GEOSTRATA Magazine

The built environment is no stranger to natural disasters. Since humanity began building gardens, homes, roadways, communities, and urban centers, we've been victims of Mother Nature's wrath. The climate crisis is driving an uptick in destructive weather events that leave devastating impacts on communities. The loss of life and livelihoods and the destruction of critical infrastructure demands action. Geoprofessionals increasingly find themselves playing a critical role at the nexus of a changing climate and fragile infrastructure.

Every day, we use various products to accomplish the tasks at hand as geotechnical professionals. From software to construction equipment, laboratory test equipment to field testing equipment, these products help to solve the problems we face quicker and with more information than the previous generations of geotechnical professionals ever dreamed possible. One commonality across all products, regardless of technologicial complexities, is that they all started with an idea to solve an existing problem or meet a market need. How did they go from an idea to the products we use today? What are the differences between developing a product from the research or university environment versus the practitioners side? Are there common challenges that all products must overcome during development regardless of the developer's work setting or background? These are likely not skills or insights we were taught as part of our undergraduate or graduate civil engineering programs. So, we decided to pull back the curtain, so to speak, and ask some innovators in our field today to share their real-life experiences with you.

Geotechnical investigations produce enormous amounts of data that are significantly valuable to a broad geotechnical engineering and construction community. Revolutionary changes in software, hardware, and cloud-based technology are affecting data collection and the data management processes of geotechnical engineers, geologists, and hydrogeologists. Subsurface data are an incredible asset and provide tremendous opportunities for organizations that adopt technology and properly collect and manage their data. These data are also extremely valuable for organizations that pay for them like departments of transportation, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, utility companies, and other large owner organizations. These owners should require that their geotechnical investigation data be collected, managed, and transmitted properly to them so they can gain future value from them.

Employers generally recognize that their employees are their single most important resource. Subsequently, they often provide formal and informal opportunities for their staff to develop professional and technical expertise. What they may not recognize is that “workforce development” has morphed to mean more than simply enhancing employee expertise — and for good reason. The level of preparation, a modern set of personal values, and individualized career expectations of the “new” workforce are different from historic norms for engineering and allied fields. Further, while there's enough of a dynamic to cause workforce instability, there's an increasingly short supply of those entering the profession.