Engineers can’t be both a subject-matter-expert (SME), AND a people/leadership expert.

This rule will of course have exceptions, which will prove the rule; because the exceptions are, simply, exceptional.

It depends if you develop in-demand, project-based, one-of-a-kind expertise (piping design, overhead wire specifications, bolt connection requirements) pursued deeply and with purpose, and therefore in demand when that skill is required (and meanwhile also being good at a lot of other things).

Or, you focus on and prefer team-based interactions leading to leadership roles (while also being really good technically).

Know which you prefer being: technical expert, or an expert leader/coordinator.

I’m involved in standards development with Standards Australia, and I love just about every aspect of it. The camaraderie, support, networking and exposure to brilliance is remarkable.

One thing that often comes up is the business model of Standards: volunteers contribute to the content (millions of hours and other expenses), and then Standards are sold at a seemingly high price considering how they’ve been made.

One concept to consider is how the social media enterprises (FB, IG, TikTok, LI) have been so successful making billions of dollars *using content created by volunteers*. I wonder if there’s something to integrate there.

When looking for work, consultants often just list the deliverables produced for a client (such as reports, facilitation, designs).

But the buyer wants the benefits; the deliverables are how we get there.

It’s like we don’t “want” a hook in the wall (deliverable), we want to hang a great piece of art on the wall (benefit).

In knowledge work, it’s difficult to make that leap from deliverable to benefit. The benefit isn’t as straightforward as hanging a picture. It’s not always clear in my mind, but it’s a magical shift when we can switch from talking about deliverables to benefits.

I’m fortunate to belong to a number of teams. Read: committees. This is important to me as a solo consultant, since I don’t have access to a ‘corporate team’ culture. I choose to be a soloist, and I also choose to belong to, or chair, a variety of committees and other team-based volunteer roles. This helps me to be connected and collaborative with other humans. It’s important for humans to be part of a community; these technical communities are mine.

I really enjoy the teamwork atmosphere of the committees I’m on. It’s fun, challenging, informative and supportive. Thank you, team-mates.

The purpose of an engineering degree – or any degree with a technical focus – should be that the graduate can do the engineering, science, or technical work. The reasons for getting an engineering degree should not be to be a manager or CEO.

It’s a little contrarian to think this, but there you go. While I agree we need technical people to be able to communicate and collaborate, I also think we need our technical people to want to do the technical work.

Engineers should want to design, build, maintain, solve problems, create new innovations, or better yet, all of those.

We in the knowledge worker space don’t ‘make’ things; not really. Some of us develop designs that eventually get built, but many, particularly in asset management or operations roles, don’t make anything except decisions.

Our decisions are our product.

Credit for the idea of a ‘decision journal’ goes to the writers at Farnam Street, and the headline idea that our “product is decisions” is clever. And products need managing.

A decision journal is quality control for our thinking. Write down, or at least contemplate, key aspects of decisions: consequences (and for who), how you feel, context, possible outcomes, and variables.

I’m Gen-X. (We’re awesome, I know, right?). We’re the generation straddling life’s existence between analogue and digital. We’ve benefitted enormously from, and know to appreciate, the inventions and improvements brought on by the large Boomer generation before us. We also benefit from the youthful enthusiasm of Gen Y and Z, many of whom we report to now.

For knowledge transfer, learning and otherwise helping those coming up behind, something my colleagues and I are trying to understand is: written word or other delivery methods? Maybe textbooks and articles are superior, but maybe we need to embrace audio and video, too.

It’s difficult to be in conversations filled with “gotchas”, where it feels like the other person is just waiting to top your contribution.

Some people seem to need to do the ‘one-upmanship’ in the conversation, such as correcting minor flaws, or expanding on a statement with a know-it-all approach that feels a little icky. But perhaps they are just trying to be helpful.

Wait, in full disclosure of self-awareness, perhaps I do this myself, appearing a little showy while trying to be helpful. They say that what we don’t like in others is something we might be ourselves. Um, gotcha?

The hardest thing engineers (and many other professions) face is trade-offs. The hard reality of many roles, positions, job descriptions and higher pay-grades is that we face impossible decisions where someone or some aspect ‘loses’.

Cost or quality; heavier weight or less strong; noisy operation or faster response; rapid results or accurate results; reliability through redundancy or lower cost production. These are dilemmas faced all the time on engineering projects and in asset management.

Of course, we want to maximise both options, but science and physics, or let’s just call it ‘the real world’, prevents that. We must accept trade-offs.

It’s normal to think of training and learning as linear. That’s to say that “Topic 3” must be preceded by first understanding Topics 1 and 2. In many cases, there are pre-requisites identified that say you can’t know ‘y’ until you know ‘x’.

This is probably mostly true, particularly for factual or mathematical learning. But, as I’ve learned recently, when we bring in ideas, innovation or complex problems, our learning is more of a spiral.

We need to circulate around a whole range of topics, ideas and facts, in and out, up and down, in order to solve complex problems.

A new purchase is exciting: new phone, car, piece of furniture.

I have a new laptop. It replaces one that’s getting slow, but not yet unusable.

Setting up the new laptop has been surprisingly intricate.

Adding back in my short-cuts, preferences, downloads, links and Bluetooth devices is time-consuming. I often go back to the old laptop, just because it’s easier.

Change, even to something better, brings with it disruption. A new setup will take a while to be as comfortable as the old one.

Keep at it though; it’s also a chance to clear out the old processes and widgets.

It might be logical to assume that we have a capacity to change if we have a chance to review the data, analyse the situation, and think about it.

But actually, change is not about analyse/think/change. Dr. John Kotter made the intriguing observation that the process is actually see/feel/change. See a situation, feel something, then change.

The important step is ‘feel’. We have to feel something to enact change. Feelings such as motivated (to lose weight), surprised (that I spend so much time sifting emails) or appalled (that humans could be so mistreated). Feelings cause change, not analysing and thinking.

I’m reading the book “Essentialism” by Greg McKeown. It’s 270pages to say: do less to do better. Not to make light of it though, there are some good ideas and strategies in the book to help with just that.

Minimise the minutiae. Choose what’s important now. Stop saying yes to everything. Clarify your purpose. Only do what’s essential.

All very good advice, and good strategies. I try to implement them in my days too.

I like the point of thinking about what’s important now. What’s essential right now.

It does give a different spin on the next thing you do.

The human brain is governed by a rewards-centre. There’s plenty of research showing the relationship between rewards and behaviour. Be it sugar, praise, booze, success, money. When we feel rewarded in any way, we want more of that.

This applies to forming habits. The trajectory is: cue-behaviour-reward-repeat. We get a cue to brush our teeth, we brush our teeth, they feel fresh, and we do it again the next day.

The key, I think, is the quantum, and timeframe of the (feeling of) reward.

There is a gap here with knowledge work. Rarely do we receive a tangible, instant reward.

Rules give structure and set expectations. A rule, even those we don’t understand or like, at least helps to set the boundaries.

However, upon entering a new space, or joining a new group, or starting a new project, I think being faced with a whole list of rules, of ‘don’ts’, of restrictions and cautions, isn’t very welcoming.

I noticed this going into a restaurant recently. A whole string of signs cautioned us on the way in of what not to do. It was an odd welcome.

Here’s a rule: if you’re on the welcoming committee, don’t start with the don’ts.

There are 7days per week x 24hrs per day = 168 hours in the week.

If we allow 7x8hrs=56hours for sleep and 7x2hrs=14hrs for ablutions and general time, and say 40hours+10hours/week=50hours for work plus commuting, that adds up to 110hours allocated for full-time non-work-from-homers.

168-110 leaves 58hours unallocated per week. Say exercise is 7x2hours/week=14hrs (allowing for changing etc), and 8hours/week for shopping and errands, that leaves 36hours unallocated.

Meals? Maybe a generous 1hr each, that’s 3h per day: 21h per week on mealtime.

That’s only 5 unallocated spare hours left.

168-56(sleep)-14(ablutions)-50(work incl commute)-14(exercise)-8(shopping/errands)-21(meals)=5 spare hours!

No wonder we’re so “busy”.

Sometimes people conclude a critical comment with stating “because they don’t know what they’re talking about”. It’s a huge statement to apply a broad conclusion like that, on anyone.

It’s not kind to conclude so definitively and be so dismissive of someone you’re talking to.

They probably think they know exactly what they’re talking about. So already you’re in a friction of disagreement.

Before leaping to a generalisation like “they don’t know what they’re talking about”, get a little more specific. Pinpoint where in the conversation you came to that conclusion. And then maybe consider helping to resolve the friction.

I can feel the reawakening, in me, in the workplace, in my friends and family. We are emerging from the past 2.5 years. During those years, we were fairly restricted with our activities (stating the obvious).

I like that now people are ‘up to something’. We’re back to sports, back to travelling, back to going places and doing things. It’s a dull existence when we’re not up to something. Whether it be visiting friends, planning for the next endurance event, getting out to the countryside, or just reading in the park.

Whatever ‘up to something’ means to you, do it.

We are all very busy, or so it seems. Somehow the day gets away on us, and we wonder what actually got done each day. We seem to be continually ‘doing’ something. But, an analysis of the day sometimes makes me marvel at whether the ‘doing’ has produced any real outputs.

Job satisfaction is tied to concepts such as connection, mastery, impact and autonomy. I also think that job (and life) satisfaction is defined by the value of our outputs. Many of us in office jobs are defined by the value we add in between the inputs and the outputs.

I wonder if we can think of CPD (Continuing Professional Development) as SEO (Search Engine Optimisation).

The purpose of SEO is to improve website ranking in search results. By using the right keywords and phrases, your SEO-enhanced site is more appealing to your target audience. SEO “improves quantity and quality of inbound traffic”.

Perhaps that what CPD does for individuals. A consistent and deliberate approach to professional development (keywords and phrases) makes us ‘more appealing’ to our stakeholders. CPD will ‘improve quantity and quality’, particularly for our outputs. Our deliverables, discussions and deliberations improve in quality because of professional development.