The symbiotic relationship between engineering and architecture

Posted on By Mark Wilson
This content is 3 years old. I don't routinely update old blog posts as they are only intended to represent a view at a particular point in time. Please be warned that the information here may be out of date.

I’m entering a new phase of life as my children are growing up. My eldest son has passed his driving test, and now we’re touring university open days. He’s looking to become an engineer (as was I, before I failed my A levels and fell into computing, but that’s another story).

Last weekend, we visited the University of Bath, to learn about their Structural and Architectural Engineering course. In his introductory presentation, Senior Lecturer Dr Chris Blenkinsopp was talking about the relationship between engineers and architects, and it really struck a chord with me.

Dr Blenkinsopp was speaking about engineers as “born problem solvers”. Engineers focus on design – following guidelines and using their problem-solving skills. The architect does the big picture “drawing”, the engineer makes it work. Whilst a computer might be able to solve the maths, the engineer needs an ability to use a range of skills in an imaginative way.

Successful projects need collaboration between engineers and a variety of stakeholders. Critically, it’s vital that architects and engineers work together closely. And, for that reason, the University of Bath’s Design Projects involve both engineers and architects – collaborating at university as they will in their professional careers.

Whilst Dr Blenkinsopp was talking about civil/structural engineers and architects who work in the built environment, there are strong parallels with my world of information technology (IT).

Architects and IT architects

I have to be careful here, because I’ve been called out previously for calling myself an architect, which is a protected title:

“The title ‘architect’ is protected by law in the UK, under Section 20 of the Architects Act 1997. It can only be used in business or practice by someone who has had the education, training and experience needed to join the Architects Register and become an architect.”

[Architects Registration Board]

But all of that relates to architects who work in the built environment. In IT, architect is a broadly used term – and is recognised in the Skills Framework for the Information Age (SFIA). It’s also part of the job title in my employment contract!

The relationship between IT engineers and IT architects

Unfortunately, in IT, the term “architect” is also abused. It’s become common as a term to imply some seniority in the technical space. As a result, it’s lost some of its meaning. Even so, my role as an architect is less and less about technology and more and more about solving business challenges. In the course of that work, I work with lots of subject matter experts – the engineers of the IT world – who solve the problems that I give to them. My role is to draw the big pictures and join everything together. [Often, my tools are some whiteboard pens…]

Where I work, at risual, we run Consulting Skills Workshops, to help our subject matter experts develop the soft skills that are required to be a successful consultant. In reality, our consultants are on the first step towards IT architecture (whether they know it or not). Consulting is an engagement model and a set of soft skills. In terms of career progression, our consultants are no longer engineers – they are often required to work as technical architects.

But there is absolutely nothing wrong with being an IT engineer. We need those problem solvers – the people who know how to bring technology together and use it in imaginative ways. Just as much as we need the people who can take those technology building blocks and use them to solve business challenges.

Conclusion

As a result of taking my son to Bath and sitting in Dr Blenkinsopp’s presentation, my mission has changed. The work I’m doing at risual to develop and grow our Architecture practice needs to be tweaked. I need a slightly different focus. I still need to create great architects. But I also need to up the emphasis on constant collaboration with great engineers.

Because, to take a quote from Dr Blenkinsopp’s talk:

“The best […] engineering solutions require engineers and architects to work together from the outset.”

Professor Ted Happold

Additional Reading

What is IT Architecture? (part 1 of a series I wrote last year)

Developing IT Architecture Skills (part 2)

So, you want to be an Infrastructure Architect? (very old, but contains some useful diagrams)

Featured image: author’s own.

Bringing engineering to life with some Key Stage 2 schoolchildren and K’nex

Posted on By Mark Wilson
This content is 6 years old. I don't routinely update old blog posts as they are only intended to represent a view at a particular point in time. Please be warned that the information here may be out of date.

Last year, I signed up as a STEM Ambassador. With my employer’s backing, I can now volunteer to take part in events that are intended to bring Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM) subjects to life and demonstrate their value in life and in careers.

I receive regular invitations to take part in events but, until recently, I hadn’t been able to make them fit around my calendar. Then, a few weeks ago, I saw an invitation to run an engineering workshop with some Year 4-6 students as part of a school Science Day. The brief was to give a short presentation on:

  • What is STEM?
  • Why STEM skills are important
  • The story of what I was like at school and what I wanted to do for a job
  • What I do now
  • What I enjoy about my job

and then to facilitate an activity, breaking the children into small teams with a box of K’nex to build a tower that could support a small object.

I was pretty nervous about the activity – after all, I’m not a teacher! I spent quite a bit of time tuning the presentation and, taking advice from my own children (who are in years 6 and 8), making sure there were lots of images (that’s my style anyway) and animations. Unfortunately, when I arrived at the school, the animations were useless: PowerPoint 2010 didn’t like my 2016-based graphics so I quickly removed all of the transitions and animations – and the moral of the story there is don’t take advice from your 13 year-old…

I ran two workshops, each with a class of around 28 children. The teachers were present at all times (dealing with any disruptive children) and I found I just needed to be myself, to answer the children’s questions (which, of course, ranged from “what age can you start being an engineer?” to “what car do you drive?”) and to guide them during the activity.

I set out the activity as a challenge, with requirements and materials:

STEM engineering challenge, with requirements and materials

but I didn’t tell the children how to make a tower strong.

Time to test the towers

Only after we had tested it, did we spend some time talking about the things they had done to make their towers work (and all of them had managed this themselves, whether they did it consciously or not).

Making towers strong and stable

It was fantastic to see how each group approached the activity – each team had different ideas for how they might use the K’nex. Some children had played with it before whilst others needed some advice on how to make the connectors and rods fit together but almost every team completed the challenge successfully. The one team that didn’t complete the task had struggled because they had divided into two smaller groups and ended up with two short towers – that gave me an opportunity to talk about teamwork and also about project management (managing to time!).

I came away from school that afternoon with a great buzz. It’s wonderful to hear children say things like “I like your lessons – they’re fun!” and “Are you coming back next year?”. And, if you want to know more about STEM Ambassadors (either getting someone involved in an activity or event – or perhaps becoming one yourself), check out the website.