Communication

This week we were to pick one of three choice for our blog. I chose to use free writing and directed writing to explain the importance of communication for engineers.

Free Writing:

Communication in engineering is very important. You must communicate your ideas well to allow other to understand them. For you to make someone else understand your idea or think it is good you must be able to explain it coherently and effectively. When in teams you must be able to communicate in order to work together well. You must ask good questions when you are confused about a point in someone else’s idea or comment, and you must be able to ask questions to help expand others ideas. If you see a problem that they do not it is better to ask what they intend to do about it rather than say that this is a problem they have not seen. If you say it is a problem it comes across as if you are attacking them not helping them. If you ask about the problem as a question they must think about it and give you an answer even if its “I hadn’t thought of that.” Also when in a team you must be able to communicate quickly to allow development to move at a good rate. If it takes you two days to respond to someones email they will be slowed down because they had to wait for your response. In most cases email alone will not be effective for communication. Meeting face to face allows for very quick communication because you can get instant responses from multiple people. Also wikis can be very good forms for communication because they allow anyone on the team to post ideas and get feedback quickly from everyone else. If you do not know how to communicate effectively you will be slower in giving responses to others and your ideas will not be heard. You will also both be frustrated by and frustrate your co-workers because they may misunderstand your plans and either not follow them or will misunderstand and be frustrated with you when you don’t do what they expected.

Directed Writing:

Communication is a very important skill for engineers. Engineering is not a solitary profession. One cannot work on projects and ideas alone. A team is needed and must be able to work together to finish the project. Everyone on this team must be able to communicate in order for them to understand everything that is going on. Without communication skills the team may not understand why they are working on the project, why their co-workers aren’t working well or aren’t doing what they expected, or why no-one came to work one day. Without good communication skills development will slow due to the time communication takes. Good communication is essential for engineers.

Imagine an engineering team that did not communicate at all. The project manager decides that the team is not getting enough work done and should come in on saturday to work. He does not email anyone, tell anyone, or even post a notice. He then comes in on saturday to find that no-one shows up to work. He becomes angry with his team because he feels that they are not dedicated to the project. In reality the team had no idea that this saturday meeting was scheduled and did not know they were expected to come to work. Other problems this team would face would be things like not knowing who was working on what, who needed help with what, or possibly even what is was they are making. Without communication this team will never finish a project.

Now imagine an engineering team that communicates, but cannot communicate well. Their only forms of communication are meeting face to face and email. They meet together to discuss their work on their project. The project manager tells everyone that they must come up and explain how they are progressing on their piece of the project. The first person comes up and simply says, “I’m not done yet.” The next comes up and explains what he has done, but no-one sees how it fits in to the greater project. This goes on for the whole meeting. The first person clearly communicated poorly because no-one knows anything more than before he spoke. They do not know how much work he has left to do or if he needs any help or resources to continue on his piece of the project. Likewise anyone who needs his portion of the project before they can finish their own does not know how long they will have to wait for him to finish. The second person was able to tell what he was working on, but ultimately confused everyone. There could be one of two reasons for this. The first could be that when the project was started the project as a whole and the individual tasks were not explained well enough, so he thought that he was expected to build what he built when really it it needed to be something completely different. The other reason for the confusion could be that he decided on a different way of building his piece. It will ultimately fulfill the same purpose, but because he did not let anyone know he changed the plans and does not understand how his piece fits in to the whole no-one understands it. This team will need to meet more often so that everyone can understand how the project is coming along and to solve any problems they come across. These constant meetings slow everyone down and the confusion lowers team morale. This team will probably finish their project but it will cost them time, money, and frustration.

Now imagine a team with near perfect communication skills, to the degree that they can almost read each-others minds. They communicate with a combination of face to face meetings, video conference calls, a project wiki, and email. When the project began the project manager explained exactly what it was the project was meant to do and what everyone was expected to do. Any team members who didn’t understand or saw problems asked good questions and continued to ask good questions until they fully understood, or until the problem was seen and solved. Once the team began working the team members kept their page of the wiki up to date with their progress and any changes they have made to their piece. If someone had a question while working they emailed it to whoever could answer, and that person answered clearly. The team met once every couple weeks to discuss any changes that needed made, or any possible pitfalls they found. Because everyone is in almost constant communication and communicates clearly they will have to meet less often, feel less frustration from misunderstandings, and ultimately work together like a well oiled machine. They will finish their project well and will be more than ready for the next.

Communication is clearly an important skill for all engineers. It allows them to understand each-other and the work that is being done. It allows them to share ideas and ask questions to both clarify and point out problems. Most importantly it allows them to work together and finish projects that would take one person years to finish.