How to become a better Engineer

[zbang]

I learned that engineering is more than just can you make a circuit that makes sense electrically

Very much more. I'd say that the engineer's job isn't just to "design a circuit", but to understand what it should do (might be different from what was requested), how it will fit in to the client's overall process/budget/environment, etc.

Here's an example-
The client has a long line of powered rollers that move heavy product along a production line stopping at each station, it's been working fine then starts burning out motors. What do you do? Start asking questions.... in this case the product had gotten heavier (more starting load on each roller & motor) but more importantly they were processing 50% more than before and instead of each motor starting 6-7 times an hour, it was now more like 12-14 times and the heat buildup over the production day was baking them. The solution was to get replacement motors that weren't generic 5hp (IIRC) but some special and more expensive ones that would handle the starts and to arrange for better cooling.

If the original designer had understood how close the spec'd motors were to failure with the initial planned loading, they might have spec'd something that was overpowered for now but would accommodate the production increase and probably last longer anyway.

That's engineering .

(That's also a long winded way of saying to read the stories of problems and how they get solved.)

 

[Besoeker3]

Oh like you working on variety or projects by yourself, so that you had to figure stuff out on your own without being able to ask a senior engineer?

Thank you kindly, sir!
A little of where I got to. After I got a degree I was offered, and accepted, a position as a Commissioning Engineer. It was not a bad company but I though maybe I could better....... In the event I and another chap started our own business and we got more business. Sure, ir was hard work at times and we had to travel extensively.

 

[Julio Chadrone]

If you work on your own all the time without consulting anyone, you risk making uncorrected mistakes that can run from building something too expensively and/or overly complex to something that will fail catastrophically. If you work under heavy supervision all the time and never make any decisions on your own you may have your development into a better engineer stifled.

There is a sweet spot somewhere in the middle.

Yeah, trying to figure out that variable sweet spot. I'm guessing it changes depending on complexity of project vs how quickly the customer needs it. Which I think will determine whether I'm allowed the time to struggle through it myself or if I should go for help to be "given" the answers

 

[Julio Chadrone]

Very much more. I'd say that the engineer's job isn't just to "design a circuit", but to understand what it should do (might be different from what was requested), how it will fit in to the client's overall process/budget/environment, etc.

Here's an example-
The client has a long line of powered rollers that move heavy product along a production line stopping at each station, it's been working fine then starts burning out motors. What do you do? Start asking questions.... in this case the product had gotten heavier (more starting load on each roller & motor) but more importantly they were processing 50% more than before and instead of each motor starting 6-7 times an hour, it was now more like 12-14 times and the heat buildup over the production day was baking them. The solution was to get replacement motors that weren't generic 5hp (IIRC) but some special and more expensive ones that would handle the starts and to arrange for better cooling.

If the original designer had understood how close the spec'd motors were to failure with the initial planned loading, they might have spec'd something that was overpowered for now but would accommodate the production increase and probably last longer anyway.

That's engineering .

(That's also a long winded way of saying to read the stories of problems and how they get solved.)

"to understand what it should do (might be different from what was requested), how it will fit into the client's overall process/budget/environment, etc."

I think this is very validating. There were times where I was given a task which seemed a little questionable to me, but I just assumed that the client most likely spent lots of time coming up with their ask and they know what they're doing so I should just build it as requested without asking any follow up questions. Didn't go super well I'm glad I have a great team who caught that.
I learned that day that one of engineers responsibilities is to "think" and not just regurgitate answers.

 

[Julio Chadrone]

Thank you kindly, sir!
A little of where I got to. After I got a degree I was offered, and accepted, a position as a Commissioning Engineer. It was not a bad company but I though maybe I could better....... In the event I and another chap started our own business and we got more business. Sure, ir was hard work at times and we had to travel extensively.

I've always wondered about starting a firm, the process. Like going from where I work which requires a bunch of people work to operate smoothly to starting with just 2 people seems insane. By that I mean like I can't imagine how 2 people manage to do the job of all these people

 

[Besoeker3]

I've always wondered about starting a firm, the process. Like going from where I work which requires a bunch of people work to operate smoothly to starting with just 2 people seems insane. By that I mean like I can't imagine how 2 people manage to do the job of all these people

We started just with the two of us and expanded to around 80 bodies age 70. Eventually, when I was nearly seventy, we transferred to another business.

 

[OldBroadcastTech]

Read-read read; study, study, study; attend any and all lectures-seminars-online classes that you can manage (and if the presenter says something that makes no sense to you or others, you will tell by everyone looking at each other) don't be shy about calling things to a halt until you get it straightened out, above all learn from your mistakes, don't be shy about asking someone who has more experience; be generous with your time and information to those junior to you, and most of all...never be afraid to admit that you don't know or understand something, in other words, never try to BS your way through it, take as much time as needed to find the answer. A wise person is one who knows what he-she DOESN'T know.

My biggest gripe in 48 years of electronics work was engineers/ computer geeks / consultants who would never say 'Gee, I don't know' but instead get out the BIG shovel and scoop it hard, fast, and deep to cover their lack of knowledge.

 

[charlie b]

. . . and most of all...never be afraid to admit that you don't know or understand something, in other words, never try to BS your way through it. . . .

1. I heartily agree with this.

2. To that I will add, never be afraid to admit you made an error. Otherwise nobody (i.e., not you, not your coworkers, not your clients) will have the opportunity to learn from the errors.

3. Be open to learning from engineers less experienced than yourself. Great leaders are not threatened by the capabilities and successes of the people working under them.

4. Ask the new guy to set aside one lunch hour per week to chat with you about whatever technical topics are on your mind. Make this a regular "pick his brain" session. No set agenda is needed; just chat. I try to do this as often as possible with the two junior EEs in my group. I call it, "Tech Talk Tuesday."

5. Someday you will be a supervisor. Make an absolute, firm commitment, do it now and never break it, to follow this rule: "Praise in Public; Criticize in Private."

6. Stay active in this forum. I can't begin to describe how much I have learned from my fellow forum members over the past 20+ years.

IMPORTANT NOTE:
Please don't hit "reply" and leave the entire text of the post to which you are replying. Do you see how I replied to a post from OldBroadcastTech? I deleted most of that post and kept the part to which I wanted to add my comment.

 

[jim dungar]

Please don't hit "reply" and leave the entire text of the post to which you are replying. Do you see how I replied to a post from OldBroadcastTech? I deleted most of that post and kept the part to which I wanted to add my comment.

Which can done very easily by selecting/highlighting the text portion you want, but instead of using copy/paste you should see an option to Reply (mine shows up below the highlighted text).

I just learned this step recently. Someone posted about it in a different thread.

 

[ggunn]

Something that I have not seen in this thread so far is one personality trait that I consider to be necessary for an engineer, and that is the ability to switch sides without rancor in a debate when you are faced with hard evidence that you have taken an incorrect position.

 

[OldBroadcastTech]

" Make an absolute, firm commitment, do it now and never break it, to follow this rule: "Praise in Public; Criticize in Private."

The best boss I ever had followed this rule religiously......no matter what or how bad I (we) screwed up, his stance was that we did the best we could with the information we had.

However, later, in his office, we would get a well-deserved butt-chewing.....but he kept that private and when it was over, he never referenced it again.

 

[Julio Chadrone]

However, later, in his office, we would get a well-deserved butt-chewing.....but he kept that private and when it was over, he never referenced it again.

My boss does that. Once when I made a pretty big screw up. We had a big team meeting with other departments where he fought tooth and nail for me (It wasn't a let's point fingers and fire this person meeting more of an okay this is the situation how do we resolve this meeting). But In that he did defend my decisions, as honestly as he could, but once that was over, he called me to his office, and I was in the hot seat for a good minute. And in future project reviews for a while he would ask if I made sure to take in account, not in a snarky or demeaning way, what I had overlooked in the previous mistake.

 

[Julio Chadrone]

To that I will add, never be afraid to admit you made an error. Otherwise nobody (i.e., not you, not your coworkers, not your clients) will have the opportunity to learn from the errors.

This I live by religiously after learning from a small age. I acknowledge it's much easier to fix a mistake in the drawing before everything is ordered, built, delivered, and installed. Then it is to hope it goes unnoticed, and it potentially come and bite everyone in the butt.

 

[ggunn]

" Make an absolute, firm commitment, do it now and never break it, to follow this rule: "Praise in Public; Criticize in Private."

The best boss I ever had followed this rule religiously......no matter what or how bad I (we) screwed up, his stance was that we did the best we could with the information we had.

However, later, in his office, we would get a well-deserved butt-chewing.....but he kept that private and when it was over, he never referenced it again.

A butt chewing is not deserved either in public or in private when someone realizes that he has made a mistake and reports it to his boss.

 

[shockking]

Here are my pro tips.

1. Get to know the history of the problem at hand. Make sure you know why things are done the way they are, and what lead them to be done that way. Know why the problem needs solving in the first place. Question the requirements, and try to make them less dumb. Skip steps entirely if possible, don't find the perfect answer to an unnecessary problem.
2. Take better notes. Make checklists, cheat sheets, and how-to guides. Refer back to and improve upon them as you repeat similar tasks. Use OneNote or something similar with good search. Start every project with an excel file, and keep it easy to follow (work top-to-bottom, left-to-right. leave notes and units.) Write up formal reports for big projects, and start these with a PowerPoint, with one slide per paragraph.
3. Use the forums. Don't waste time being stuck. Search first, and ask for help when needed. Mikeholt, eng-tips, stackoverflow, and reddit are all good. Take note of code references and other non-forum things to go read.
4. Search the NEC, NESC, and the IEEE library (buff books and other standards). If you don't have access through your employer, you might through your university alumni association.
5. Read the manufacturer instructions. These should have the answers to your specific questions. If they don't, reach out to tech support.
6. Continuously improve. Attend at least one conference and one training every year. Everything is code at some point, keep practicing Python. Try to automate (check out PhraseExpress). AI is big right now, test out ChatGPT. Keep practicing with ACAD and SKM/eTap. Learn keyboard shortcuts for software you use heavily.

 

[norcal]

Don't change things for the sake of changing things, observe & change where it will be a improvement, not just because you can.

 

[petersonra]

Don't change things for the sake of changing things, observe & change where it will be a improvement, not just because you can.

Change things you can to learn new stuff.

 

[k3pgx]

I recently graduated a year, ago and am currently at a job I enjoy. I for a while was the only electrical engineer and was nervous about having so much responsibility as a fresh graduate even though I interned here. I got a huge ego about my skills since once I was given more responsibilities (I was interning under an engineer I was given very little to do) I go to learn a lot about practical engineering. Like dealing with cost efficiency, how important connections to both suppliers and clients are, and the actual engineering aspect.

Then my company finally hired an old veteran since they were looking for senior engineer and he has been a total joy to work with an being decades old veteran just blows me away at how just how much background knowledge he has about everything. He has a lot of connections and more importantly he can look at a process that my company is doing and instantly knows how to improve it. Not instantly but I digress he has great ideas.

I see the amount of respect and trust my boss has for him, and I love that for him, and it inspires me to improve. I always wanted to get much better at my craft even without him but know that I have a measuring stick to compare myself to I can see how much more I can improve.

My real dilemma is I have no idea how to do it. If it comes to designing a panel a customer brings to me, I am good at providing them what they need, but when it comes to ideas of my old, I am drawing a blank. Like do I just look up conferences for electrical engineers in my area and rub elbows is that how people improve? or do I just job hop to job hop when I think I learned enough. I enjoy my job they are very open to engineers starting their own ideas if they can pitch it well enough.

TLDR Engineers how did you improve as an engineer to a point where you felt comfortable in a senior role?

Sign up at a local university to teach a class. That's what I did and the preparation and interaction with the students was a learning experience for me. DCW BSEE/MS

 

[Strathead]

One thing I didn't see here... Good Electricians have a different knowledge base than Engineers. We may not have gone to college, but we learned in the Mike Rowe way. Develop a good relationship with a couple of us. We often look at a situation from an entirely different perspective. I notice you list yourself as a controls engineer, so maybe the "big wire" electrician isn't as helpful to you. But, I used to do a lot of work at a chemical plant. After a time the Process Engineers, figured out that sending me their new designs early on gave me the opportunity to ask "stupid" questions. There are so many times these questions led to early solutions even when I had no solid idea of the science behind their design.

Since you asked your question here, I probably don't need to say this, but realize electricians are valuable and just as important as engineers to get the job done. Nothing is worse in the field that an arrogant Electrical Engineer who thinks it is his way or the highway.

 

[rambojoe]

One thing I didn't see here... Good Electricians have a different knowledge base than Engineers. We may not have gone to college, but we learned in the Mike Rowe way. Develop a good relationship with a couple of us. We often look at a situation from an entirely different perspective. I notice you list yourself as a controls engineer, so maybe the "big wire" electrician isn't as helpful to you. But, I used to do a lot of work at a chemical plant. After a time the Process Engineers, figured out that sending me their new designs early on gave me the opportunity to ask "stupid" questions. There are so many times these questions led to early solutions even when I had no solid idea of the science behind their design.

Since you asked your question here, I probably don't need to say this, but realize electricians are valuable and just as important as engineers to get the job done. Nothing is worse in the field that an arrogant Electrical Engineer who thinks it is his way or the highway.

Electricians have certainly learned that engineers love putting switchgear w/4" pipes out of the top DIRECTLY below girders and beams... my favorite!
Oh, and buss ducts...