The following is my spoof, based on an excerpt from the July 1943 issue of Transportation Magazine (see below) sent to me by a friend who knows this stuff both makes me laugh and makes me crazy .
This is written for management of engineers in the workforce during the digital revolution of 2013.
Eleven Tips on Getting More Efficiency Out of Engineer Employees:
There’s no longer any question whether technology companies should hire software engineers for jobs formerly held by systems analysts and hard core computer scientists. The explosion of the internet and mobile devices and the resulting engineer shortage has settled that point. The important things now are to select the most efficient engineers available and how to use them to best advantage.
Here are eleven helpful tips on the subject from Silicon Valley:
1. Pick single engineers. They usually have more time that their unmarried brothers, they’re less likely to want to go home at the end of the day, they enjoy the work or they wouldn’t be doing it, they still have the pep and interest to work hard and to code efficiently.
2. When you do have to use older engineers, try to get ones who have worked outside of engineering at some point in their lives. Older engineers who have never contacted customers have a hard time adapting themselves and are inclined to be cantankerous and fussy about features. It’s always well to impress on older engineers the importance of user friendliness and quality.
3. General experience indicates that “husky” engineers – those who are just a little on the heavy side and who enjoy junk food – are more productive than their hard bodied brothers who may want to spend time in the gym.
4. Retain a physician to give each engineer a special physical examination – one covering concentration and substance issues. This step not only protects your company against the possibilities of lawsuit, but reveals whether the employee-to-be has any substance issues which would make him mentally or physically unfit for the job.
5. Stress at the outset the importance of time, the fact that a minute or two lost here and there makes serious inroads on product schedules. Until the point is gotten across, productivity is likely to be slowed up.
6. Give the engineer-employee a definite day long schedule of duties so they’ll keep busy without bothering the management for instructions every few minutes. Numerous companies say that engineers make excellent workers when they have their projects cut out for them, but that they lack initiative in finding work for themselves.
7. Whenever possible, let the engineer change from one project to another at some time during the day. Engineers are likely to be less morose and generally happier with change.
8. Give every engineer an adequate number of rest periods during the day. You have to make some allowances for the nerd psychology. An engineer has more confidence and is more efficient if he can keep up on pop culture, play a video game and get a diet coke several times a day.
9. Be tactful when issuing instructions or in making criticisms. Engineers are often sensitive; they can’t shrug off harsh words the way a sales person can. Never ridicule an engineer – it breaks his spirit and cuts his efficiency.
10. Be reasonably considerate about using strong language around engineers. Even though an engineer’s friends may swear vociferously when playing first shooter games, he’ll grow to dislike a place of business where he hears too much of this.
11. Get enough size variety in chairs, desks and screens so each engineer can have a proper fit to their work style and body type. This point can’t be stressed too much in keeping engineers happy.
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