ENGINEERING CHANGE - OR IS IT CHANGE ENGINEERING - A PERSONAL PERSPECTIVE

The paper illustrates the way in which a knowledge of 'hard' systems can be utilised to plan and manage change in 'soft' systems. Many analogues may be used to 'engineer' change effectively, including system simplification techniques, aggregation, input/output analysis, feedforward/feedback controls, periodicity, sampling and determination of important signals in conditions of poor SNR scenarios. It is further argued that this discipline of 'change engineering', which is common to many walks of life, is naturally related to systems engineering concepts. Thus the graduate engineer who possesses a working knowledge of these concepts will be in demand in a wide range of professions. Thus the 'leakage' of good engineering graduates into commerce, line management, consultancy etc. may be a tribute to their lateral education as much as a criticism of technology orientated employers failing to offer suitable challenges and rewards.