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Skyscraper
150
Skyscraper.
A novel by Robert Byrne. Atheneum, 1984, $14.95, 267 pages and appendix.
Why do we draw this work of fiction to the attention of our readers? Engineering Management, as a topic, leads to the ideas that engineers should understand management but that management should also understand engineers. The attitude of non-engineering managers towards engineers too often tends to oscillate between blind faith and acute distrust, while the attitude of the public to engineering is to take good engineering for granted (or to reject its culture for the hippy culture) and to be excited by major engineering failures. This novel deals with the latter in an exciting way, but it is authentic also. It deals centrally with the problems an honest and objective engineer can meet in getting people to understand and act on his warnings and predictions. The story has been mirrored in many real situations, which are met in most countries.
In the U.K., for example, there was Lord Baker’s wartime fight to get energy absorption accepted as the design criterion for air raid shelters, and Sam tiebb’s 15 year fight, after the disastrous partial collapse of the Ronan Point tower aparfment building, to get people to understand that such buildings were unsafe and should be demolished. For these reasons it is recommended reading for engineers; at a less dramatic level, let us remember that in the U.K. alone some $1 billion a year fs wasted through design errors in buildings. The book concludes with particular recommendations about avoiding catastrophes, most of which are generally also good practice for not causing money to be wasted. They include design skill, design supervision and designer’s information needs, all too often neglected by management.
D.J. FARRAR Director, Cen tre of Engineering Design, Cran field, U.K.
Skyscraper.
A novel by Robert Byrne. Atheneum, 1984, $14.95, 267 pages and appendix.
Why do we draw this work of fiction to the attention of our readers? Engineering Management, as a topic, leads to the ideas that engineers should understand management but that management should also understand engineers. The attitude of non-engineering managers towards engineers too often tends to oscillate between blind faith and acute distrust, while the attitude of the public to engineering is to take good engineering for granted (or to reject its culture for the hippy culture) and to be excited by major engineering failures. This novel deals with the latter in an exciting way, but it is authentic also. It deals centrally with the problems an honest and objective engineer can meet in getting people to understand and act on his warnings and predictions. The story has been mirrored in many real situations, which are met in most countries.
In the U.K., for example, there was Lord Baker’s wartime fight to get energy absorption accepted as the design criterion for air raid shelters, and Sam tiebb’s 15 year fight, after the disastrous partial collapse of the Ronan Point tower aparfment building, to get people to understand that such buildings were unsafe and should be demolished. For these reasons it is recommended reading for engineers; at a less dramatic level, let us remember that in the U.K. alone some $1 billion a year fs wasted through design errors in buildings. The book concludes with particular recommendations about avoiding catastrophes, most of which are generally also good practice for not causing money to be wasted. They include design skill, design supervision and designer’s information needs, all too often neglected by management.
D.J. FARRAR Director, Cen tre of Engineering Design, Cran field, U.K.