THE LOST SOUL OF THE ENGINEER! PART TWO: Profile of the Engineer versus the Technocrat

THE LOST SOUL OF THE ENGINEER!

PART TWO : Profile of the Engineer versus the Technocrat

James R. Fisher, Jr., Ph.D.

© December 8, 2014

REFERENCE:

This is the second part of an article published in the Short Circuit magazine, The Newsletter of Engineering Empowerment, Spring 1993.

The ultimate desire of the engineer is to bring the future into the present.  The technocrat fights to reserve the status quo culture of the present.  The social systems epitomize the existing culture – the shared beliefs, values and expectations – of the majority.  It is a psychological wall that resists change until breakthroughs occur. 

When breakthroughs do occur, technocrats are quick to invent language – supportive belief systems with suitable tantalizing hooks – consistent with the existing culture’s proclivities to rush to purchase new products if not embrace actual change itself.   Seldom do the architects of cultural change, which inevitably follows, share in the spoils.  Johannes Guttenberg’s (1398-1468) invention of the movable type printing press in the late 1440’s pulled medieval Europe out of the Dark Ages, but quickly left the inventor bankrupt.

Engineers’ arrogant disregard for things not technical proves a damning disease.

This malady is compounded by basking in each other’s reflected sun.  This is further complicated by the pettiness of comparing and competing in imitation of each other, while allowing themselves to be programmed to conforming patterns: from competing for grades in school, status on the job, then thrown off their axis by a complement of rewards and recognition, flattery and approval rather than finding fulfillment in the management of their creations.    

The engineer’s best friend is often a professional rival because of this inclination. The other engineer is admired if not envied because he can do what he does only better.  With such a temperament, such a person is found to be difficult to manage and impossible to lead.

Take for example, his proficiency in managing data and information, but his aversion to manage himself.  He functions best in a measured world with well-defined parameters and a discrete frame of reference. 

Consider these five dimensions intelligence, support, conformity, achievement, and decisiveness.  As we examine these, note how relatively minor subtle adjustments can tip the scale in favor of the engineer, adjustments that he is not likely predisposed to show.

INTELLIGENCE

The engineer has an uncanny ability to analyze, digest, assimilate, and utilize information put before him.  He has a great facility for information he can see, grasp and manipulate.  Information he cannot see or visualize existing is quite another matter.  His purview is data specific, anything beyond that is considered unimportant, and therefore not worth pursuing.

Stated otherwise, information that is not derived empirically does not exist because it cannot be quantified or replicated.  The engineer is interested in facts, not feelings, in hard data not soft data, nor is he interested in abstractions.  Yet, ironically, he doesn’t escape being impulsive, but is unlikely aware of the fact. 

Engineers are known to be compulsive buyers who justify the purchase after the fact.  Likewise, they are poor gamblers, risk takers, or stock market aficionados.  Many engineers got into “day trading” mania when that sickness swept the country, and lost their shirts. 

Since love, hate, security, freedom, tranquility, violence, success and failure are part of life’s emotional grid, one or more of these conflicting values can be expected to trip up the engineer at some time.  Cognitive intelligence needs the counterbalancing force of emotional intelligence.

The technocrat swims confidently in the muck as if it were fresh water for he is constantly fighting to justify his existence.   This finds his mindset dedicated to the proposition of making an impression rather than a difference.  He lives in the conflicting and contradicting world of soft data (impressions and feelings), data invariably irrelevant to the engineer. 

Survival demands the technocrat be highly creative in knowing where useful information exists, who possesses it and how to leverage it to his advantage.  He takes the product or technology of the engineer (e.g., the Eagle computer), and runs with it for dear life.  There is a prehensile, almost reptilian intelligence to a technocrat’s consciousness allowing him to see from the outside and inside of an issue or situation that is not at all apparent to the engineer.

SUPPORT

An engineer by the nature of his technology being his god expects support from all disciplines to his purposes without complaint.  He is surprised and mystified, restive and petulant when there are any glitches to this protocol, demonstrating a pervasive immaturity.

This is not true of the technocrat.  Glitches are part of his modus operandi as he reflects philosophically, stuff happens!  He is also used to being slighted and taken for granted.  Pride is a luxury he cannot afford as it is an outdated, outmoded and a useless concept to ponder. His natural propensity is to passive aggression which finds him taking insult and injury in stride but with a vengeance.  Rejection is the way to opportunity finding it better to be bold and brash to win an occasional victory than watch others get all the promotions.  The world of uncertainty and choices is his domain.

What the engineer expects the technocrats knows he must create.

Consequently, the technocrat is constantly in a selling mode, always politicking for the next advantage, weighing the mood of the working climate and the confidence level of all those in positions of influence.  Once he measures the disposition of those in charge and calibrates their vulnerability to exploitation, he moves quickly to rally support to his cause, subtly and stealthily recruiting a cadre of folks of different views, disciplines and needs.  He finds no need to be an expert in anything for his role is that of the consummate facilitator. 

Often this is a dangerous high risk game.  He has to maintain the appearance of being a “company man,” when his intent is that of identifying key talent, recruiting them to his scheme without having any authority to do so. 

Taking the initiative is second nature to him.  This finds him hooked on fads, organizational interventions that have a happy ring to them while having no problem with them being totally cosmetic, at the same time, seeming to be an enthusiastic supporter of the company’s business plan.  As the quintessential chameleon, his motivation is to keep his options viable while appearing to be all things to everyone.  His skill is a skin game in human relations.  Strange as it might seem most engineers from afar admire him and believe him legitimate.

CONFORMITY

Paradoxically, it is the engineer’s efforts that creates the necessity for change, but it is also the engineer (not the technocrat) who expects social constructs to remain unchanged.  Conformity is an engineer’s safe haven.  It is what he knows and expects and the guidance system to his performance. 

For the technocrat it is only a half-way house.  Seldom does a radical come out of the engineering ranks.  It is as unlikely to see an engineer at some protest rally as it is to find him wearing beads and tie-dye clothes.  It is the antithesis of his training, discipline and mindset.  Engineering is synonymous with empirical laws (first principles), familiar frames of reference, structures, paradigms and algorithms. 

Learning to be an engineer is a demanding pursuit leaving little time to challenge the concepts thrown at him.  Stated another way, the dogma of science is theologically repressive.  Consequently, the engineer is conditioned to be more loyal to data than to his own mind.  Compare this to the liberated engineer who dances in the world of Liberal Arts with a sprinkling of the humanities.  Inveighing as he goes is a matter of routine for him, balancing his cognitive and emotional sides, as he deals with “what is,” or reality, but for the effort he is no longer considered an engineer.

The technocrat doesn’t worry about allegiances, but operates essentially in uncharted territory, which is radically different from that of the engineer, who operates with a blueprint (CAD/CAM) and the comfort of his technology.  The technocrat gets the job done by bending if not breaking the rules seeing possibilities where the engineer is unlikely to venture.  He takes the engineer’s science and makes it commercial leaving the engineer to brood on the unfairness of it all. 

Once I was told by an unhappy engineer, who wanted to start his own business that his company always paid him more than he could afford to take the risk.  He felt himself trapped in the conformity and security of his profession, but found solace in putting the onus on economic verities as the cause, having little sense that it was a cage of his own making.

ACHIEVEMENT

An engineer has a strong personal drive towards excellence, which need not be related necessarily to achievement.  One of the consistent complaints of the engineer is that he is underutilized, as if that were the fault of the system.  But he is the system!  The fact that he fails to see this goes back to his sense of powerlessness.

The engineers on the Eagle Project were consumed with a drive to complete the task at hand.  Every action was orchestrated towards that end.  It was not a drive toward self-aggrandizement, but towards completion.  But completion for what, for whom?  And why not self-aggrandizement?

Solid achievement, while spectacular in this case, can however mask a deeper dilemma, a failure to feel in control.   

A project becomes the engineer’s life with his will and obedience to its demands at considerable sacrifice and personal inconvenience.  Who then is in charge?  Is the engineer on automatic pilot?  Whatever the rationale put forward the engineer’s actions indicate that his mindset is to put the project first, second, third, and everything else a distant fourth, and on hold.   Panic pervades the before and after void until the next project, if there is one.

The technocrat is spectator to this process sitting in the bleachers while scheming as to how best to exploit the project’s successful completion.  He sees the engineer as a kind of trained seal.  Moreover, it is no accident that the world of the technocrat appears upscale to that of the engineer’s sophistication and urbanity, as he pays attention to these aspects that lay beyond the pale of the work at hand.   

The technocrat luxuriates in his Armani three-piece button-down world, or chinos and sandals belying the competence or casualness that he aims to project.  What happened with Eagle at Data General is repeated daily around the globe in the engineer’s world.  The engineer is invited into the house he has built and made to feel like a trespasser.

            DECISIVENESS

An engineer is not decisive.  I think we have established that.  By nature, he is tentative, circumspect, always looking for more data to verify his findings, or to ensure the positive outcome of his decisions.  Perfection is the engineer’s bottom line.

The technocrat is of a totally different mindset.  He knows the language of management or corporate speak, which is money, and that only numbers matter on the annual report and balance sheet. 

The technocrat is a magician with numbers.  The competent level of the staff may be declining, but he will show impressive number for training given, employee conferences attended, awards earned, which mask actual performance or why the company is losing business.   

He operates in the high risk business of doing whatever it takes to put a positive spin on company operations.  He functions at the gut level and strives under stress, and ignores the engineer’s claim that he is “shooting from the hip” and is “a loose cannon.”  He does and is, but it doesn’t matter to him for criticism is like water off a duck’s back.

The technocrat makes decisions with a flare.  The point is he is not afraid of making the wrong decision: “It is better to do something than nothing.”  His thought processes while appearing overtly to be orderly can be covertly chaotic, as he believes a wrong idea if the troops believe in it will succeed, while the right idea if they don’t will fail. 

He gambles the house on his and other people’s ability to deliver as promised, especially engineers.  He keeps different mental books on file, one for management, and the other for everyone else.   He is a maestro at hedging his bet, playing show your ass and cover your ass games.  His decisions are made to further his career if they succeed, and to derail the careers of others if they fail. 

Management sees him as “high talent,” intently loyal while the engineer’s loyalty is seen as suspect, when this is likely to be the reverse of the facts.

THE DELICATE BALANCE

If the engineer looks like the pigeon in this modern game of enterprise my efforts have not been wasted.  Once I was consultant to a hi-tech organization with a $65 million systems engineering contract.  A large group of systems analysts showed no interest in performing the function of management for the group.  So, a technocrat was brought in to manage the group having no idea what these engineers did. 

Operations were barely into the first phase of the contract when a brouhaha erupted.  The supervisor had downgraded one of the system analyst cutting his pay and grade level, citing “poor performance and cavalier incompetence.” 

The basis for this performance appraisal evaluation was the fact that the engineer was always found tapping his pencil at his desk, whistling and smoking never being seen engaged in any work or exchanges with other analysts.  Clearly, a case of incompetence, right?

It turned out that this particular system analyst was the unspoken leader of the group, and the most respected man on the team.  He, alone, had made important breakthroughs on the contract.  When his colleagues heard of this downgrade, they walked off the job and threatened to quit.

Abruptly, this supervisor was removed.  Finally, one of the analysts reluctantly volunteered to take on the management job “for the duration of the project.”  Even with this development, these engineers didn’t get the message.

As Plato had observed, the engineer has the power of sight to see into his own soul, but he must be goaded into looking in the right direction.  For the engineer, the answers are not in his technology, but in himself. 

The engineer has created the modern world, but has spurned the responsibilities inherent in doing so.  He has done this to himself, but also to the rest of us.  He has allowed technocrats to take possession of his creations, what they don’t know or understand, and manage them at their will.  Fault not the technocrat.  He has taken possession of modernity by default.

The engineer has been finessed by his own stubbornness, by his own inability to establish a delicate balance between social and technical demands, between emotional and rational demands, between engineering and management.  His contempt for non-engineering has put him in a cage of his own making.  Only he can leave that cage by abandoning old beliefs and verities, and embrace new ways of taking charge of his genius.  The first step might be to invite a technocrat to lunch.  He can teaching him a great deal.

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