| Editor's Note:
Earlier we featured Part
I of this article series,
which address the deep scrutiny and heated debate around
the term "engineer."
The Engineering camp
The engineering profession has traditions that span centuries,
and a heightened sense of professional status awareness
among its members. Modern engineering has over 80 very
diverse specialties. However, in Canada, “Professional
Engineer” is a blanket title, which does not prevent,
for example, a civil engineer to undertake work of chemical
engineering. As Ken McMartin of the Professional Engineers
of Ontario (PEO) explains, “the onus is on the
engineer to undertake work he or she is competent to
perform by virtue of the practitioner’s training
and experience.”
Some could argue that this is a loophole and in fact
it is more likely to have a professional engineer cross
specialties, undertake work for which he is not fully
qualified and pose a risk to the public, than having
a software engineer “cross the border” into
conventional engineering. Nevertheless, the professional
engineers feel that their title is an asset to be protected.
They also feel that their role and importance to society
is not visible enough to the public and therefore is
undervalued. Denis Leblanc, general manager of OIQ argues
that "if we allow anyone to use the title, people
will see the term ‘engineer’ everywhere and
won't have the confidence that everyone using it has
the same standard of training and experience".
But what if tables were turned by the software engineers?
As information and computers pervade and underpin our
society, the need for qualified practitioners, with very
high standards of specialized competency and strong ethics
is a necessity. While a number of years ago it was easy
for a professional engineer – for almost anyone
with at least college education for that matter – to
enter the IT field, now this becomes increasingly difficult,
although there are no regulations in place to prevent
it. One of the reasons for the absence of such regulations
is that, from an organizational point of view, the IT
profession has not yet attained enough maturity and strength.
The global camp
Is the engineering debate a global one? Apparently not. “Engineer” is
a widespread term, which penetrated even sectors that traditionally
had little to do with engineering; for example, in Europe,
it made its way in agriculture. In Australia, UK and south
of the border, conventional engineers and software engineers
have been able to harmonize their interests and regulations,
creating joint specialized bodies (the Software Engineering
Board in Australia) or coming together under the umbrella
of organizations such as the British Computer Society (BCS)
or Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).
A look at the IEEE Computer Society website reveals indeed
that the term “engineer” in used sometimes
without any qualifier - other than the context.
That lawsuits proliferate in Canada, and not in the
US – where there is a strong tendency towards
litigation, is ironic. The actions of the Canadian
professional engineering associations might have a
global echo once they start targeting companies such
as Microsoft. But could they have a real impact beyond
Canadian jurisdictions? Not a constructive one, especially
in this age when professions need to embrace globalization
and mobility of the work force. From the outside, the
dispute is seen by some as a frivolous one, wasting
time and energy that could be put to better use for
the advancement of the field.
CIPS’ Paul Bassett thinks the solution is “computer
scientists and [conventional] engineers to work together
wherever feasible, to teach and do research in this
very important emerging field. More specifically, we
encourage current efforts to find a way to jointly
accredit Software Engineering courses and programs,
and to permit academic freedom in the choice of venues
for Software Engineering education. Last but not least,
while we strongly encourage professionalism through
accreditation and certification, employers should be
able to recruit and employ whomever they deem best
for their needs, to decide for themselves the qualifications
necessary in a software engineer without outside interference.”
Upholding the letter of a local law while defying
common sense and practical considerations may well
prove to be a futile exercise in the long run, a battle
won in a useless war of words.
Tatiana Andronache
is IT technical staff for a large information technology
company in Toronto, Canada. She can be reached at tatiana.andronache@sympatico.ca
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