Successfully Transitioning From Engineer To Engineering Manager Management Essay

Which path should an engineering manager follow? How can organizations develop people with effective management skills? This report provides the way of success for identifying future engineering managers and a pathway for progressing their capabilities and responsibilities. The objective is to understanding the principles of engineering management. Each organization selects its engineering manager based on a complex set of factor. Majority of engineering managers are engineers before whose technical expertise allows them to effective manage employees, projects and process lines in organizations.

Aspiring to become an engineering manager is the right objective if have an interest in the technical and the administrative. Technical skills are the elementary type of skills for an engineer, but for engineering manager, technical skills are generally less important, and their professional development focal point should be on skills that will assist a manager become a primary leader of the business. Specialized professionals require an integration of technical skills, soft skills and conceptual skills as well.

Keywords: Engineering management, Engineering manager, Technical skills, Interpersonal skills, Business skills, Management skills.

INTRODUCTION

An engineering manager has four main field of responsibility, that is, supervising engineers or technicians, project management, interacting with clients, and offering suggestion and representative as a resourcefulness. An engineering manager should be a completely permit and specialized. All job seeker must finish a university undergraduate degree in engineering. Engineering management is the field involved with the application of engineering principles to the planning and manipulative management of manufacturing and industrial organizations. Engineering managers requires an integration of technical skills, soft skills, and conceptual skills as well.

Technical skills are the elementary type of skills. Engineering manager is a leader of the team; normally consist of a group of engineers, technicians and workers. Engineering managers should have a unique skill in a specific area which can leading them to stand out among the public. Along with the proficient of technical skills, the engineering manager will able to understand the requirement and specification of the whole project. Beside that, engineering managers should have self-confidence while leading the group. Show the ability that can resolve the technical problem and hence the employees might convinced to him. As an engineering manager, the continuing study and upgrading the knowledge is required. This will help them in solving the specific problem.

Admittedly, to develop employees effective, the soft skills are needful for engineering manager. Actually, for engineering manager, technical skills are generally less important, and their professional development focal point should be on skills that will assists a manager become a good leader at the organization. People who like to interact with others, are congenital leaders, and are capable engineers discover this type of position remunerative. There is a standard of direction or instruction as stage of this position that is a fresh skill for great majority of engineers. Interpersonal skills and communication skills are extremely importance in this responsibility.

In addition, conceptual skills are needed for engineering managers. These essential skills are regard as a fundamental requirement for managers who located in highest level of management position. A successful engineering manager with specific skills normally has brilliant cognitive abilities to deliberate creativity. The conceptual skills involved thinking creativity, analysis and diagnosis, recognizes, psychological skills, planning intelligence, emotional intelligence and problem solving skills. Engineering managers who provided with conceptual skills are able to investigate complex problems, imagine details, and effective practice of behavior.

Overall, management is an integrated new profession for engineers. Engineers who take on management position should emulate and study new set of specific skills. From beginning, engineering managers may often confront an intercession period that requires accepting a whole fresh skill and mentality. Engineering manager should change their natural instincts such as straightforward answers and seriousness. The important principles for engineering managers may and must be flexible. Always put effort on additional skills, will bring good results.

CHAPTER 1 TECHNICAL SKILLS

Technical skills are those skills, such as intellectual and mastery that managers use to complete their task in specialized areas such as engineering or information technology. Technical skills must be come out by entire standards of administrative. High level of management use technical skills to develop project plans and for making conceptual decisions, and to focus on the individual decision making process. Technical skills give lower-level managers the capability, intellectual and practiced in a designated field, not only to perform tasks, but also to regulate the tasks of employee in that area.

Technical skill can define as the most fundamental type of skills that should have to achieve in our life. The technical skills required of life general as well as the particular technical skills required of specific job or task. The technical skill suggests an understanding in a specific kind of task. It involves specialized knowledge, analytical ability, and facilities in the use of the equipments of the specific branch of learning. Occupational practical training programmes mostly do a great job in developing this kind of skill.

Engineers may evolution to transform into technical specialists or to monitor a team of technicians and engineers. Some may ultimately become engineering managers or to participate other managerial tasks. In business, an engineering intellectual will offers them to discuss a project’s technical specification and helps in production planning, assembly, and utilize.

Unique Skills

Engineers who always succeed the greatest in their profession are engineers who have unique skills in a specific area leading them to stand out among the public. It might be the difference between banality and distinct.

Upgrading the Knowledge

People who able to take his skill levels in a specific area one level higher than his have now, and always taking up the effort in value adding process. This effort may even bring long term extra pay or reward from an unimaginable source. Technical skill building is an on-going, and it is a never-ending process. Constantly upgrade the skills, make continuous education, and always stay at a distinct advantage of changes and developments.

For example: An engineering manager who hadn’t had a consulting project of any considerable order in over half a year, and he realize that the relationship between his effort for improvement with his life’s better response to the effort. He tried to improve his knowledge by continuous learning some higher level skills. Within a short period, he was contacted by a company to produce a large consulting project.

Mechanical and electronic engineering manager

The technical skills are fundamental to the job. The computer skilful is very important. Most professionals task widely with computer drafting software and other specific programs to help them design a new product. Besides that, engineers always work on physically building prototypes, which need manual practised and particular knowledge of various types of tools and assemble techniques. Normally, it is require working rapidly and efficiently, without skipping any steps in the building procedure. After the prototypes has been completed, the engineer manager will passing the idea to the development team’s member, and supervise them to complete the task according to the initial concept.

Information Technology engineering manager

The hardware support is the basic technical skill for information technology engineer, it depend on specialized training in hardware installation, software application, and computer networking. As an information technology engineer manager, the continuing study and upgrading the knowledge is required. Else, that will be difficult in certain kind of problem solving. The information technology is rapidly changing, the technology tends to evolve rather quickly, such as telecommunication, and there is an evolution from 3G to 4G, just taking a short period. The information technology manager should always review and estimate the current applications are satisfying the demands of the company. Besides that, the manager must be able to verify the new technologies to improve the objective of the company.

Fully Integrated Skill

As a skill gets carried out over and over again, it becomes nearly second. As the skill grows more integrated into out being, it transform from our conscious awareness of carry out the action involved in the skill fall into a subconscious stage where it is manipulate on an nearly automatic of implement. It is done without any effort and is done with a meaning of impassive.

Technical Responsibilities

Technical responsibilities can change greatly; it is depending on the scale and composition of the company.

Identify

Identify conclusive process scope that controls the reliability, quality and performance of the final product.

Leading

Lead the commercial grade design and progress a high volume manufacturing line in order to meet the requirement.

Managing

Manage the evolution of mechanical, electronic and electrical, and software systems for carry out, inspecting and controlling all field of the manufacturing process.

Inspection

Manage the design of electrical and mechanical measurement tools for received good monitoring, post-process inspection and final inspection.

Evolution

Evolution and refine the innovative product line to meet the requirement of client. Engineer manager will be working closely with the CEO, clients, contractors and manufacture groups.

CHAPTER 2 SOFT SKILLS

Soft skills also define as interpersonal skills. Engineering managers require interpersonal skills to be efficient. Without the capability to influences others, produce good decision making and control many preferential, the excellent of technical skills aren’t going to dedicate completely to the administrative of the team. As a engineering manager, who realize themselves badly off in interpersonal skill, must try to aspire training at any time to support up leadership skills, human skills, communications skills, management skills, presentation skills and so on. An administrative management must hold out such training.

Engineering managers requires an integration of technical skills and interpersonal skills as well. For engineering manager, technical skills are generally less important, and their professional evolution focal point should be on skills that will assist a manager become a primary leader of the business. For those engineering managers who are not willing to spend those specialize into leadership path, may not be the greatest rightness for engineering management responsibilities.

Human Skills

Human skills include realizing how to interact nicely with people. Normally, nobody like to working for a manger that is impolite and inconsiderate. A manger lack in human skills can decrease both spirit and productivity of the team. However, engineering manager with effective human skills always has employees with a positive manner and a tough desire to boost up company productivity. It is important for engineering manager to work effectively with positional, subordinates, and supervisors.

Always entertaining employees or workers with respectful and polite together with the ability to expressive a vision for the task are main element to a manager to archiving an interpersonal skills. Well communication skills and the intelligence to associate with people are the essential to become a successful engineering manager, or else, they will not be able to express their opinion for the business with the involved person. A successful engineering manager able to complete the task in all kind of responsibilities by cooperates with workers, technicians, managers and clients.

Leadership

Responsibilities

Every organization requires certain people to take leadership responsibilities. Anyone can be a leader, as long as they are proficient in leadership skills. The organization will develop well if everyone expends their professional skills into proper leadership roles.

A leader is someone who looks for works that haven’t been completed or pursue to improve the team’s objectives to make it become more efficient. Leaders are responsible for employing, training, inspiring, counseling, and disciplining their employees. They always pursue to inspiring and utilize the energies and skills of employees to guarantee a productivity and efficient work. Besides that, they must always instill positive thinking or manners, to ensure that all the employees are working towards an achievement of same goal.

Be a good example

As usual, there are leaders and there are followers. Developing good leadership skills can bring about the excellence between the two. Some of the people claim that, a strong leader is born and not made. This is not to conclude that, the leadership skill does not be able to learn. As an engineering manager, try to developing yourself to stimulate become a good leader.

People always follow a good leader due to he is stand for the beliefs of a team. This person is always well focused on a main objective and resolves the difficulties. In the same time, the employees will be happy to provide the support for the team in order to succeed in accomplishes their goals.

Background Skills for a Manager

In order to processing the effectively influencing of the team’s activities, a leader should also need to influence their employees through some characters such as personal glamour, expertise, command of language, and the produce of mutual respect or polite. The engineering manager should also require to handling some background skills such as mentoring, decision making, group works, delegation and motivating others.

Mentoring

Become a trusted advisor and assistant with experience in a specific field. Actively sustaining and directing someone to develop their experience and knowledge in order to achieve career goals. A mentoring relationship could be formal or informal, but must include trust, respect, acceptance and commitment as both sides work together to accomplish a common goal.

Group work

Team work defines as any activity in which members work together. It also explains as an activity that has been specifically designed so that members can work in a team. An engineering manager should able to supervise the task for each member in the group. Help each other with their task given in order to achieve the common objective. Always corporately and working efficiently with other team members.

Decision Making

Evaluate proper evidence and balance up that evidence to make an option. As an engineering manager, should always taking responsibility for a decision and its consequence.

Delegation

An engineering manager should taking responsibilities for ensuring when to request someone else to carry out a decision for the task. In order to increasing the efficiency and productivity of the task, engineering manager should assigning responsibilities and power in a team by giving someone else the judgment to carry out the decision.

Network Building

As a leader, should always creating contacts with other people and keeping those contacts. For example, meeting and bring together with someone at a seminar with similar interests, and interchanging email addresses with them. Obtaining and keeping information about those who might be beneficial contacts for certain intention. Make use of a contact in an ethical way to help each other achieve particular goals.

Motivating Others

Engineer should always produce devotion and capability by being positively. Besides that, focusing on researching solutions and holding a positive manner even when thing are going bad. A good leader should always ask his employees about the ways to overcome the problem. Inspiring the team member to come out the solutions, and try to listening carefully to their opinion. Always prepared to support employees in taking agree with them, calculated risk, and not criticizing and blaming others when the thing is going wrong.

Counseling

Counseling defines as a personal talk with someone who need for helps in individual problem. Everyone has confronted with problems from time to time. As a good leader, employees will grow to respect him, and they will ready to come to him with problems. A leader always recognizes employees with problems, and he cannot let them suffer or just move them away. If the serious problem has been ignored, that will almost consequently become a group problem.

Furthermore, counseling can also defines as listening. From the view of employees, when they get into trouble, they just need to talk it out about their worries and show the difficulties faced. After their worries and difficulties have been heard by leader gives the sufferer a feeling that his/her worries and difficulties are rational. Hence, by using this way, the self-confidence of employees might increase, handling the problem easily.

Management Skills

Engineering manager requires understanding many aspects of the business in running a task. The important skills related on special skill or knowledge in the area of organization, finance, marketing surveying, communication, and human resources. Based on the research, great majority of the projects fail because the management skills distribution of the project has not obtained enough notice. The human element has not been sufficiently concerned. For an organization or individual, the transform or change is stressful. It the manager is capability to develop this kind of change; he will accomplish his objective or goal easily.

Planning

Planning is an essential skill. It provides a common conceptual system to integrate a variety of related skills, involving problem solving skills, scheduling, to develop estimates of the time and resources needed to complete the project, negotiation with client, and conflict resolution.

Planning is a sequential process, where a decision at certain stage helps transparent your choices in the next stage. As a manager, he can utilize the suggestion after each stage to help define the particulars for each task. The efficient utilize of planning will do more than any other technical skill to advance both obtaining the job done and managing the group together. Planning is advantage in team organization and individual.

Managing Risk

Engineering manager can also learned how to recognize problem of risk by establish a project permit that transparent the objectives, opportunity, limits, resources, and timing for the project. Manager require to know how to apply management skills to develop these ricks, Some of the organizations had provided certain kind of certification courses of training for this specific skills for new of future engineering managers.

Budgeting

An engineering manager should understand how to use the budget. It is another fundamental management skill, even though the organization has hired a team of profession accountants to manage the financial path. There are three important steps to a budgeting, first is preparing it, second is writing it, and final step is monitoring it.

Although the finance department are responsible to charged with perform these matters for manager, but as a good engineering manager have the responsibility for the project’s budget planning. Besides that, engineering manager also require to understand what have been told about the project’s budget. To fully integrate into budgeting, engineering manager need to know about the logically challenge of project cost overrun. By develop this essential skill; engineering manager can be able to managing the budget efficiency.

Team work

The effective team work will assist an engineering manager to developing his/her project effectively. A good engineering manager also is a team leader as well. Always prepared to help and work with team member to accomplish the common goals. A good manager will able to set up a culture of teamwork into all direction of the task given. Furthermore, there will be a high self-respect within all of the team members, and it sense that they already feel personally included in the whole process of the project. Hence, the project will be success.

Decision Making

Decision making defines as an action of selecting between two or more type of option. Nevertheless, it might often be bear in mind that there may not always be a right decision making among the available choices. Sometimes there may have been a greater choice that had not been regarded at the suitable time. It is important for a manager to take notes of all decision and the reasons for each decision were made in order to make the improvement in the future time. Besides that, by using this way, we can easy to justify for any decision taken when problem is occurs.

Time Management

Engineering managers require the ability to organize themselves and others by implement of time management. Always require to examine precisely what had spending your time on and how significant are those task and distributions of time to the successful accomplish of the project give.

For example, as an engineering manager, you could spend a lot of time per day just for reading the emails. Actually, this task can be distributed to your clerk or personal assistant. They might tell you what needs follow up with immediately and what can be keep until later or just ignore. By using this way, a manager could save a lot of time and concentrate in another part of the project like checking on progression or inspecting the quality and so on. The time management skills should be applies, and do take note that, it is not necessary to manage the entire task by yourself. The greatest way to improve the time management skills is to further up our self-control and hence can develop the task without terribly upset.

Communication

Communication is fundamental for effective operation in every stage of an organization. Even though finance, marketing, production, and technical department, may receive guidance from overall objectives and goals, the communication will connects them together and easier become organizational achievement. Communication is required to improves efficiency, quality, give satisfaction for customer, and hence create renovation products.

Effective communication is very crucial for company success. That shouldn’t only for manager, but also their employees and team members must be efficient in communication. The responsibilities of an engineering manager is to assist their employees improve their communication skills. The good manger must be able to established collaborative relationships through active listening. If all of the team members can communicate efficiently with each other, the performance of the team will be improved.

Several ways to improve the relationship between manager and employees:

Manager should

Always identify employees training requires.

Give feedback or suggestion on employee’s performance.

Form a principle for staff decision is necessary, such as promotions, disciplinary actions, allowances, and salary increases.

Offer the chance for company diagnosis and development.

Demonstrate staff hiring techniques and human resource policies.

Interact with client

Beside that, interacting with the client also act as an important stage of the role of engineering manager. An engineering manager is usually involved in the beginning meeting, examining, designing of the product, and supervising of the team members. Frequently scheduled meetings with clients are normally planned by the engineering. The ability to operate well with an extensive range of people, and always share opinion and experience with employees is important. Now, many engineering manager attend additional courses in order to advance their communication skills that will help them to managing the employees.

Controlling the Group

As a good manager, always balances getting the job completed and managing the team together. Control is always a public behavior of the engineering manager. To control the team efficiency, an engineering manager should:

Set the tempo

A good manager should illustrate his volunteer to do anything asked from team members. Beside that, always sets a good model and example.

Observes

Observes the team and communicates with the team members but it is not necessary to dominate. Always tends to give suggestions for improvement, it is better than orders.

Instructs

Communicate clearly with employees. A good manager always allows team members to use their own idea. Although there is a mistake occurs, try to correct the mistake with mutual respect and without blaming. If the work is going well by employees, do not disturb. If necessary, try to offer direct support and instruction.

Counsels

A leader should be ready and willing to support their employees with certain needs. Always recognizes employees with problems, and he cannot let them suffer or just move them away. Beside that, encourages all of the team members to show their best.

Inspects

Practice and manage a positive thinking and does not appraise or blaming. Praises good work, in the same time silently provides suggestions to correct the errors. Avoid making employees fall into contempt.

Reacts

Identifies that responsibilities for lose or breakdown is on the leader, do not shift the blame on employees or team members. Always remain humble and constantly work hard to give service to the team.

Human Resources Responsibilities

Broadcast and Advertises Engineering Duty

Moreover to supervising production, engineering managers always undertake human resources responsibilities as well. Manager broadcast and advertises engineering duty open to public in order to hire new workman and offer practically training. Human resources consist of all elements of employee management, such as recruiting, hiring, training, reserving and dismissal. Within each given area, they are verified effective human resource administration strategies.

Effective human resources management skills

The successful human resources management skills are needed for a productive organization that can accomplish the goal which is higher profit. All of the employees are a required resource in any organization. If the company does not using effective human resources management skills can be a bad bargain for a business.

Human resource management skill is the anticipative developing of people. It needs opinion in advance, and planning methods for an organization to meet the requirement of its employees. In the same time, it also the employees also will meet the requirements of the organization. By using this way, the effective improvement of productivity will appear. A good human resource management should always improve everything from recruiting, hiring, training to evaluate skill and discipline. By improving the employees keeping proportion can reduce the cost for organization to training or hiring new employees.

CHAPTER 3 CONCEPTUAL SKILLS

Conceptual skills are skills that use the capability of a human to produce concepts. Conceptual skills also defines as a skills that manager should have to think and to conceptualize about digest, abstract and complicated condition. By using this essential skill, managers should be able to observe the company as an integrated, know the relationships between different subunits, and imagine how the company suits to its wider environment. These substantial skills are most significant at the highest grade of management. An engineering manager at the highest level of the companies have the responsibility for making the decision for whole sense of organization and set up the objective and goal that impact the whole organization.

In the business field, these essential skills are regard as a fundamental need for managers who located in highest level of management position. Good engineering managers with specific skills normally have brilliant cognitive abilities to deliberate creatively hence resolve problems. A manager be provided with these essential skills are able to investigate a complicated issue and visualize details, and effective practice of behavior.

To apply conceptual skills to produce concepts, progressing solution and resolving difficulties. They are some important steps need to follow:

Ensure the outcome to be accomplished or explain the problem.

Investigate and analyze all required information

Evaluate the choices by using problem solving skills

Analyze the feasibility of each option.

Determine and perform most appropriate solution.

Thinking Creativity and Visualizing Abstractions

A concept is a series of ideas. A concept manages many ideas jointly; an idea is similar to a brick, it is not a final formation for a building. The final formation is the concept. Do not start a project without a creative concept. The creative concept is the way or the plan that you will use to produce the required outcome.

As an engineering manager, you are requiring the ability to comprehend a situation or difficulties by evaluating and cope with possible issues and limits. Conceptual thinking involves organizing the sections of an issues or condition is a regular way and being able to visualize opinions and ideas. Hence, you can extend abstract ideas from certain case.

Analysis and Diagnosis

A manager should observe at models in events or objects. Always understand how to visualize the ideas. Engineering manager requires analyzing and diagnosis complicated situations which need them to learn conceptual skills. They are able to make the process rationally and make clear with available information. Beside that, engineering manager must be able to determine problems, identify correct option, estimate them and pick the greatest one in order to make a rational decision. Nevertheless, some managers lose in the direction due to lack of ability in rationally processing and illustrating information, managing the results in mind.

An individual with conceptual skills can determine how ideas are relevance. They effectually see individual compositions in relationship to the entire project. Inspecting complicated situations and difficulties are important for an engineering manager. Furthermore, problem solving is an important skill that includes both creativity and analysis. A leader with strong conceptual skills always recognized as effective managers, due to their ability to comprehend the whole organization and develop the creativity strategies.

Recognizes

Recognizing how the different functions and operations of the company depend on one another, and how varies in