People skills or technical skills?
A recent Boston Globe article (At MIT, a new focus on generating ‘people’ skills) covered a program at MIT where engineering undergrads get training in “people” skills. In the two-year program, they learn how to make a sales pitch to a company executive, among other things. Students are critiqued on their presentations and communications skills.The program, funded by none other than Analogic founder Bernard M. Gordon, is another in list of university programs he has funded. Others include programs at Tufts and Northeastern. Gordon has long advocated that engineers need more than technical skills to thrive in the real world.
Should engineering undergrads be required to take a course in communications and presentations? In a recent Tech Trends column “The technical divide,” I noted that there seems to be a gap in knowledge between experienced and neophyte engineers. Several readers commented that today’s recent engineering graduates lack basic technical skills. This begs the question, should engineering schools focus more on technical skills to make up that gap or is teaching “people” skills more important?
Martin Rowe commented:
I spoke the Mr. Gordon today. He explained that the Boston Globe article missed the point of the university programs. He said that the programs as designed to teach engineers how to thrive in the real world. He particularly emphasized that engineering students miss details such as component tolerances which can produce production products that don't always work.
