Most large engineering and construction (E&C) companies share the same conundrum. They claim to be engineering companies, yet the top leadership almost never talks about the way engineering is being done, the quality of the engineering staff, the concerns and needs of engineering management, or the need to focus on recruiting, motivating, and retaining the bulk of the engineers who do the day-to-day work.

The focus of most E&C companies is on business development, client contacts, commercial contracts, and the project managers who deliver major projects. Very little management time is spent evaluating new engineering work processes and technologies to increase efficiency and quality. Little time is spent to assure the correct technology is being employed and that engineers are being adequately trained to use it.

The problem is that when management views staff as “hands” that deliver “man-hours,” there is no recognition that man-hours are not created equal or that behind the hands, there are human beings.

This is the “Engineering Company Conundrum.” Many engineering companies simply do not value their engineers as professionals.

Potential antidotes

There is no simple solution to dealing with a problem as complex as the Conundrum. It requires a change in culture that can follow only from a change in actions taken by every level of leadership, management, and supervision. Change must start at the top.

A company culture is based on actions, not on pronouncements of intent. Collectively, those actions must show all of the staff that they are important, their views are being solicited, and they are respected.

The first step is for a company’s leadership to have a clear understanding that a problem exists and that it is necessary to modify behavior, even if this modification results in a short-term tradeoff between profit and people.

In the past, most of what was necessary to attract, motivate, and retain an engineering staff involved a good salary and benefit package and interesting projects. These are no longer sufficient conditions by themselves. Unless other conditions exist that make engineers want to work for the company, some will eventually find a better deal elsewhere.

Defining differing needs

An important realization for engineering companies in the oil and gas industry to be aware of is that the workforce is changing. Demographers have classified the current workforce into four groups based on birth date. They are:
• Matures – born before 1946;
• Baby Boomers – born between 1946 and various times between 1960 and 1965;
• Generation X – born between 1960/1965 and 1977; and
• Millennials (Generation Y) – born after 1977.

Each group is impacted by the way they were brought up, major events that took place as they were coming of age, and their interaction with the generations that came before them.

For each of these groups, management must understand how it can differentiate itself from the competition and provide an appealing environment.

Relationship to management

Today, many company leaders are Baby Boomers who believe in the apprentice/master relationship. They expect direct reports to be patient and to trust that they will eventually work their way up through the organization.

While direct reports may respect these supervisors for their technical ability, often personal bonds are not well developed. Even when the bond is developed, the supervisor often is perceived as having neither sufficient knowledge of company dynamics nor the power to influence company policies. Sometimes there are personality clashes, and the subordinate feels the organization is too inflexible for him to receive sufficient attention.

There are several steps that can be taken to address this problem. The first is to train first-level supervisors to perform personnel responsibilities better and assure more frequent one-to-one interaction with the engineering staff. The second is to have wider discussions on personnel planning issues, where views of the first-level supervisors are combined with those of others who are familiar with the individual’s work. The third step is to increase the authority of all levels of supervision and management in terms of decision-making.

In the end, some of the decisions may turn out to be better because they are being made by employees closest to the problem. This approach gives staff the feeling that immediate supervisors and managers have some power to affect their lives.

Next, first-level supervisors have to be empowered to truly represent the company. This means being included in discussions that impact company culture, such as when a policy is introduced or amended. It is always easier to explain a decision you do not fully support if you know your opinion was heard and if you know that in some cases, your opinion influenced a proposed change.

The next step is to actively engage first-level supervisors in career planning and training of their staff and to engage all levels of management in staff motivation.

The final step is to create more opportunities for higher-level management to interact directly with engineering staff. The staff must feel that levels of management above them view them as individuals who are making a valuable contribution.

Solving the conundrum

It is important to remember that employees are individuals. Some engineers are happy doing stress calculations, while others want more involvement. Differentiating between these groups is important. Promoting a social committee to organize company-sponsored events is also a good idea. When all levels of management recognize their responsibility to encourage, support, and attend these events, employees see them as significant.

Promoting committees to raise money for charities or to do volunteer work in the community is beneficial as well. And group meetings, lunches, monthly celebrations, etc. also can help build goodwill. Anything that creates group connections and introduces camaraderie into the workplace is positive.

Encouraging involvement with technical societies and industry associations is another way to invest in employees, allowing them to gain peer recognition while they increase their benefit to the company.

The industry has recently experienced a rapidly expanding need for engineering services that created a seller’s market where the focus on getting things done acted as a disincentive to providing the training necessary to respond to the demographic challenges that the industry faces. Over time, actions of management have allowed the Conundrum to creep into our corporate cultures.

The slowdown in demand for engineering services offers an opportunity. If the industry takes the same approach it has taken in the past, it will reinforce the culture that created the Conundrum and make it even more difficult to transfer knowledge among generations when the industry eventually recovers.

If this problem is not addressed, it will be difficult to attract new engineers to the profession, encourage experienced engineers to delay retirement, and compete with other industries for a diminishing pool of engineering graduates.

There is an opportunity now for the industry to catch its collective breath and make the cultural changes needed to show that engineering companies really believe that the quality of the engineering work they perform is important.

This article is the second part of a two-part series that has been edited for publication in the magazine. For the unabridged, unedited version, please visit http://www.energycareerzone.com/ TopStories/item32276.php.