INTRODUCTION TO ENGINEERING MANAGEMENT

1. ENGINEERING MANAGEMENT

2. INTRODUCTION TO
ENGINEERING MANAGEMENT

3. Textbook
Managing Engineering and Technology, 3rd Edition
Daniel L.Babcock and Lucy C.Morse
RPP04

4. Course Outline
Understanding
• Principles of Engineering Management
• Engineering Organizations
• Management challenges for engineers
Learning
• The importance of management to engineers
• Forms and functions of organizations

5. What is an Engineering?
 Design for customer requirements
 Solve technical problems
 Application of science/principles to solve
problems within constraints
 Trade-offs between safety, economy,
performance, serviceability
 Efficient application of resources

6. What is an Engineering?
• ENGINEERING IS THE APPLICATION OF
SCIENCE FOR HUMAN BENEFIT
• ENGINEERING = PROBLEM SOLVING

7. SCOPE OF ENGINEERING
If Engineering = Problem Solving
• Does this mean any problem?
• or only problems dealing with a technology
component

8. •If it’s green, it’s BIOLOGY
•If it stinks, it’s CHEMISTRY
•If it doesn’t work, it’s PHYSICS
•If it works but no one knows why,
it’s ENGINEERING

9. The scientist explains that which exists;
The engineer creates that which never was.
Theodore von Karman

10. What is an Engineer?
• Ingenieur: from old French “engeigneur” - a war machine
• All of these words derive from the Latin “genius” meaning
 A divine spirit presiding at birth
 A talent, natural gift
• To contrive or plan out usually with more or less subtle skill
or craft; to guide the course of: manage or supervise
during development

11. The first issue (1866) of the English
Journal Engineering
The art of directing the great sources of power
in nature, for the use and convenience of man.
Is it an art or profession?

12. Modern Definition of Engineering
By ABET (Accrediting Board for
Engineering and Technology)
The profession in which a knowledge of the mathematical and natural
sciences gained by study, experience, and practice is applied with
judgement to develop ways to utilize, economically, the materials and
forces of the nature for the benefit of mankind.
Engineer: A person applying his mathematical and science
knowledge properly for mankind
It is a discipline not an art!

13. Engineering – includes the application of these
mathematical and scientific principles to the planning,
design, construction, operation, and maintenance of
products, systems etc. that serve humankind; -
Engineering – includes the management of such activities,
research and development, and the education of persons
who will be responsible for these activities.

14. What is Management?
• Directing the actions of a group to achieve a goal in
most efficient manner
• Getting things done through people
• Process of achieving organizational goals by working
with and through people and organizational resources

15. Top-level management
(president, executive vice president)
Middle managers
(chief engineer, division head etc.)
First-line managers
(foreman, supervisor, section chief)

16. Level Type of Job
First-line Managers
 Directly supervise non-managers.
 Carry out the plans and objectives of higher management using
the personnel and other resources assigned to them.
 Short-range operating plans governing what will be done
tomorrow or next week, assign tasks to their workers, supervise
the work that is done, and evaluate the performance of individual
workers.
Middle Management
 Manage through other managers.
 Make plans of intermediate range to achieve the long-range goals
set by top management, establish departmental policies, and
evaluate the performance of subordinate work units and their
managers.
 Provide and integrating and coordinating function so that the
short-range decisions and activities of first-line supervisory
groups can be orchestrated toward achievement of the long-range
goals of the enterprise.
Top Management
 Responsible for defining the character, mission, and objectives of
the enterprise.
 Establish criteria for and review long-range plans.
 Evaluate the performance of major departments, and they evaluate
leading management personnel to gauge their readiness for
promotion to key executive positions.

17. Managerial Skills:
Managers need three types of skills:
Technical: Specific subject related skills such as engineering,
accounting, etc…
Interpersonal: Skills related to dealing with others and leading,
motivating, or controlling them
Conceptual: Ability to discern the critical factors that will determine
as organization’s success or failure.
Ability to see the forest in spite of the trees.

18. Managerial Level
Lowest Middle Top
..more technical skills, less salary???

19. Managerial Roles (What Managers Do)
• Interpersonal roles
• Informational Roles
• Decisional Roles

20. Managerial Roles (What Managers Do)
• Interpersonal roles
Figurehead role: Outward relationship
Leader role: Downward relation
Liaison role: Horizontal relation
Outward
Horizontal
Downward

21. Managerial Roles (What Managers Do)
• Informational Roles
Monitor Role: Collects information about internal
operations and external events.
Disseminator Role: Transforms information
internally to everybody in organization (like a
telephone switchboard)
Spokesman Role: Public relations

22. Managerial Roles (What Managers Do)
• Decisional Roles
Entrepreneurial Role: Initiates changes, assumes
risks, transforms ideas into useful products.
Disturbance Handler Role: Deals with unforeseen
problems and crisis.
Resource Allocator Role: Distributing resources
Negotiator Role: Bargains with suppliers, customers
etc. in favor of enterprise

23. Functions of Managers
Planning: Selecting missions and objectives.
Requires decision making.
Organizing: Establishing the structure for the
objective.
Staffing: Keeping filled the organization structure
Leading: Influencing people to achieve the objective
Controlling: Measuring and correcting the activities

24. Management: Is it an art or science?
Management has a body of specialized knowledge.
This knowledge need not to be obtained in formal
disciplined programs.

25. Engineering Management (Discipline+art)
Somewhere between art and science.

26. Management
Management can be classified into one of four categories:
An organizational or administrative process
A science, discipline, or art
The group of people running an organization
An occupational career

27. What is Engineering Management?
Narrow definition: Directing supervision of
engineers or of engineering functions.
Proper Definition of Engineering Manager:
Engineer possessing both abilities to apply
engineering principles and skills in organizing and
directing people and projects.

28. Why Engineering Managers?
Competition is global and companies need these people
to compete successfully

29. Why Engineering Managers?
Engineering manager uniquely qualified for two types of jobs:
The management of technical functions (design or production)
in almost any enterprise
Management of broader functions (marketing or top
management) in a high-technology enterprise
Engineering manager has great capability towards planning, resolving
the uncertainties, evaluate risks and motivate technical personnel.

30. Advantages of Understanding Technology in Top
Management
• Really understanding the business
• Understanding technology driving the business
today and technology that will change the business
in future

31. Advantages of Understanding Technology in Top
Management (2)
•Treating Research and Development as investment
not an expense to be minimized
• Spending more time on strategic thinking
• Dedicating a customer’s problem (true marketing
via customer relations)
• Place a premium on innovation
The first rule of any technology used in a business
is that automation applied to an efficient operation
will magnify the efficiency. The second is that
automation applied to an inefficient operation will
magnify the inefficiency…BILL GATES

32. Management challenges for engineers
The expectations…
They (engineers) are logical, methodical, objective, and make
unemotional decisions based on facts.
Use technical knowledge to check validity of information
Analyze problems thoroughly and explore the best solution
They understand what motivate engineers
Review and evaluate the work of their subordinates because
they understand what they are doing

33. Engage in future planning with appropriate consideration for
technology and its relationship to cost effectiveness
 Understand both the technology that is driving the business
today and the technology that will change the business in future
Treat research and development as an investment to be
nurtured, rather than an expense to be minimized
The engineering background increases the manager’s capability
with subordinates, customers and superiors. People attribute
qualities, abilities, skills, and knowledge to them, which allows
the manager to influence those who have that perception.
Engineering backgrounds help in technical communication

34. To be GREAT…THINK GREAT

42. Critical Thinking #1
Which one is the best??
The engineering manager with
business skills or the business
manager with the technical skills???

43. THANK YOU