One common denominator in the practice of management and engineering during the past two decades has been change-enough change to make one's head spin. Yes, this is cliché. However, that accelerating change coexists with a decreasing tolerance for error is notable. It would be too generous to suggest that such evolution derives only from the right thinking of a few forward-minded individuals-those that exist are not often taken seriously by captains of industry. Nor is this change a product of faddish experimentalism in corporate America, although management ranks do love fad. Instead, workplace evolution is driven by the fundamental and unavoidable forces of competition and survival. Winners and losers are more evident these days. This is true with firms, investments, communities, and jobs; just as with football. To the significant extent that one's financial security hinges upon employment, investment, and community vitality, one's desire to associate with the right side- winning-is heartfelt. This issue of the Review is about the intense three-way forces among technology, market competition, and business practice.
Big Tent, Stormy Weather
It used to be that there were all kinds of ways to survive in a career. Marginal performance was tolerable, even expected, and stability was valued beyond reason. Whatever paradigm industry worked to must have had words like tradition, stability, loyalty, tolerance, and patience strewn through it. Perhaps it was the early '80s when many industries came to realize that their loss of operational elasticity was real and perhaps permanent-inflexible in the face of necessary change. My own perspective is colored by experiences in the nuclear industry. The reactor services business was a model of applied high technology; big money could be thrown at problems that were both complex and immediate. New construction, the lion's share of the industry to that point, was in collapse. The market for nuclear plant services, a heretofore add-on component of the industry, was about the only survival path for many of the players. The industry was one sick puppy. Some employees, mostly engineers, were not lucky; they emptied their desks into cardboard boxes and then departed.
This scene played out in other industries, but for different reasons. Again, many engineers got hammered at work. Some markets enjoyed legislated supports for pricing, foreign trade protection, and market controls. However, protection and competitiveness are mutually exclusive-the former undoes the latter, and players lose their edge. In other markets there were companies that failed to keep current with technology, while other firms embraced high tech but overlooked quality. Concurrently, the economy was in uncharted territory: factors like the cost of capital, inflation, trade deficits, and unemployment were all at outrageous levels. In particular, high inflation confounds one's ability to manage well; real performance is less easily understood and more often misrepresented. For example, enough money might be made on one venturous speculation to overcome a firm's mismanagement of a core business. Conversely, good management decision making did not guarantee victory over prevailing economic woes. In such cases, luck is valued over intelligence and hard work. Customers and employees both lost something.
When Defeats Are Visible
Customers rebelled, and markets ceased paying big prices for poor quality and service when better alternatives were available elsewhere. Traditional market leaders often suffered a double whammy of new competition and lost brand loyalty. Indeed, it became apparent that, among customers, mediocrity and loyalty-not the same thing-had fallen from vogue. The same could be said regarding jobs; head count reductions would be offset by increased productivity. Mediocrity, at least conversationally, fell into disdain everywhere. These have been big, visible lessons not to be forgotten by today's movers and shakers of industry.
Unexpectedly, a number of firms and products started to look like "has-beens" and others were not looking too good. Japan was the story of the day; Far Eastern trade surpluses and employment paired closely with Western deficits and unemployment. The landscape changed: brand icons disappeared, industry giants withered and were consumed, and layoffs prevailed. Questions like "What do you mean we're not going to make light bulbs anymore?" reflected (for good reasons and bad) the vacating of core businesses. The West seemed to be living in a pattern of failure among many of its heartland industries. Major downsizings and plant closings altered cityscapes: Akron, Buffalo, Chattanooga, Detroit come to mind, as do many more. Being scared is primal motivation for a paradigm shift.
Getting a Grip
Stakeholders include citizens, corporations, customers, employees, investors, politicians, sports fans, suppliers, and unions. They do not tolerate losers now. Win-loss results are presented in binary state these days; thus decision constraints have also clarified. Industry changed, and a realignment of epic magnitude has restored many businesses to sound health-a point not missed by the current economy. Winning and losing both demand sacrifice, but at least with winning, sacrifices are selected. When firms do very well (and when they don't) performance is evident on Wall Street, on Main Street, and among the rank and file. When the chips are down, stakeholders are aware, do care, and will exercise control. It is a world gone simple for its brutal honesty.
We've regained self-reliance: we make businesses survive, we make our own careers happen. Our mission is, if not easier, clearer. Slimmer, more focused, more agile: these are the gains of an industry and its workforce that has turned a corner. Certainly this agility has benefited from computerization and office automation-winners are better informed and respond more quickly. This ought to bode well for electrical engineers. After all, when it comes to speed and memory, electrons outweigh gears and file cabinets.
A Question of Balance
The economy and its gross product is technologically ever more complex-good for engineers. Yet we've seen far more displacements among engineering careers than the gross trade in technology would seem to justify. The sum of this thesis is that although goals-always win, never lose-have simplified, attaining them is more complicated and quite demanding. What does this mean for engineers? Well, I think it means opportunity. Survival and growth dictate that corporations and individuals will need to assimilate and process more information, better understand the structural drivers of their businesses, and be more adroit at assessing the outcomes of their decisions and efforts. I believe the economy will make more room for engineers, but, perhaps, have less need for engineering. My reasoning is this: mental discipline for analysis and problem-solving, not a particular technology, is the engineer's strong suit-technologies have too short a half-life. Further, engineers are conditioned to seek the next problem to solve. To realize these opportunities at the leadership level they must be agile outside their core discipline.
Survival is no guarantee of the good life. Companies have indeed become more efficient and more agile, but as important, they are more aware of their environment than they were. I think many employ- ees have done the same thing. For individuals, awareness of economy and community offers context for understanding and managing personal interests, goals, and values. Ultimately, that is a key reference for gauging career worth.
This restoration of competitiveness means one very important thing. Companies and individuals have regained understanding and control. Perhaps today's movers and shakers will be better prepared for the next storm. True leaders will be helping others prepare as well.