Introduction to the Special Issue
Publication: Leadership and Management in Engineering
Volume 8, Issue 4
This special issue focuses on the evolution and state of infrastructure policy and decision making with its associated achievements, shortcomings, and future prospects for collaborative leadership.
Given the recent-past failure of major parts of infrastructure systems with its associated impact on communities, the level of collaboration between the public, elected and appointed government officials, and professional engineers needs to enter a new stage of norm-building and institutionalized relationships. For engineers to regain the trust of the public, the need for transparency within public sector decision making while simultaneously protecting the public’s right to expect their safety, health, and welfare to be unambiguously addressed must be timely as well as clearly communicated. And that dialogue is no longer to end once a facility is opened or renovated.
Major “sudden” physical failures soberly illustrate the need for professional engineers to be more visibly, vocally, and publicly involved in the politics that govern decision making. However, professional engineers appear to be conflicted between their sense of client confidentiality and employment security and their state-registered and ethical professional obligations to the public-at-large. As a result of education and experience, engineers tend to focus primarily on the analytical and quantifiable. Their excellent technical problem-solving skills do not appear to be the most effective methodology to address the techno-sociocultural challenges concerning infrastructure, the public, and politics.
It is essential that twenty-first century engineers be more proactively and visibly involved in the political policy processes involving infrastructure. This subject needs to be placed in the “light of day” as a new normal part of the public’s voting process within the American political system. Along with education, health care, housing, and jobs, the state of our nation’s infrastructure needs to be placed under public scrutiny with unambiguous public accountability.
Engineers are committed to educating the public, presenting the facts clearly and correctly. But… the basic technological decisions today must ultimately be subject to the public will, which means subject to the approval of politicians and bureaucrats (Florman 2002).
What follows in this special issue of The Journal of Leadership and Management in Engineering are selected “thought pieces” intended to start or continue the dialogue from various perspectives within the professional engineering community and the public they serve.
What Decision-Dialogue Criteria Applies
Habitual actions are automatic. In order to learn the correct view, it is necessary to first undo the incorrect view, recalling that habit is stronger than reason. This means that acquiring new knowledge might mean removing erroneous, old knowledge.
Given that most major infrastructure failures occur decades after the facility is open for use, what might a cause and effect model for such time periods look like? In an unpublished presentation, Wisawayodhin suggested a process over time that, prior to realizing the failure, follows the pattern of organizational influences as latent failure, leading to unaware supervision as latent failure, leading to preconditions for unsafe acts as latent failure, leading to unsafe acts as active failure, which lead to the mishap itself.
So perhaps an initial question might be: How should we design a system to accommodate the way humans think and behave, knowing that we desire to change the current process?
General Criteria for Success
Contributing factors for successful major public and professional change (Johnson 1997) were previously found to be:
1.
Customer driven;
2.
Adaptive to dynamic safety issues;
3.
Active in industry participation;
4.
Based upon multidisciplinary research teams;
5.
Pragmatic in approach; and
6.
Capable of wide-scale information dissemination.
Why There Needs to Be a Comprehensive Approach for Lifecycle Infrastructure Safety Assurance
Significant research needs to be accomplished (Krebs 2002) on developing the concepts and measurements of “professionalism” and mutual trust in a professional environment because it is postulated to be the key in building safe (infrastructure). Such measures must transcend the traditional boundaries of national and organizational cultures because (infrastructure) is an international business. Currently, it is known that differences in professional, organizational, and national cultures exist in (infrastructure) maintenance. Their interrelationships and the consequent effect on the overall safety culture are not known. Research will provide a further understanding of the concept of “safety culture” in (infrastructure) maintenance and identify the positive and negative influences on that culture.
The Public’s Expectations of a Professional Engineer
When engineers design a facility, such as a bridge, they use design criteria that state the useful life of that structure. The engineer has knowledge that as the original assumptions change (e.g., traffic loading), the life of the bridge without preventive action not only decreases but moves the bridge from safe to questionable public usage. Can a professional engineer continue to seek refuge within contract law and say, “We don’t fix them, we just design them?” Is it reasonable for the public-at-large to continue to believe that any bridge open to traffic is safe because it was designed by a professional engineer? Ought not the public be able to reply on the reasonable anticipation of a professional engineer regarding such matters?
ASCE’s Leadership Role
ASCE’s Strategy Management document (ASCE 2007) states the goal: “Advocate infrastructure and environmental stewardship to protect the public health and safety and improve the quality of life.” In addition, O’Rourke (2007) states:
Leadership is, perhaps, the most critical factor in promoting resilience, and also the least predictable. However, we know that effective leaders require good advice. Thus the engineering and scientific community must be prepared to communicate accurate, timely information to governmental officials.
The ASCE Strategic Plan Committee also notes: “Years of deferred infrastructure investment and maintenance, and the profession’s limited effectiveness in communicating with public officials regarding infrastructure needs places public safety at risk as well as hindering the nation’s economic growth and competitiveness.”
Given these findings, what does it suggest that professional engineers might continue doing, start doing, and stop doing to raise the level of public safety while strengthening our nation’s economic health?
Random Thoughts
Following are a few random thoughts on the intersection of engineering and politics:
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Wouldn’t it be nice if operating facilities document major trends and key factors that directly affect and/or influence maintenance operations work activities?
•
Wouldn’t it be nice if operating facilities identify linkages between maintenance operations activities and public owners’ long-term plans?
•
Wouldn’t it be nice if operators identify performance measures in the operations maintenance area, and gather supporting data for tracking progress toward achieving the performance measures?
•
Wouldn’t it be nice if, based on identified trends and present performance levels, operators identify funding gaps and/or changes in maintenance operations activities to meet performance measures?
•
Wouldn’t it be nice if professional engineers were an integral part of the above, including a clear report (absent techno-speak) back to the public as to what the data informs?
Such radical change would require the adoption of new ways for engineers, their clients, and the general public to collaborate, communicate, and cooperate. That would definitely require a reengineered approach to how engineers work now.
“Engineered by Design . . .” I like the way that sounds.
That’s my opinion, I welcome yours.
References
ASCE. (2007). “ASCE strategy management.” Online: ⟨http://www.asce.org/inside/next_plan.cfm⟩ (accessed February 2008).
Engineering News Record (ENR). (2006). “Speak up on safety.” Eng. News-Rec., p. 68, July 24.
Florman, S. C. (2002). “Engineering ethics: The conversation without end.” The Bridge, 32(3), Fall.
Johnson, W. B. (1997). “Phase report summary and FAA program review.” Galaxy Scientific Corporation, Advanced Information Technology Division, Egg Harbor Township, N.J.
O’Rourke, T. D. (2007). “Critical infrastructure, interdependencies, and resilience.” The Bridge, 37(1).
Biographies
—William M. Hayden, Jr., guest editor; e-mail at [email protected].
Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Leadership and Management in Engineering
Volume 8 • Issue 4 • October 2008
Pages: 172 - 173
Copyright
© 2008 ASCE.
History
Published online: Oct 1, 2008
Published in print: Oct 2008
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Metrics & Citations
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