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Engineers use science and mathematics to solve technical problems and design solutions to meet specific needs. Before the Industrial Revolution, which began in the late eighteenth century, engineers built the Roman aqueducts, the Great Pyramids of Egypt, the Buddhist temples of Southeast Asia and Gothic cathedrals of Europe using known science and mathematics and the trial-and-error method of design. Master artisans taught their secrets of what worked to their apprentices. The technical revolutions that followed the Renaissance in Europe used the scientific method of experimental hypothesis and observation to fuel the development of specialization, first into civil and mechanical engineering. New technologies of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries created needs for chemical, electrical and industrial engineers. Marine, aeronautical, automotive and control engineers served the growing transportation sector. Communications engineers formed the first wave of the Information Revolution, and today engineers work in dozens of fields, from agriculture to thermodynamics. Some of the most advanced work in biochemistry, nanotechnology and robotics is done by engineers who, only 50 years ago would have had to choose between building bridges and designing televisions. Regardless of their specialization, all engineers have methodology in common. It is that methodology--and their position within an organization--that determines what each does during a workday.
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Engineers investigate, define, plan and execute. Most of the working day is spent either studying a problem or designing solutions. Depending on specialty, these activities may take place in a building or on a production site, at a computer terminal or in consultation as part of a team assembled for a given project. An agricultural engineer may supervise experiments covering an entire county and a bio-technical engineer may sit at the same microscope for days. Most engineers develop alternative plans and designs so that, when a model fails, there will be a "plan B." As engineers work, they also document each step of the project, spending from a few hours to a few days preparing project and project reports so that work is not duplicated and successes are shared. Often, engineers work on only one project at a time and many serve as independent contractors who find and complete projects for a number of companies in any given year.
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Research engineers often never leave their laboratories (which may be as large as space or as small as an electron microscope), but they must communicate findings and present plans to production engineers whose job it is to make the technology or products designed by the researchers. Production engineers are responsible for evaluating plans and making corrections during production for a successful result. Supervising engineers may engage in research and oversee production as well as assume management responsibility for hiring, firing and creating and managing budgets. One of the benefits of engineering, no matter what the specialization or level, is that each day brings new problems to solve. For someone with a creative and analytical mind, it is a great job.
