Entrepreneurial You by Dorie Clark.  Harvard Business Review Press:  Boston, MA (2017).  254 pages.  US$28.00 (hard cover). 

My home office is about three miles from my gym.  During the winter, when the sun sets early, I walk to the gym rather than ride my bike.  You just can’t trust that cars will see a cyclist!  Walking gives me 50 minutes a day to listen to podcasts or music.  I often listen to the Harvard Business Review’s podcast.

A recent episode included an interview with Dorie Clark on the topic of portfolio careers.  I knew I had to read the book after listening raptly to stories of entrepreneurs diversifying their income streams.  And, “Entrepreneurial You” did not disappoint.

“Entrepreneurial You” is a great book for engineering managers, professors, and anyone who works more than one job.  Some of us already own small businesses and can use Ms. Clark’s guidance to grow our influence while others can reference the book as they consider free-lancing or post-retirement careers.

The first two chapters of “Entrepreneurial You” teach us to build our own brand.  Just like a product has an expected reliability, each person must establish himself or herself as a trusted expert in his or her own field.  “We have to find a way to build trust with the people in our audience and make them want to do business with us,” (pg. 19, emphasis added).

Part Two of “Entrepreneurial You” offers tactical and operational guidance for entrepreneurs to build portfolio careers.  Chapter 4, for example, illustrates steps to become a coach or consultant.  Chapter 6 advises how to set up a podcast and monetize the activity.  Finally, Chapter 8 describes how many business people have set up exclusive events and conferences for specialized audiences to share and learn from one another.  So, even if you are not considering another gig, you can use the information from these chapters to enhance organizational communication.

In Part Three, the author describes various online avenues to expanding one’s reach and influence.  To be honest, Chapter 11 on affiliate marketing makes me a bit uncomfortable, but the author assures us throughout the text that moving out of our comfort zone is a pathway to growth.  In this chapter and others, she emphasizes the importance of growing a mailing list (also important for any engineer working in sales or marketing).

Ms. Clark concludes “Entrepreneurial You” in Chapter 12 with the advice to choose from the buffet of options in the book to construct a portfolio career that fits our own unique lifestyle.  For example, while growing my business is important to me, it’s also a priority for me to work out at the gym every day.  Understanding who you are, and your own strengths and weaknesses make you better suited to selecting appropriate, diversified income streams.

I really enjoyed reading “Entrepreneurial You.”  You can listen to the HBR podcast here (about 20 minutes) to see if you want to invest another 5 or 6 hours reading the book.  My copy is highlighted and dogeared as I continue to review and revisit much of the information presented.  I highly recommend “Entrepreneurial You” for anyone who has embarked upon or plans to begin a free-lance, portfolio careers as an engineer, engineering manager, or consultant.

What is your biggest challenge in managing multiple careers?

Teresa Jurgens-Kowal, PhD, PE, PMP, CPEM, NPDP
Global NP Solutions, LLC

By Patrick Sweet, P.Eng., MBA
(Blog #10 EMBOK series)

In this ninth installment on the Engineering Management Body of Knowledge, I tackle a subject near and dear to my heart: Systems engineering. Today, I’m going to share an overview of what systems engineering is and some of the major themes and concepts from that domain.

Photo credit: https://stocksnap.io/author/4436

What Is Systems Engineering?

One of the first issues most people face in understanding systems engineering is in defining what systems engineering is in the first place. The International Council on Systems Engineering (INCOSE) calls systems engineering an interdisciplinary approach and means for the realization of successful systems. Systems engineering has been called a practice, a process, and a profession. A system can be just about anything that transforms inputs into outputs, but is traditionally understood to be a large scale, complex design, like a warship, or an enterprise, for example.

Systems engineering emerged as a response to the failure of traditional engineering design methods to deal well with the increasing complexity and interconnectedness of engineering designs, particularly in the defense and aerospace industries following the Second World War.

Systems engineering aims to deal with the complexity and complicatedness of modern systems through specialized techniques that allow for systems that, at the end of the day, perform how they’re meant to at a cost agreeable to the customer.

What Does Systems Engineering Focus On?

Systems engineers focus a great deal of time and attention on defining needs and functions early in the development of a system. Before any detailed design, there are several iterations of requirements definition and analysis to ensure that what is being designed meets the strategic objectives and the tactical needs of the acquiring organization. After all, if you’re designing a fighter jet, there are a lot of needs and requests that need to be balanced and understood!

Along with a focus on detailed requirements gathering, there is also a focus on documentation. While this is important for all engineers, the importance of careful documentation grows exponentially along with the complexity of the system, the number of stakeholders involved, and the timespan over which the design is executed.

Another area of particular focus for the systems engineer is on the full lifecycle of the system. While there is no one “correct” lifecycle, INCOSE suggests that all systems progress through the following stages (not necessarily sequentially):

• Concept
• Development
• Production
• Utilization
• Support
• Retirement

Systems engineering demands that a system be designed with all of these stages in mind from the start. For example, understanding the constraints in place to retire a given system will likely influence the materials used in the production stage.

Key Concepts in Systems Engineering

System – A system is a “whole” consisting of interacting “parts”. For systems engineering purposes, systems are generally man-made, developed and used for a specific environment to deliver specific benefits.

Emergent Behaviour – A system’s emergent behaviour is that which cannot be fully understood by the behaviour of the individual constituent parts. Systems engineers seek to understand and manage emergence in their systems.

Validation and Verification – A system is valid when it’s the right system for the job. A system is verified when it has been shown to meet all of its requirements. In other words, validation and verification are used to show that you built the right system, and that the system was built right.

Enabling Systems – Enabling systems are those other systems that exist at various points throughout the lifecycle of a given system that enable it to exist or operate. For example, an airport would be an enabling system for an airplane during the airplane’s utilization stage. A factory could be an enabling system for that same airplane’s production stage.

Value of Systems Engineering

The use of systems engineering can be extremely valuable when conducting systems projects. A study by Eric Honour showed that spending 14% of a systems project’s budget on systems engineering helped those projects get completed on time and on budget. The same study showed that over- or under-spending on systems engineering was correlated with poor budget and schedule performance.

Practical Applications for Engineering Managers

Perhaps the most important takeaway for non-systems engineers is that an early focus on a system’s constraints and requirements can pay enormous dividends later in the systems’ life. While it can often be tempting to jump into design in order to show “progress”, patience in the early days of a project can be extremely valuable. I suspect many of us have been in situations where we worked quickly to complete an assignment, only to have our customer say, “This isn’t what I wanted!”, even if it was what they asked for. Using the tools and techniques developed by systems engineers can avoid this kind of problem, and help get the right systems delivered, on time, and on budget.

About Patrick Sweet

Patrick Sweet, P.Eng., MBA, ASEP is a recognized expert in engineering management and leadership with expertise in systems engineering, project management and product management. You can read more from Pat at the Engineering & Leadership blog.

Dr. Kwasa’s research focuses on value-based systems engineering and multidisciplinary design optimization. Dr. Kwasa’s current research involves UAS design and applications, healthcare systems integration and organization design for large-scale complex engineered systems. Kwasa attained his Bachelor’s, Master’s and Doctorate degrees from Iowa State University between 2008 and 2017. His B.Sc and Ph.D were earned in Aerospace Engineering while his M.Eng was earned in Systems Engineering. Originally from Kenya, Kwasa very much enjoys looking for ways to solve engineering problems by lessons learned from numerous life experiences growing up in a developing nation.

About the Founder's Award, Student Chapter

This award recognizes ASEM student chapter excellence.

More information about the award is available here:
Founder's Award, Student Chapter

A list of past recipients is available here:
List of Past Recipients

NOTE: ASEM wants to recognize all 2018 award winners. If you received an award and did not provide your biographical information, you still can. Please help us by completing this short Google form at https://goo.gl/WULsGW - thank you!

Steven M. Corns an Associate Professor of Engineering Management and Systems Engineering at Missouri University of Science and Technology. He received his PhD degree in mechanical engineering from Iowa State University in 2008. Dr. Corns research interests include computational intelligence applications, the mechanics of information transfer in evolutionary algorithms, and model based approaches for complex systems design and analysis.

About the Founder's Award, Graduate

This award recognizes graduate engineering management program leadership.

More information about the award is available here:
Founder's Award, Graduate

A list of past recipients is available here:
List of Past Recipients

NOTE: ASEM wants to recognize all 2018 award winners. If you received an award and did not provide your biographical information, you still can. Please help us by completing this short Google form at https://goo.gl/WULsGW - thank you!

Friends, it is an honor to serve as your ASEM President and I look forward to the upcoming year. I hope that each of you, whether members of long standing or new members from recent conferences, will feel free to reach out to me with any comments or suggestions to make this YOUR society. I hope that many of you were able to share your thoughts in the recent survey and I want to promise you that we are listening. We will spend the year expanding our professional training offerings and making sure that all products and services fit your needs as engineering managers, whether in academia or industry.

Speaking of conferences, another hearty thank you to our hosts, technical program committee, and our wonderful ASEM WHQ staff for making the 2018 IAC an amazing success! A special thank you to three wonderful women: Angie Cornelius, Ean Ng, and Denise Engelbrecht. I think all will agree that they were the life and soul of the meeting! Wow! What an incredible program of offerings, surrounded by an unbelievable venue! I came back energized and proud to be part of ASEM; I hope all who attended felt the same.

When I say that this is your society, I truly mean that and hope that each of you will consider opportunities to give back to ASEM and help it grow. There are several opportunities for service across a range of activities. We are actively looking for committed volunteers for our professional membership and professional/product development committees. We’re also looking for an Associate Executive Director to support operational needs with the World Headquarters and will send out separate communications on this soon.

Also, it is important that we look back at all we’ve accomplished in the past year and offer our heartfelt thanks to those who have rotated out of previous positions! Several others have changed positions, so I’ll save introductions of the incoming team for next time. Sincere thanks to Trish Simo Kush, Brian Galli, Patrick Kush, and Tugrul Daim as they complete their service. We won’t say good-bye, but rather until our next posting to borrow from an old saying in the Cavalry!

With gratitude to all and strong hopes for the future,

Suzie

Edward A. Pohl is a Professor and Head of the Industrial Engineering Department and holder of the 21st Century Professorship at the University of Arkansas. Ed also served as the Director of the Center for Innovation in Healthcare Logistics (CIHL) and past Co-Director of the Institute for Advanced Data Analytics at the University of Arkansas. He has participated and led reliability, risk and supply chain related research efforts at the University of Arkansas. Before coming to Arkansas, Ed spent 21 years in the United States Air Force where he served in a variety of engineering, operations analysis and academic positions during his career. Previous assignments include the Deputy Director of the Operations Research Center at the United States Military Academy, Operations Analyst in the Office of the Secretary of Defense where he performed independent cost schedule, performance and risk assessments on Major DoD acquisition programs, and as a munitions logistics manager at the Air Force Operational Test Center.

Ed received his Ph.D. in Systems and Industrial Engineering from the University of Arizona. He holds a M.S. in Systems Engineering from the Air Force Institute of Technology, and M.S. in Reliability Engineering from the University of Arizona, an M.S. in Engineering Management from the University of Dayton, and a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Boston University.

His primary research interests are in risk, reliability, engineering optimization, healthcare and supply chain risk analysis, decision making, quality. He has served as a PI or Co-PI on 45 Research grants totaling more than $7,000,000. His grants have been funded by DoD, DHS, DOT, NSF and AFOSR. Ed has published more than 50 peer reviewed Journal Articles, over 50 peer reviewed conference papers and given more than 100 presentations at national and international conferences. Ed is the Co-Editor of the Journal of Engineering Management, an Associate Editor for the IEEE Transaction on Reliability, the Journal of Risk and Reliability, Journal of Quality Technology and Quantitative Management, and the Journal of Military Operations Research, on the Editorial Board of the IEEE Transaction on Technology and Engineering Management, and Systems.

Ed currently serves on the Board of Directors for the RAMS international conference. Ed is a Fellow of IISE, a Fellow of the Society of Reliability Engineers, a Fellow of the American Society of Engineering Management, a Diplomat in the Society of Health Systems, a Senior Member of IEEE, a Senior Member of ASQ, member of INCOSE, INFORMS, ASEE, MORS and AHRMM.

About the ASEM Fellow Award

Nominees who receive majority support from the Fellows are selected as new inductees. No more than five new Fellows are elected in a given year.

More information about the award is available here:
ASEM Fellow

A list of past recipients is available here:
Link to Past Recipients

NOTE: ASEM wants to recognize all 2018 award winners. If you received an award and did not provide your biographical information, you still can. Please help us by completing this short Google form at https://goo.gl/WULsGW - thank you!

The West Point Chapter of the American Society of Engineering Management is a club for the Department of Systems Engineering at the United States Military Academy.  The club seeks to explore how engineering management and systems engineering is applied in the real world through trip sections, luncheons, and guest speakers, and we travel to a variety of conferences and companies each year. The club exists to assist its members in developing and improving their skills as practicing managers of engineering and technology and to promote the profession of engineering management.

About the Founder's Award, Undergraduate

This award recognizes undergraduate engineering management program leadership.

More information about the award is available here:
Founder's Award, Undergraduate

A list of past recipients is available here:
List of Past Recipients

NOTE: ASEM wants to recognize all 2018 award winners. If you received an award and did not provide your biographical information, you still can. Please help us by completing this short Google form at https://goo.gl/WULsGW - thank you!

Willy Van Overschée was the CEO of CIMCIL from Jan. 2012 until end of 2016. CIMCIL is an independant training center, specialized in workshops and education programs in Operations Management, Lean Management and Supply Chain Management, active internationally for several global enterprises.

Willy is a former IBM-er, having started in 1977 as a systems engineer, and soon after called towards commercial and management responsibilities. He continued his career in the management team of IBM Europe in various responsibilities for the industrial and distribution markets. He returns to the Benelux in 2005, serving as a member of the executive team, both covering the Industries market and supply chain roles.

He is a guest professor at the University of Ghent in the Master program in Industrial Management and CIMCIL board member since 1995. He also was a co-founder in the early existence of Möbius Research & Consulting, meanwhile a leading supply chain consulting firm in Belgium.

He was elected as a full member of the prestigious Royal Academy of Belgium in Engineering, Science and Technology in 1999, where he has been leading several cross-disciplinary academic workgroups in the field of logistics and mobility.

He co-created the European section of the ASEM association in 2018 and is driving a rapid development in the EU 27 countries.

About the Presidential Award, Local Section

This award recognizes ASEM Local Section Excellence.

More information about the award is available here:
Presidential Award, Local Section

A list of past recipients is available here:
List of Past Recipients

NOTE: ASEM wants to recognize all 2018 award winners. If you received an award and did not provide your biographical information, you still can. Please help us by completing this short Google form at https://goo.gl/WULsGW - thank you!

Dr. Daniels is currently a Senior Lecturer in the Engineering Management and Systems Engineering Department of the Batten College of Engineering and Technology of the Old Dominion University. He joined the EMSE faculty on July 25, 2008.

Dr. Daniels has over 30 years of experience in organizational management and leadership, communications systems, information systems, management consulting, change management, employee and leadership development and quality improvement in both government and commercial enterprises. He has over 20 years of experience in program management for large scale, mission-critical systems; system development lifecycle analysis; planning and implementation; systems engineering; line management and engineering; culture change and management consulting.  He has also served as a senior executive and Vice President for Engineering for a Fortune 500 commercial enterprise.

He has supported NASA Human Space Flight, Science and Aeronautics Research programs for over 25 years at the Goddard Space Flight Center, the Johnson Space Center, the Langley Research Center, the Ames Research Center, the Marshall Space Flight Center and the Jet Propulsion Lab. Dr. Daniels also played a key role as a contractor executive in the design, development and implementation of several U.S. national criminal justice information systems.

Dr. Daniels has extensive experience in assisting organizations in developing and implementing plans to achieve business excellence and culture change. He served for five years as a member of the Board of Senior Examiners for the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award of the National Institute of Standards and Technology.

Prior to his retirement from corporate life, Dr. Daniels currently served as the Director for the Space and Mission Support (SMS) Business Area for Raytheon Information Solutions (RIS). In this capacity, he had overall executive management and leadership responsibility all of the NASA related service business in RIS. The SMS Business Area generated approximately $110 million in annual revenue with over 500 technical professional employees. Dr. Daniels is also a co-founder and chief operating officer of Learning Curve Coalition, Inc. and founder and president of Leadership Dynamics, Inc.

Dr. Daniels is the founder of the ConITS Leadership Institute. In addition, Dr. Daniels is been a lecturer in the George Washington University Engineering Management and Systems Engineering Graduate Program and currently serves as an adjunct in the Old Dominion University and the Florida Institute of Technology Graduate Engineering Management programs.

Dr. Daniels is a certified facilitator for Emotional Intelligence, the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI®) and the Fundamental Interpersonal Relationship Orientation – Behavior (FIRO-B®) instrument and is certified as a Leadership Coach. Dr. Daniels is a certified Project Management Professional (PMP®), a Certified Professional Engineering Manager (CPEM), a Certified Scrum Master (CSM) and has been certified as a Level 4 Raytheon Program Manager.

Dr. Daniels is a Member of the American Society for Engineering Management (ASEM), where he is the Southeast Regional Director and a member of the ASEM Board of Directors.

As a member of the ODU BCET Faculty, Dr. Daniels teaches a wide range of courses, including Engineering Management, Engineering Ethics, Project Management, Project Management Professional Certification Preparation, Advanced Project Management, Agile Project Management, Finance for Engineering Managers, Capital Budgeting, Financial Engineering, Leadership, Organizational Behavior.

About the Frank Woodbury Special Service Award

This award recognizes an ASEM member who has provided outstanding service to the Society.

More information about the award is available here:
Frank Woodbury Special Service Award

A list of past recipients is available here:
List of Past Recipients

NOTE: ASEM wants to recognize all 2018 award winners. If you received an award and did not provide your biographical information, you still can. Please help us by completing this short Google form at https://goo.gl/WULsGW - thank you!

Dr. Chamila Kalpani Dissanayake, is currently working as an Instructor at the Industrial, Manufacturing, & Systems Engineering Department (IMSE) of the Texas Tech University (TTU), Lubbock, TX. She has successfully completed her doctoral degree at the IMSE department of TTU with a major in Systems and Engineering Management and a GPA of 4.00 in August 2017. Before joining the IMSE department at the Texas Tech University, Kalpani earned her Bachelor of Science in Engineering (Major: Production Engineering), and the Master of Business Administration degrees from the University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka. She has also completed the Project Management Professional (PMP) certification from the Project Management Institute (PMI) in 2016.

Kalpani has won several awards including the ‘Best Dissertation Award’ at the American Society of Engineering Management(ASEM) conference 2018, the ‘Merl Baker Award for the Best Student Paper’ at the ASEM Annual Conference 2015, the ‘J.T. and Margaret Talkington Fellowship Award 2015/2017’ from TTU, and the ‘Doctoral Degree Scholarship Award from the Ministry of Higher Education in Sri Lanka, 2013’.  Kalpani was also honored as the “Banner Bearer for the Graduate School” at the commencement ceremony, August 2017, for her best all-around achievements during the Ph.D. program.

About the Engineering Management Best Dissertation Award

To annually recognize the Ph.D. dissertation that makes the most significant contribution to the engineering management field.

More information about the award is available here:
Engineering Management Best Dissertation Award

A list of past recipients is available here:
List of Past Recipients

NOTE: ASEM wants to recognize all 2018 award winners. If you received an award and did not provide your biographical information, you still can. Please help us by completing this short Google form at https://goo.gl/WULsGW - thank you!