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| A philosophical question - Is lateral thinking a valued trait in engineering? |
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| Cerebus:
--- Quote from: e100 on March 01, 2022, 04:58:32 pm --- --- Quote from: Cerebus on March 01, 2022, 03:09:20 pm ---My innate suspicion on encountering the sort of person who starts with telling you "I'm good at lateral thinking" is that they have left out the second half of the sentence "but I'm terrible at logical thinking or actually getting on and doing something". >:D --- End quote --- If you were stuck on a particular engineering problem and such a person offered to help you find a solution, would you automatically reject their offer because of your suspicions? The consequence of rejecting that offer could be that you never find a solution, or it takes much longer to find a solution. I think I've just created a new catch phase, I shall call it "anti-engineering" - the processes by which you fail to achieve an engineering goal because you distrust or dislike someone and therefore you avoid them even though they may be able to help you. --- End quote --- I haven't suggested anything like that, you've put words in my mouth by hugely extrapolating from something that, quite obviously, is a mere quip. Moreover, you've suggested that a mere suspicion would motivate me to reject someone's help. It wouldn't, my judgement would only be formed by the quality of their suggestions, not a mere initial suspicion. I'm hugely against the idea of jumping to conclusions from insufficient evidence, whereas you seem to have done exactly that. Let me guess, you like to go around telling people how good you are at lateral thinking. >:D |
| Cerebus:
--- Quote from: Nominal Animal on March 01, 2022, 04:18:05 pm ---In a work environment, you see something similar between bosses who lead from the front, and the bosses who lead from the back. --- End quote --- I used to have a boss who led from another continent, or somewhere on the road, and he was supposed to be in the same office as me. His boss was frequently heard to ask "Remind me, what exactly is that Edward is actually supposed to do?". |
| tggzzz:
--- Quote from: Cerebus on March 01, 2022, 02:42:36 pm --- --- Quote from: tggzzz on March 01, 2022, 08:40:59 am --- --- Quote ---At the best these methodologies sometimes work by mere coincidence because they make people think about and analyze what they are doing, at their worst they destroy any chance of success by being followed religiously, thereby excluding any exploration of solutions that might actual work but aren't part of "the process". --- End quote --- The "sometimes" had a 100% hit rate, with the right interpreter and right division of roles. I could never understand the standard roles such as "plant". --- End quote --- In your experience – probably just of one place that used it and had a culture that was the real cause for success. --- End quote --- Those are strawman points, if you read the bits you snipped. I was explicit that it was my experience, it was two places (HP Labs and Cambridge Consultants), they did not use it during work, merely as an adjunct to interviewing. The culture was, unsurprisingly, the dominant factor in those two places' success, and Myers Brigg paid no part in it (because it wasn't used). --- Quote --- --- Quote ---Overall it is very useful mechanism for realising that different people have different strengths and weaknesses, and you need to cover one person's weaknesses with another person's strengths. --- End quote --- You don't need Myers Brigs to tell you that, and it doesn't purport to exist to remind you of "different strokes for different folks", it purports to provide an accurate personality analysis and any psychologist will tell you that it does not and if that is what you want that there are modern personality inventory tests that will (for some probabilistically quantifiable value of "will"). --- End quote --- All the engineers that went to the talks found it very interesting and enlightening. |
| rstofer:
A thought and a tale: In my view, July 20, 1969 proves that we should remove "can't" from the dictionary. Really, the concept just keeps getting in the way! Every time I hear "I can't..." or "We can't..." it's all I can do to stop myself from going non-linear. So we're pouring foundations for steel columns and the standard concrete spec is 2500 PSI compressive strength in 28 days. Now, the project isn't being built for the greater glory of mankind, it is going to save the company about $3000 per day. So that 28 day wait is going to cost us about $84k. The "never say can't guy" (who knows diddly about concrete) grabs the concrete design manual off the shelf and looks at some graphs. Did you know that you could just add a little more cement to the mix and have 2500 psi by the next morning? Apparently neither did anyone else. But it's true, we had the samples at the lab first thing in the morning and they passed testing. We hung the steel that very day! Saved the company $84k! And, yes, that kind of stuff will get you a raise and a reputation. There is no such thing as "can't". |
| Cerebus:
--- Quote from: tggzzz on March 01, 2022, 06:18:17 pm --- --- Quote from: Cerebus on March 01, 2022, 02:42:36 pm --- --- Quote from: tggzzz on March 01, 2022, 08:40:59 am --- --- Quote ---At the best these methodologies sometimes work by mere coincidence because they make people think about and analyze what they are doing, at their worst they destroy any chance of success by being followed religiously, thereby excluding any exploration of solutions that might actual work but aren't part of "the process". --- End quote --- The "sometimes" had a 100% hit rate, with the right interpreter and right division of roles. I could never understand the standard roles such as "plant". --- End quote --- In your experience – probably just of one place that used it and had a culture that was the real cause for success. --- End quote --- Those are strawman points, if you read the bits you snipped. --- End quote --- No they are not strawman arguments, and I snipped the bits that I had no objection to. You've snipped lots, is that evidence of fallacious argument, as you imply it is? Two places that you worked is still as much anecdote as it would be if it was just one. If you want to claim that Myers Briggs is anything other than undiluted hooey, you need to cite properly conducted surveys, from unbiased sources, that demonstate that. Reiterating "It worked for me" isn't evidence. --- Quote --- I was explicit that it was my experience, it was two places (HP Labs and Cambridge Consultants), they did not use it during work, merely as an adjunct to interviewing. The culture was, unsurprisingly, the dominant factor in those two places' success, and Myers Brigg paid no part in it (because it wasn't used). --- Quote --- --- Quote ---Overall it is very useful mechanism for realising that different people have different strengths and weaknesses, and you need to cover one person's weaknesses with another person's strengths. --- End quote --- You don't need Myers Brigs to tell you that, and it doesn't purport to exist to remind you of "different strokes for different folks", it purports to provide an accurate personality analysis and any psychologist will tell you that it does not and if that is what you want that there are modern personality inventory tests that will (for some probabilistically quantifiable value of "will"). --- End quote --- All the engineers that went to the talks found it very interesting and enlightening. --- End quote --- "interesting and enlightening" is not evidence of any kind of truth, it's a subjective opinion. It's the sort of polite phrase that gets used about a vicar's sermon in the parish magazine, which I suggest is quite an apposite comparison. |
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