.S.W.I.T. 100% of those who responded to survey, the question thought that a vocationally oriented M.Eng.Man. degree, which would be more specialised than current M.B.A. programmes, was justified. This overwhelmingly favourable response cannot be disregarded lightly, especially in the light of North American experience.
POSSIBLE
AUSTRALIAN
M.ENG.MAN.
Brief specification A Master of Engineering Management (by coursework and report) could meet the needs established earlier in this paper. The course should be open to experienced graduate engineers only and would probably require part-time attendance for one afternoon and two evenings per semester week for three years. Admission
requirements
Our view is that a person can only be an effective engineering manager if he is a competent engineer first. Hence the formal qualification should be a recognised degree in one of the engineering disciplines. In addition, a total of 3 years of professional work experience should be required. For graduates from part-time or sandwich course B.E. programmes, not more than 2 years of approved experience gained concurrently with undergraduate studies ought to be counted towards this requirement.
Course graduates Upon completion of the envisaged programme, the graduate would be a graduate engineer with a total of not less than 6 years of professional experience and with sound postgraduate level training in engineering management. He or she would have learned the theory and practice of basic or fundamental aspects such as technical communication, engineering law, industrial and social psychology, manageengineering economics, ment accounting, technical personnel management and engineering industrial relations together with a selection of applied areas such as management of technical computing, project management, contract engineering, energy manenvironmental engineering, mainagement, tenance management, manufacturing mansimulation of engineering sysagement, tems, engineering operations research, etc. chosen to suit his or her expected or aspired career path. This learning process would have been rounded off by a major and preferably employer-based project, in which various aspects of the course will have been drawn together and integrated. More importantly, it would have contributed significantly to the development of his or her appreciation of the art and practice of engineering management and would be tangible demonstration of his or her future potential. A significant proportion of later stage part-time undergraduates at N.S.W.I.T. hold positions of responsibility. We would expect that the additional training, experience and demonstrated ability of graduates from the proposed course would result in most of them holding responsible engineering management positions by the time they graduate from the masters programme. Typical positions might include design team leaders, drawing office or design managers,
205
production supervisors, production managers, plant managers, maintenance managers, R&D managers, construction supervisors, site managers, construction managers, project managers , engineering product managers, chief engineers, chief works engineers, technical services managers, etc. Course structure
In keeping with similar M.Eng. degrees by coursework plus project, the programme could require the candidate to attend on a part-time basis over 3 years. The structure of a possible course is shown in Table 3. The programme is predominantly 2 years which includes basic or of coursework, fundamental subjects and those of a more applied nature, followed by 1 year devoted almost entirely to a major project, which is assessable by report (minor thesis). TABLE
3
Possible
course Autumn
1
Engineering Management Technical Communication Organizational Behaviour Engineering Management
3
semester
Engineering Engineering
Management Management
Management
Semester hours
Spring semester
Semester hours
Engineering Economics Systems Engineering I Engineering Management
2
3 3 3
1
1 2 3 3
3
3 1% 1% 3
Management Accounting Project Management Project Seminar I Engineering Management
Elective
4
2 2 3 3
1
Project Seminar II Engineering Management
Project
Seminars
Elective
Engineering Law Technical Personnel Management Engineering Industrial Relations Engineering Management Elective
Engineering
Practice Project
Electives.
Four
8 to be selected
Contemporary Issues in Eng. Management Construction Management Contract Engineering Energy Management and Engineering Engineering Markets Environmental Management Maintenance Management and Terotechnology These electives
Analysis of the proposed course content will reveal that it is substantially different from an M.B.A. and from many North American masters degrees in engineering management. It should be realised that the adjectival qualification “Engineering” in certain core subjects is not simple affectation. It represents a genuine intention that those subjects will be heavily biased towards the interests and needs of engineers. The course content is largely in accord with the ratings given to various subject areas by respondents to the N.S.W.I.T. survey. Detailed subject areas were reconstituted into 25 groups of related areas and ranked using the standardised MannWhitney non-parametric rank test. The results are shown in Table 4.
structure
Year
2
Course content
will allow individual
specialisation
Elective
1 8
from: Management of Technical Computing Manufacturing Management Organization Analysis and Design Power System Economics and Management Simulation of Engineering Systems Systems Engineering II Other to be offered from time to time
in relevant
technical
areas.
206
TABLE
4
NEEDS
Industry’s view management Subject
of importance
of area to engineering
area
Rank
Communication Management Principles Behavioural Sciences Statistics Budgeting and Control Project Management Management Accounting Personnel and Industrial Relations Manufacturing Management Operations Research Safety Management Information Systems Economics Quality Assurance Terotechnology Marketing Management Engineer in Society Small Enterprise Management Financial Accounting Computers Organizations Taxation Aspects of Law Insurance Financial Management
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
OF SMALL
BUSINESS
The preceding proposal is intended to train engineering managers for mediumsized and large businesses; it does not attempt to fulfil the needs of small business. The latter is, however, an important employer of engineers and engineering managers as indicated by Table 5. The development of an engineering management programme suitable for small business remains a challenge and an opportunity. CONCLUSIONS The amount of management performed by Australian engineers is large. Yet the preparation and training given for it is minimal. The Master of Engineering Management programme presented here is based on local Australian needs as perceived by both practitioners and educators. Implementation of this or similar programmes in Australia would go a long way towards filling an important gap in the training of engineering managers in this country. APPENDIX
TABLE
5
Deployment
Organizations of Australian
engineers
Employer
Private sector - small business* Private sector - other State government Federal government Local government Armed forces Educational institutions Other Total *A small than 150 with one decisions.
Engineers
Eng. Managers
(%l
(%)
24.5 21.7 25.1 14.4 6.7 1.8 5.4 0.4 100.0
26.4 23.4 24.1 13.1 8.9 2.5 1.2 0.4 100.0
business was defined to be one with less employees, not dominant in its field, and or two people making all the important
in N.S.W.I.T.
survey
CSR Ltd. Consolidated Bearing Co. Ltd. Email Ltd. James Hardie Ltd. James N. Kirby Ltd. S.T.C. Pty. Ltd. N.S.W. Public Transport Commission Telecom Australia City of Sidney Council Metal Trades Industry Association National Committee on Engineering Management of the Institution of Engineers, Australia Faculty of Engineering at the University of New South Wales Faculty of Business Studies at The N.S.W. Institute of Technology
REFERENCES Boyce, R.O., 1972. Management Education in Australia. Submission to Federal Government by the Australian Institute of Management. Cyert, R.M., Solomon,
Cannon, E., 1970.
W.M., Report
Frederick, W.C. of the Committee
and of
Enquiry into Postgraduate Education for Management. Australian Government Printing Service. Department of Labour and Industrial Relations, 1973. A Survey of the Australian Engineering Profession. Canberra. Garland, J.E., 1978. Management Training for EnProject Report, School of Mechanical gineers.
Engineering, The New South Wales Institute of Technology, Sydney. Jackson, R.G., 1976. Management Education in Australia. The James N. Kirby Paper, Australian Institute of Management, Sydney. Kocaoglu, D.F., 1980. Masters degree programs in Engineering Management. Engineering Education, January, pp. 360-362. Mills, D., 1971. Australian Management and Society 19 70 to 1985. Penguin, Sydney. Urwick, L.L., 1961. The Golden Book of Management. Newman Neame, London. Wearne, S.H., 1974. Management studies for professional engineers. Int. J. Mech. Eng. Edu., 2 (1): l-10.
Elsevier
Management
Science
Publishers
International,
199
2 (1984)
B.V., Amsterdam
199-207 - Printed in The Netherlands
ENGINEERING MANAGEMENT -THE AUSTRALIAN EXPERIENCE A SURVEY OF THE NEEDS AND A PROPOSAL FOR TRAINING ACTION L.A. Baker Chairman, manufacturing
and Management Group, The
P. 0. Box 123, Broadway,
New South Waies
N.S. l4, 2007
institute
of Technology,
(Australial
ABSTRACT The extent to which engineers perform a management role in Australia is investigated and quantified. The need for formul postgraduate training in engineering management is established and the distinction between an Australian Master of Business Administration programme and a Master
of Engineering Management suitable for Australian conditions is delineated. A possible Master of engineering Management degree is then developed. The findings of a survey of major employers of engineers are referred to at appropriate points.
INTRODUCTION
and social status by practising the profession of engineering are much less in Australia than in some other countries, such as the U.S.A. The purpose of this paper is then to examine the significant involvement of engineers in management in Australia and to establish the most effective methods of training such engineering managers.
Professional engineering involves a wide range of technical activities. However, an Australian Department of Labour and Industrial Relations survey (1973) of over 20,000 engineers shows that management and supervision is the major area of work for over 40% of all Australian engineers. The reasons why management and supervision are of such signifi~~ce in the work patterns of engineers in Australia are numerous and complex. Clearly the application of modern technology to the process of resource development and manufacturing requires a sensitive mix of both technical and managerial skills. Also, the opportunities for attaining the highest economic
0 1984 Elsevier
Science
INDUSTRIAL
NEEDS
Survey data In addition to the Department of Labour and Industrial Relations survey (1973), a further survey was devised and carried
Publishers
B.V.
200
out for the author by Garland (1978). The survey consisted of in-depth interviews (each of 2--3 hours), with a sample of senior staff with either an interest in or responsibility for training of engineers from the private and public sectors, professional bodies and the educational sphere. The organizations represented in the sample employ over 1600 engineers. These organizations are listed in the Appendix. During each of the interviews, a 27 page questionnaire covering employer characteristics, attitudes to management training and the relative importance of recognised management subjects was completed. Further details are given by Garland (1978). Further significant sources of information on professional management were the Australian Institute of Management 1972) and the Committee of In(Boyce, quiry into Postgraduate Education for Management (Cyert et al., 1970). Management
performed
by engineers
An obvious fundamental question is whether engineers should be involved in management. The New South Wales Institute of Technology (N.S.W.I.T.) survey showed that over 80% of the respondents thought TABLE
that engineers make good managers. Also 35 of the 70 pioneers in management recognised by Urwick (1961) in “The Golden Book of Management” were engineers. However, a more pragmatic and important question relates to the extent of actual involvement of engineers in management. As noted in the Introduction, the Department of Labour and Industrial Relations survey of 20,818 engineers showed that management and supervision are the major area of work for over 40% of Australian engineers. This figure is twice that for the next highest area, namely engineering design. Other individual areas rate less than 10%. Details are given in Table 1. The Department’s findings also reveal that almost 60% of all engineers spend more than 50% of their time functioning as managers for 20-25 years of their professional careers. The profile against age is shown in Fig. 1. For those engineers whose management activities account for less than half of their time, the N.S.W.I.T. survey indicates that less than 50% of them perform no managerial functions. Furthermore, over 90% spend at least 10% of their time on managerial tasks and approximately 75% of them spend at least 25% of their time on such activities.
1
Major areas of work for Australian Major area of work
engineers
All engineers
Chemical
Civil
Electrical
Industrial
Mechanical
1%)
(%I
(%I
(%I
(a)
(%l Management/supervision Engineering design Construction/installation Research and development Planning and evaluation Maintenance engineering Teaching/training Sales/marketing Production/industrial eng. Other Totals
41.6 20.4 7.9 7.2 5.7 4.7 4.5 2.7 2.3 3.0 100.0
33.0 10.2 2.2 22.9 6.0 1.2 7.9 3.9 8.0 4.7 100.0
44.6 26.1 13.1 3.3 5.6 0.7 3.1 0.9 0.3 2.3 100.0
36.0 21.7 8.8 7.9 6.5 6.5 5.0 3.3 1.4 2.9 100.0
44.9 6.7 1.4 3.2 7.7 2.4 7.1 3.0 20.0 3.6 100.0
41.2 20.2 4.2 7.9 4.4 7.1 5.0 4.2 3.1 2.9 100.0
201
TABLE
2
Academic Vocational
backgrounds and Tertiary
of Australian education
managers Proportion (%)
Economics, Commerce, Accounting Engineering Science and Applied Science Arts, Philosophy, Humanities Law Other None or no answer
, 5
20
30
Fig. 1. Percentage versus age.
A$ of engineers
Relative involvement management
I
100.0
60
50 (YEARS) working
Total
34.9 21.9 9.9 3.3 1.4 18.4 10.2
as managers
of engineers in
All of the preceding information confirms that a large proportion of the Australian engineer’s work is management. A relevant converse question relates to the percentage of Australian management performed by people trained as engineers. A survey of 424 members of the Australian Institute of Management (A.I.M.) by Mills (1971) showed that the Engineering profession was the second largest source of Australia’s professional managers. Table 2 shows that its contribution is twice as great as that of the next largest contributor and not far behind the combined category of Economics, Commerce and Accounting. (Many engineers with professional recognition as engineers might not seek further professional recognition as managers through the A.I.M. Hence they might be underrepresented.) In summary, the preceding information demonstrates that, in Australia, management forms a significant proportion of the work of most engineers, that most engineers will spend a substantial proportion
of their careers performing tasks that are predominantly management and finally, that the Engineering profession is the second largest source of professional managers in Australia. A continuing need for management training for engineers is clearly established. Mills (1971) observes that: ‘Some three quarters of the companies interviewed have moved or are moving toward a ‘flatter’, or more decentralised structure, whereby line managers at lower levels in the organization are responsible for more important activities (than previously). ” Combining this with an increasingly complex technology and an increasingly complex business involvement, a continuing and expanding need for training engineers in management is clear.
Need for formal postgraduate training Whilst experience is invaluable, it should not become the only source of management training. The General Manager of one of Australia’s largest companies comments (Jackson, 1976): “ quite of ten rein forces pre. . . experience conceived ideas. These may be wrong. Some
202
managers might never discover what others, through luck, greater intelligence or an imaginative insight, might have unearthed, polished and found to be of great value. Learning by experience alone may not only take up a lot of time; it may well waste a lot of time unnecessarily. . . . Much of the management education burden, theremust fall upon formal education. ” fore, The N.S.W.I.T. survey showed that over 90% of the respondents felt that management performance was improved by academic training and that nearly as many believed a trend toward academically trained managers was in progress. Since 32% of Australian post-graduate management students are engineers, it would appear that they have a similar view of formal training. An undergraduate course entirely oriented to engineering management is generally considered to be undesirable in Australia. Our view is that a person can only be an effective engineering manager if he is a competent engineer first. The expectation and demands by Australian employers regarding the breadth, depth and completeness of an engineer’s technical training are such that the time available during an undergraduate degree in engineering management would not be sufficient to present the basic core of essential engineering. A similar situation appears to exist in Britain where an undergraduate engineering management course has been offered by the University of Swansea with a singular lack of success and has been discontinued. The growth of such courses in the U.S.A. indicates that a different situation applies in that country. For the Australian engineering environment, the current engineering management elective strand in the Bachelor of Engineering at the N.S.W.I.T. offers a suitable balance between the competing requirements at the undergraduate level. This programme, which allows up to 18% of the coursework to be taken in engineering management subjects, received over 90% support in the N.S.W.I.T. survey. So did
the proposition that all engineers require some management training. Consequently, the bulk of engineering management education must be conducted at a postgraduate level. Whilst continuing education courses can play a valuable role, they do not allow sufficient coherence of presentation or total quantity of material to be presented to train a well rounded engineering manager. A postgraduate degree course is the only satisfactory alternative. Since the aim is to provide an opportunity for the entrant to extend his undergraduate training in engineering management to a significantly superior level of accomplishment, seems a masters degree to be most appropriate. Moreover, the practice of engineering management is very much an art which is learnt by doing. Acquisition of management science without integration or application should not be the aim of any course. The presence of a preferably employer-based major project in the final year is seen as an essential and integrating feature of the development process for an engineering manager. This feature is considered to be vital to such a course and might be allocated 30% of the total semester hours in the programme. Distinction between Master of Engineering Management and Master of Business Administration Titles and content of masters degree programmes vary considerably around the world. Consequently, it is important to clarify what a Master of Business Administration (M.B.A.) is interpreted to denote in Australia. Furthermore, and perhaps surprisingly, there are no masters degrees in engineering management on offer here. The closest, in concept, is a Master of Engineering Science in Industrial Management at the University of New South Wales. Hence it is also important to clarify the concept of a Master of Engineering Management (M.Eng.Man.) suitable for Australia.
203
A Master of Engineering Management should complement and not compete with existing or proposed Master of Business Administration degrees. The philosophies of the two degrees and the nature of their graduates would be different. The most definitive description of an Australian M.B.A. programme is that given by Cyert et al. (1970) in the Report of the Committee of Inquiry into Post-Graduate Education for Management: “An M.B.A. programme attempts to produce general managers rather than specialists, and practitioners rather than reseachers. should encourage . . . An M.B.A. programme the development of general management skills required for successful decision-making at high levels in the organization. ” This is a worthwhile and very valuable approach and produces a high quality general manager. On the other hand, an Australian M.Eng. Man. programme would aim to produce an equally high quality specialist manager; namely a person who is trained to manage the normal range of engineering activsuch as construction, installation, ities, design, maintenance, production, manufacturing, engineering R&D, etc.; activities which could not be managed without initial training in engineering. Usually engineers do not become involved in general management situations until late in their careers and then only when or if they reach senior management levels. In their early to middle careers they are involved in engineering activities; initally as technologists then progressively, more and more, as managers of that technology. To train all of them in general management is to deprive them of much specialised knowledge regarding the management of their detailed technical activities. For some, this would be a deprivation which would last over a large proportion of their careers; for others, all of their careers. In more general terms, the community would be deprived of more efficient management of
engineering activities and of the benefits which would result. By limiting the more general material which is present in M.B.A. courses by virtue of the greater diversity of interest of the students but which is not essential to engineering managers, greater depth in and breadth of topics of special relevance to engineers can be pursued, thereby rendering different the whole emphasis of the course. Those engineers who do eventually become involved in general management could follow one of many possible paths. For example, they could attend one of the local or foreign management development programmes, which aim to convert specialists to generalists (e.g. the Australian Graduate School of Management, The Australian Administrative Staff College at Mt. Eliza, one of the short Harvard programmes, the Sloan Programme at the London Business School, etc.). Many companies not only encourage but sponsor senior staff to attend such courses. An M.Eng.Man. programme should not replace an M.B.A. for all engineers. Many engineers would still opt for an M.B.A. because it suits their expected (or aspired) career paths better than an M.Eng. Man. The Master of Engineering Management would provide a needed alternative and would fill a significant gap in educational opportunities in Australia. Need for M.Eng.Man. The need for specialist vocationally oriented postgraduate education is well recognised in North America. There are now more than 70 masters degree programmes in engineering management on offer in the U.S.A. and Canada. The extremely rapid growth in recent years has been reported by Kocaoglu (1980). Put bluntly, if Australia is not to miss the boat, it must act quickly. Activity in this area in Britain is minimal due to the lack of acceptance of course-
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work masters degrees by the bulk of British industry. A favourable response from both industry and academe to a draft Australian M.Eng. (Engineering Management) proposal was received by the author during a recent sabbatical at the London Business School. Locally, in the N.S.W.I.T. 100% of those who responded to survey, the question thought that a vocationally oriented M.Eng.Man. degree, which would be more specialised than current M.B.A. programmes, was justified. This overwhelmingly favourable response cannot be disregarded lightly, especially in the light of North American experience.
POSSIBLE
AUSTRALIAN
M.ENG.MAN.
Brief specification A Master of Engineering Management (by coursework and report) could meet the needs established earlier in this paper. The course should be open to experienced graduate engineers only and would probably require part-time attendance for one afternoon and two evenings per semester week for three years. Admission
requirements
Our view is that a person can only be an effective engineering manager if he is a competent engineer first. Hence the formal qualification should be a recognised degree in one of the engineering disciplines. In addition, a total of 3 years of professional work experience should be required. For graduates from part-time or sandwich course B.E. programmes, not more than 2 years of approved experience gained concurrently with undergraduate studies ought to be counted towards this requirement.
Course graduates Upon completion of the envisaged programme, the graduate would be a graduate engineer with a total of not less than 6 years of professional experience and with sound postgraduate level training in engineering management. He or she would have learned the theory and practice of basic or fundamental aspects such as technical communication, engineering law, industrial and social psychology, manageengineering economics, ment accounting, technical personnel management and engineering industrial relations together with a selection of applied areas such as management of technical computing, project management, contract engineering, energy manenvironmental engineering, mainagement, tenance management, manufacturing mansimulation of engineering sysagement, tems, engineering operations research, etc. chosen to suit his or her expected or aspired career path. This learning process would have been rounded off by a major and preferably employer-based project, in which various aspects of the course will have been drawn together and integrated. More importantly, it would have contributed significantly to the development of his or her appreciation of the art and practice of engineering management and would be tangible demonstration of his or her future potential. A significant proportion of later stage part-time undergraduates at N.S.W.I.T. hold positions of responsibility. We would expect that the additional training, experience and demonstrated ability of graduates from the proposed course would result in most of them holding responsible engineering management positions by the time they graduate from the masters programme. Typical positions might include design team leaders, drawing office or design managers,
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production supervisors, production managers, plant managers, maintenance managers, R&D managers, construction supervisors, site managers, construction managers, project managers , engineering product managers, chief engineers, chief works engineers, technical services managers, etc. Course structure
In keeping with similar M.Eng. degrees by coursework plus project, the programme could require the candidate to attend on a part-time basis over 3 years. The structure of a possible course is shown in Table 3. The programme is predominantly 2 years which includes basic or of coursework, fundamental subjects and those of a more applied nature, followed by 1 year devoted almost entirely to a major project, which is assessable by report (minor thesis). TABLE
3
Possible
course Autumn
1
Engineering Management Technical Communication Organizational Behaviour Engineering Management
3
semester
Engineering Engineering
Management Management
Management
Semester hours
Spring semester
Semester hours
Engineering Economics Systems Engineering I Engineering Management
2
3 3 3
1
1 2 3 3
3
3 1% 1% 3
Management Accounting Project Management Project Seminar I Engineering Management
Elective
4
2 2 3 3
1
Project Seminar II Engineering Management
Project
Seminars
Elective
Engineering Law Technical Personnel Management Engineering Industrial Relations Engineering Management Elective
Engineering
Practice Project
Electives.
Four
8 to be selected
Contemporary Issues in Eng. Management Construction Management Contract Engineering Energy Management and Engineering Engineering Markets Environmental Management Maintenance Management and Terotechnology These electives
Analysis of the proposed course content will reveal that it is substantially different from an M.B.A. and from many North American masters degrees in engineering management. It should be realised that the adjectival qualification “Engineering” in certain core subjects is not simple affectation. It represents a genuine intention that those subjects will be heavily biased towards the interests and needs of engineers. The course content is largely in accord with the ratings given to various subject areas by respondents to the N.S.W.I.T. survey. Detailed subject areas were reconstituted into 25 groups of related areas and ranked using the standardised MannWhitney non-parametric rank test. The results are shown in Table 4.
structure
Year
2
Course content
will allow individual
specialisation
Elective
1 8
from: Management of Technical Computing Manufacturing Management Organization Analysis and Design Power System Economics and Management Simulation of Engineering Systems Systems Engineering II Other to be offered from time to time
in relevant
technical
areas.
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TABLE
4
NEEDS
Industry’s view management Subject
of importance
of area to engineering
area
Rank
Communication Management Principles Behavioural Sciences Statistics Budgeting and Control Project Management Management Accounting Personnel and Industrial Relations Manufacturing Management Operations Research Safety Management Information Systems Economics Quality Assurance Terotechnology Marketing Management Engineer in Society Small Enterprise Management Financial Accounting Computers Organizations Taxation Aspects of Law Insurance Financial Management
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
OF SMALL
BUSINESS
The preceding proposal is intended to train engineering managers for mediumsized and large businesses; it does not attempt to fulfil the needs of small business. The latter is, however, an important employer of engineers and engineering managers as indicated by Table 5. The development of an engineering management programme suitable for small business remains a challenge and an opportunity. CONCLUSIONS The amount of management performed by Australian engineers is large. Yet the preparation and training given for it is minimal. The Master of Engineering Management programme presented here is based on local Australian needs as perceived by both practitioners and educators. Implementation of this or similar programmes in Australia would go a long way towards filling an important gap in the training of engineering managers in this country. APPENDIX
TABLE
5
Deployment
Organizations of Australian
engineers
Employer
Private sector - small business* Private sector - other State government Federal government Local government Armed forces Educational institutions Other Total *A small than 150 with one decisions.
Engineers
Eng. Managers
(%l
(%)
24.5 21.7 25.1 14.4 6.7 1.8 5.4 0.4 100.0
26.4 23.4 24.1 13.1 8.9 2.5 1.2 0.4 100.0
business was defined to be one with less employees, not dominant in its field, and or two people making all the important
in N.S.W.I.T.
survey
CSR Ltd. Consolidated Bearing Co. Ltd. Email Ltd. James Hardie Ltd. James N. Kirby Ltd. S.T.C. Pty. Ltd. N.S.W. Public Transport Commission Telecom Australia City of Sidney Council Metal Trades Industry Association National Committee on Engineering Management of the Institution of Engineers, Australia Faculty of Engineering at the University of New South Wales Faculty of Business Studies at The N.S.W. Institute of Technology
REFERENCES Boyce, R.O., 1972. Management Education in Australia. Submission to Federal Government by the Australian Institute of Management. Cyert, R.M., Solomon,
Cannon, E., 1970.
W.M., Report
Frederick, W.C. of the Committee
and of
Enquiry into Postgraduate Education for Management. Australian Government Printing Service. Department of Labour and Industrial Relations, 1973. A Survey of the Australian Engineering Profession. Canberra. Garland, J.E., 1978. Management Training for EnProject Report, School of Mechanical gineers.
Engineering, The New South Wales Institute of Technology, Sydney. Jackson, R.G., 1976. Management Education in Australia. The James N. Kirby Paper, Australian Institute of Management, Sydney. Kocaoglu, D.F., 1980. Masters degree programs in Engineering Management. Engineering Education, January, pp. 360-362. Mills, D., 1971. Australian Management and Society 19 70 to 1985. Penguin, Sydney. Urwick, L.L., 1961. The Golden Book of Management. Newman Neame, London. Wearne, S.H., 1974. Management studies for professional engineers. Int. J. Mech. Eng. Edu., 2 (1): l-10.