Electrical engineer Bob Schmidt joins Adam, Carmen, Brian and Jeff to talk about the importance of making a good impression, and delivering the intended message, with effective email.
Jeff readily admits that he doesn’t use newer communication channels such as WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger.
Rather than use Instagram, Jeff has a Kodak carousel projector in his basement for showing slides. (An episode from the TV show Mad Men gave rise to a demonstration of the carousel projector.)
Brian is continuing to make use of Microsoft OneNote, having recently delved into it’s collaborative features.
Bob has a list of five keys for delivering effective email:
Spend some time on the subject line
Know to whom you are speaking
Check it twice, read it thrice
Oh, those miserable attachments
STOP, CAUTION, and YIELD signs along the road ahead
Brian admits sending emails with a blank subject line, but Bob says that’s inconsiderate to coworkers who must interpret the email’s subject and importance on their own.
Carmen and Bob “tag” their emails by topic or project to ease subsequent sorting and identification of important information.
Go ahead and change the subject line to fit the current conversation, suggests Bob.
Our guest points out that blind carbon copy (Bcc:) recipients do not receive replies to the original email on which they were copied.
Send carbon copy (Cc:) emails to individuals needing to know of an action or decision, but who are not directly involved in carrying out the action or decision.
Send Bcc: emails to individuals needing a high-level alert that progress is underway, but without burdening them with subsequent discussion details. As a courtesy to other recipients, make a note in the email about who is receiving the blind carbon copy.
Commenting on the dangers of using the “reply all” button, Brian mentions an email storm circulating at Time, Inc.
Bob suggest that engineers never send an “angry” email, noting that Abraham Lincoln would write “hot letters” that were never sent.
Jeff and Brian wander into a discussion of whether electromagnetic pulses (EMPs) could wipe the hard drives on which emails are often stored.
A great deal of corporate data from Sony Entertainment was made public in 2014.
Thanks to Ian Lamont for use of the photo titled “BlackBerry email on the BB 8330.” Opening music by John Trimble, and concluding theme by Paul Stevenson.
During this episode, we chat with researcher Jonathan Wai about the strong spatial skills exhibited by many engineers. We also discuss why standardized tests don’t measure spatial abilities, the manner in which highway clover leafs are designed, and how one particular co-host would go about reconfiguring his local deli counter.
Adam describes the process of designing a highway interchange. Although it’s not a purely analytical method, he assures us it does not involve the use of a Spirograph (as suggested by Carmen).
James Trevelyan’s book, The Making of an Expert Engineer, is referenced by Jeff. Long-time listeners may recall that Dr. Trevelyan was our guest for Episode 19 (Value) and again for Episode 68 (Expert Engineer).
Our guest for this episode is Dr. Jonathan Wai, a research scientist who writes about developing expertise in both educational and occupational settings. In addition to his academic articles, his writings have appeared in Psychology Today, the Los Angeles Times, Forbes, Education Week, and many other magazines and newspapers.
Certain scientific fields, including psychology, use an idealized hypothetical construct to explain that which cannot be measured directly.
With regard learning more about spatial abilities, Jon recommends the work of David Lohman, a Professor Emeritus with the University of Iowa, and also that of David Lubinski, a Professor of Psychology with Vanderbilt University.
A spatial visualization test examines a subject’s ability to mentally translate, rotate, and transform three-dimensional objects.
Hierarchical models of intelligence propose that each individual’s general intelligence (or g factor) is augmented by abilities in ostensibly dissimilar cognitive tasks, such as mental, verbal and spatial reasoning.
Terry Tao is an example of the rare individual who can perform at the highest levels of mathematical reasoning.
Jeff references a journal article about integrating spatial reasoning into the engineering education curriculum.
Nora Newcombe, David Uttal, and David Miller are mentioned as researchers who have looked extensively at how spatial abilities can be strengthened through training exercises.
The tendency of the general intelligence scores to rise over time is called the “Flynn Effect.” (You can watch Dr. Flynn describe this phenomenon in a TED talk from 2013.)
Jon recommends the book Sex Differences in Cognitive Abilities, by Diane Halpern, for those wishing to better understand cognitive differences between men and women.
Trait clusters have been investigated by Phillip Ackerman of Georgia Tech.
In this episode of The Engineering Commons, we discuss engineering skills and duties learned in the workplace, rather than from a textbook.
Brian tells young engineers that an engineering degree is a “learner’s permit.” Once in the workplace, engineers have to teach themselves to solve an entirely new class of problems.
A gold-fish shaped retention pond, first mentioned by Adam in our episode on engineering pranks, is referenced once again, although your dutiful scribe is still looking for hard evidence of such a structure.
An extended discussion related to beer production and consumption breaks out amongst the discussion panel.
Jeff describes how the bricks that once covered the entire racing surface at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway are now found only at the start/finish line, in what is known as the Yard of Bricks.
Lateral loading on racing surfaces, due to the massive grip exerted by race car tires, requires the use of specialized asphalt mixtures.
“Engineering is the art of organizing and directing men, and of controlling the forces and materials of nature for the benefit of the human race.” — Henry Gordon Stott (1907)
“”The ideal engineer is a composite … He is not a scientist, he is not a mathematician, he is not a sociologist or a writer; but he may use the knowledge and techniques of any or all of these disciplines in solving engineering problems.” — N. W. Dougherty (1955)
“Engineering is not merely knowing and being knowledgeable, like a walking encyclopedia; engineering is not merely analysis; engineering is not merely the possession of the capacity to get elegant solutions to non-existent engineering problems; engineering is practicing the art of the organized forcing of technological change… Engineers operate at the interface between science and society…” — Gordon Stanley Brown (1962)
“Scientists study the world as it is, engineers create the world that never has been.” — Theodore von Kármán
Engineers break complex problems into smaller solvable pieces. The “art” of engineering is knowing how big those pieces can be.
Whereas textbook problems usually have a definite answer, problems from the workplace are often ill-defined, and may sometimes offer no practicable solution.
Problem constraints in industry may seem at times arbitrary, being controlled by economic, political, and organizational powers beyond the engineer’s realm of influence. Additionally, these constraints are not fixed, but vary with time.
We reveal our high-tech method of aligning audio tracks in Audacity, the audio editing software used to create this podcast.
Obsolescence issues are increasingly important for design engineers as commercially-available components are being manufactured for shorter periods of time.
Engineers must avoid the natural urge to over-design products, even when dealing with complex constraints.
Making a prototype work once in the lab is far different than making thousands of mass-produced products work reliably in the field.
An important part of an engineer’s job is prioritizing where one’s time should be spent.
Many times it’s more important to be on the “proper” side of the equation than to be right; that is, one has to make certain assumptions that may be incorrect, but those assumptions need to be made such that the product or service will not fail, even if the assumptions are not perfectly accurate.
Jeff’s example of a 500 ksi stress load would have been more realistic at 50 ksi or 500 MPa, at least for steel parts.
In examining the meltdown of nuclear reactors at Japan’s Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant, recent reports have suggested that a contributing factor was the lowering of a seawall back in 1967.
It’s important for engineers to keep track of the small details, even though the process of doing so may be quite tedious.
In his autobiography, test pilot Chuck Yeager recalls the tragic outcome of a line worker’s decision to install bolts “right side up” while assembling a jet plane aileron, even thought the blueprints indicated otherwise.
Engineering designs need to account for human factors, as well as technical constraints and specifications.
As an engineer, skepticism is prudent in evaluating information and methods. However, too much skepticism can lead to one being labeled “not a team player.”
Engineers are often asked to be “fortune tellers,” predicting future outcomes for processes and designs that have never before been realized.
Adam emphasizes the importance of understanding safety factors, and their proper application in the design process.
Production and maintenance costs are crucial factors in industry, while such cost issues are often overlooked in textbook problems.
Electrical engineer Bob Schmidt joins Adam, Carmen, Brian and Jeff to talk about the importance of making a good impression, and delivering the intended message, with effective email.
