This Weeks Engineering Trivia Quiz
The Coffee Break Quiz - A challenging selection of General Engineering questions and answers
- Sometimes you just don't know what you don't know, but you're sure that you did know or that you should know and when you see the answers you know that once upon a time you probably did know !
challenge your colleagues - can they answer more than you ?
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Monday 11 June, 2012 11:05 AM |
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If you are a seller of engineering goods and services - do you have a process in place to get feed back and to measure the success (or not) of each job. To critically evaluate the results of the measures.
Then to analyze and put in place corrective actions - or congratulate your team on a "job well done" and look for ways to do it even better
Some companies do - some companies don't
If you are a buyer of engineering goods and services - are you asked for formalized feedback - and if so - do you give "honest" feedback on a project
I've just finished a smallish project - $350K - and a major part of that was to supply and install a piece of plant. There where a number of problems which where directly attributable to the supplier and which resulted in a delay to the install date and cost over runs.
The people who I dealt with at the head office level where very nice and friendly - but a number of technical and installation details at shop floor level failed
I am eagerly awaiting a feedback survey from them asking - "How did we do ?"
I have a gut feeling that it's not coming.
My options are to -
A - Do nothing and make a point of never doing business with them again
B - Demand a feedback survey so that I can tell them what I really think about the job they did - in a constructive way of course
Whilst option A is appealing - I feel morally obliged to share my frustrations with them - in the hope that they will take it on board and that it will help them to improve
What would you do - ?
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Tuesday 5 June, 2012 11:29 AM |
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This Weeks Engineering Trivia Quiz
The Coffee Break Quiz - A challenging selection of General Engineering questions and answers
- Sometimes you just don't know what you don't know, but you're sure that you did know or that you should know and when you see the answers you know that once upon a time you probably did know !
challenge your colleagues - can they answer more than you ?
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Monday 4 June, 2012 07:43 AM |
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I'm a contract engineer and I have just finished managing a smallish project in a palletising/warehousing environment
There was a degree of complexity due to an older pallet selection and management system which had a number of pieces of ancillary plant integrated into it. Also, the company I was working for had zero electrical/plc knowledge of this particular system (at a higher technical level)
I freely admit that I under estimated the complexity of the control system. A 20 year old dinosaur. However, in my defense - there was no readily available support and if I had waited until I had all of the background data, the job would not have been completed on time and the money assigned to the supply and installation of new equipment would have been eaten up in pre work.
Obviously, this was not an ideal situation - but the guidelines where set and it was a case of "manage it and make it work" - and get the job completed during a scheduled Easter 2012 outage because that the only time we can give you and we need to make it happen.
Anyway, moving on - there was one major piece of plant which was a "supply and install" and I should have been more awake.
"Should have" how I hate that expression - But I digress - I fell for the "smooth talking sales routine" - I know that I should have known better and I have a personal rule to avoid the slick sales engineers who seem to good to be true - because they usually are !
But I was under pressure and desperately looking for solutions - and I needed them in a hurry.
So the "yes, we can do that " routine seemed like a godsend - manna from heaven and I placed the purchase order with them.
I'm sure that you can all write the rest of this story -
Once the technical guys got involved - the "yes we can do that" changed to "no we don't do that" and with time pressure building - the sales engineer was quick to explain that there was obviously a misunderstanding and my understanding of the terminology in the quote was not what his company actually quoted for.
I was not happy and could have spent a lot of time justifiably arguing the point or looking for another supplier - but time was of the essence and I had to manage what I had got - so I bit my tongue hard and I did what was needed to be done in order to make it all come together. And of course - further into the project - I paid the price
The point of my story is - beware the Slick Sales Engineer - get "buy in" from the technical guys BEFORE you write that purchase order
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Thursday 31 May, 2012 11:35 AM |
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This Weeks Engineering Trivia Quiz
The Coffee Break Quiz - A challenging selection of General Engineering questions and answers
- Sometimes you just don't know what you don't know, but you're sure that you did know or that you should know and when you see the answers you know that once upon a time you probably did know !
challenge your colleagues - can they answer more than you ?
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Monday 28 May, 2012 09:12 AM |
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When the going gets tough - the tough get going. But where do they go to. I often ponder this question as I sit cross legged under my desk (cuddling my teddy bear) and repeatedly flicking my bottom lips with my finger to make bubbub…. bubbub…. bubbub…. noises - every time something goes "belly up".
As Engineers - we check and double check - but sometimes …….. as they say in the best of circles -- "Sediment happens" and a "situation" needs to be "managed"
I started writing this as a comment on how engineering projects can go off the rails - but as I look back at what I've written - it sounds more like a CIA plot for the next "Bourne" movie.
I guess that is where the similarity ends . The movie is fiction, a fantasy. My problems are very real and need to be dealt with. However - taking a positive slant - I am very pleased to have these problems because - as we all know - in reality - they are exciting "opportunities for improvement". So moving forwards - I have many opportunities for improvement. It is all in the way you look at things
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Thursday 24 May, 2012 10:39 AM |
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This Weeks Engineering Trivia QuizThe Coffee Break Quiz - A challenging selection of General Engineering questions and answers
- Sometimes you just don't know what you don't know, but you're sure that you did know or that you should know and when you see the answers you know that once upon a time you probably did know !
challenge your colleagues - can they answer more than you ?
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Monday 21 May, 2012 12:40 AM |
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This Weeks Engineering Trivia Quiz
The Coffee Break Quiz - A challenging selection of General Engineering questions and answers
- Sometimes you just don't know what you don't know, but you're sure that you did know or that you should know and when you see the answers you know that once upon a time you probably did know !
challenge your colleagues - can they answer more than you ?
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Monday 7 May, 2012 10:48 AM |
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This Weeks Engineering Trivia Quiz
The Coffee Break Quiz - A challenging selection of General Engineering questions and answers
- Sometimes you just don't know what you don't know, but you're sure that you did know or that you should know and when you see the answers you know that once upon a time you probably did know !
challenge your colleagues - can they answer more than you ?
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Monday 23 April, 2012 08:25 AM |
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