As a chemical engineer, the academic skills are essential to manage the tasks and obstacles encountered for working. However, I believe that working is far more than solving problems by typing codes in front of a laptop, or write equations and steps on paper, like what I have been doing for the final exams in the university. “It is the ability to communicate effectively about the field rather than simply the knowledge of the field that is highly valued as a working engineer” (Markel 11).
However, communication skills for accomplishing a task may not have been put to an essential place that equals the academic knowledge for various students (including the author). Here I would like to presume a task given to a process engineer, Jun, and his group, and elaborate on the jobs that the group must do step by step to finish this work. The working process may not accurately reflect what it is in reality, but what I want to emphasize is the significance of the communication skills.
Say the boss woke up with an idea to earn money by purifying alcohol. After some research on the benefits that could be brought to the company, she was convinced that it could work, and asked Jun to design a distillation column within some budget, that could distill 98.0% ethanol out from the mixture of 75.0% ethanol. Jun was asked to hand in a written proposal within 2 weeks.
Jun thought that it was impossible for him to finish his work individually, so he set up a meeting with his group members David, Angel, and Isaac, to set up a schedule to get this work done. The very first thing they did in the meeting was to separate the task apart into small tasks. Firstly, some background research was necessary to see how the distillation was scaled up into an industrial structure, what parameters should be optimized for maximizing the interest, and what the physical qualifications were throughout the process. Secondly, some program should be written to output significant values, like the output flow rate, composition, temperature, and annual interest giving input design parameters. Thirdly, after the information was attained through researches and codes, it should be written as a proposal required by the boss.
Disassembling the task into three smaller pieces gave all the members a relief. Jun and David were assigned to find relative information from research papers in the literature, and online sites about similar technology. Angel, excellent at programming, was assigned to create a feasible module that could calculate the important parameters in the process. Isaac, extrovert and charismatic in selling ideas to others, was assigned to prepare the model for the future proposal and the presentation. A Google Doc was created so that everyone could share and exchange progresses online, and a meeting was arranged after one week to sum up the findings and move on to finalizing stages.
As a professional engineer, Jun thought the task should be straightforward. However, after reading through several research papers, he found that the boss’s original task would not be achievable. Because ethanol and water formed a constant boiling point mixture at some point in the distillation, they could be no longer separated beyond such point. At a result, the theoretical highest purity of ethanol through distillation would be 95.63% by mass, while 98.0% required by the boss was unrealistic. Jun was wondering whether he should continue working on the task as if everything was okay, or he should directly tell the boss that the objective was not achievable. After considering about the ethics related, Jun thought that honesty and candor were essential to an engineer, and it was his obligation to tell the boss what the problem was. He wrote an email to the boss attaching some research paper excerpts as evidences, while forwarding it to all the group members. The next day Jun received a reply from the boss, praising Jun for his honesty and insight in this problem, and informing Jun that the objective changed to try maximizing the benefit with a reasonable ethanol purity.
Meanwhile, Isaac was ruminating on what form his proposal should appear. Recalling what he had learned from his writing class, he realized that he should consider majorly about the purpose and the audience of his document. The audience was his boss, a well-experienced engineer with a PhD in chemical engineering. Therefore, rudimentary introductions to the concepts like distillation and ethanol were not necessary. Instead, he could take advantage of the jargons describing the design efficiently to the boss. The purpose was to give the boss an idea what the distillation column would be like considering about the conditions of the industry and the budgets given, what the annual cost for running and maintaining it would be, and what the annual interest would be. Moreover, the qualifications should be mentioned, like the impacts to the nearby environment, the noise to the residents, the suggested working conditions for the worker, etc. Having planned for his documents considering all these aspects, Isaac felt more organized about the final appearance of his work. Based on the data provided by Jun and David using Angel’s codes, Isaac finished the first draft of the proposal, and decided to bring it to the next group meeting.
The progress went smoothly afterwards. In the group meeting after a week, the group found that with the new objective received, the computational parts were finished, and the first draft had the format that satisfied everyone. Finishing up all small steps within the first week, all the members were now at the same page, and felt glad that they had reliable partners. The very last objective they set was to revise and proofread the proposal before handing it to the boss.
Three days later the final version was created. After a meeting, Jun and his group reached an agreement about the proposal, and handed it in to the boss’s office two days before the deadline. The boss was impressed that they could finish the work so efficiently while considering about the ethics issues. At the very end of the story, Jun and his group members may be promoted because the design did bring the industry great benefit, or because the efficiency of the group was valued by the company. Anyways, a happy ending is deserved for successful technical communications.
From this little story, I want to emphasize the importance of various communication skills other than academic knowledge for successfully accomplish a task in the work field. A decomposition of a complicated task is necessary, and fair distributions of work to team members help everyone to focus on the part that he or she is specialized in. Progresses and findings should be readily available (like in a Google Doc) so that everyone can take advantage of the teamwork into making new progresses. Ethics is the moral part which should be treated as obligations and regarded seriously. Before writing anything down, it helps a lot to reflect on the purpose and the audience of the document to be presented. And eventually, to finish work on time with high quality is necessary to accomplish the final task efficiently. Moreover, it helps build the credit among the group members as well.
This work is highly inspired by the book Technical Communication by Mike Markel. From his introductions to technical communications, I want to present an example that generalizes the skills that should raise people’s attention in their work as much as possible. Thank you for reading my blog.
Jun Lu
08.16.2018
Work Cited
Markel, Michael H. Technical Communication. 11th ed., Bedford/St Martins, 2016.
Jun's Blog 