A Half Full, or Half Empty, Glass?

In retrospect, I probably kept track of tech developments more than I should have while I was on sabbatical (my wife definitely would agree with this statement!). One of the more compelling articles I read, which kicked already-in-progress introspection into overdrive, was ironically published by one of EDN's esteemed competitors, EE Times. In the magazine's yearly 'State of the Engineer' careers issue, published mid-last month, is an article entitled 'EEs Love The Stressful Life' (link is to a PDF). I'll quote part of David Roman's writeup:

Engineers have a love-hate relationship with their profession. For some, long hours and relentless demands are barely offset by compensation. “It’s a form of slavery,” said one participant. Yet despite squeezed deadlines and shorthanded crews, most engineers are happy with their profession and would recommend it to their children.

The stats that back up Roman's statements are quite eye-opening (both absolutely and geography-to-geography relatively).

I won't steal all of Roman's thunder, so please check out his writeup for the rest of the data, but he also provided compelling (and depressing) stats on the disparity between vacation time earned and taken, and on the percentage of respondents who:

• Had employers that expected 24/7 availability
• Had employees that made greater demands on their time than formerly, and
• Reported a shortage of engineer co-workers

But here's the kicker, the set of stats that really blew me away. In spite of all the bad news:

So let me get this straight. More than 80% of respondents felt engineering was a "grand profession", and more than half of them (and more than 70% of them, excluding folks in Japan) would steer their kids towards engineering. This even though a significant number of the respondents were working 10 or more hours per week beyond the conventional 40 hour timeframe, were leaving significant numbers of unused vacation days on the table at the end of each year, were single-handedly doing jobs formerly handled by two or more people, and had employers that expected them to be on call day and night, weekdays and weekends, even while on vacation?

Continued with 'Needle and the Damage Done'….