Maths, Physics, Chemistry and a career to combine them all.

(in homage to thisisindexed.com)

Part of my role this year has been to interview undergraduates for my company's scholarship scheme, and also interviewing graduates for our graduate positions.  It reminded me a lot of being back in college, and the fact that when I was asked "Why Chemical Engineering", my stock answer was as in the title.  It felt a bit lame, and as I said it, I would always wish I had been brave enough to give the correct answer: "I can't remember now, as I chose it before I ever knew what the course was like, but if I had a time machine, I'd go back and tell 17 year old me to do the same".

So after talking to 15 undergraduates for the scholarship, and interviewing another 10 or so graduates, every single one of them had picked Chemical Engineering as they really liked Maths, Physics and Chemistry, and found that Chemical Engineering combined them all.  It's only just occurred to me that I've never asked "why"?  Is there something about chemical engineering that makes it uniquely placed for those of us who liked maths, physics and chemistry?  What happens to those who just like Maths and Physics?  Or Maths and Chemistry?  Is it possible to end up in Chemical Engineering because you liked Maths, chemistry and biology, and wanted a career to combine them all?

What subjects influenced your career choice?

Why Stormtroopers fall into a classic process mistake

I watched Star Wars with my daughters at the weekend for their first time.  I first saw it when I was seven, and can still remember the excitement of seeing it with my uncle, cousins and older brothers.  34 years later, it is still a great film, even though the Imperial Forces were heavily armed all the way around the Death Star but never managed to get a shot onto any of the heroes/heroine.

All very interesting, but in terms of Process, so what? 

There was one scene that really stuck with me on this viewing.  Princess Leia is rescued from her cell on the Death Star, but then she, along with Luke, Han Solo and Chewbacca are stuck with no way out other than through where the Stormtroopers are firing at them from.  So they shoot their way into the garbage disposal system.  [Note, this is a utility system].  Now the stormtroopers don't bother going to investigate even though the shooting has stopped and the only place the escapees could go is into a closed system.  Instead, they reckon that they are now in a system they understand, and just initiate the compact intruders operation in the garbage chute, and assume that the problem has gone away. 

So the lesson as far as I am concerned is not just the obvious - if you are designing a foolproof process, don't forget all the potential hazards.  No point in having a system that can destroy entire planets if it can't handle small fighters, especially as based on the first film, there was no evidence of the rebellion having many big fighters, at least not at their rebel base.  And it would be good to train your staff to deal with the hazards, and not let 5 intruders wreak havoc in your system.

But also, don't forget the utilities systems, even the drains.  And don't assume that they just work, because for all their lack of glamour, it is generally regarded as bad if you can't keep production going because you have a blocked drain. Or that the pump system emptying the drain has failed and you didn't notice.

New Year

I've always liked the Christmas holidays, and although I reckon the pressure of New Year's eve to be at the best party, I quite like New Year as well. This year I've matched my holidays to the girls school break, and it feels like a good long holiday.

Returning to work after New Year is often a thought, but when you start a new diary, a blank to-do list, it feels like the possibility of being more organised, more productive, more present for people, is not far away.

Resolutions are not effective for me, but I'll do my best to blog a bit more often, and have a good year.

Leave the technology in your pocket.....

My wife challenged me to try my holiday with no email, no Facebook, no messing around on the internet, no playing games on the phone.  She didn't think I could manage, and I wasn't that sure either.  However, I'd had a vehement conversation with a friend of mine, who said she was still going to check her email on the blackberry while her family had an end-of-an-era holiday in California, before her daughter goes to college.  My argument was that if you keep checking your email, you are not on holiday, and you never really relax.  So I was now going to have to live up to my side of the argument.

Like many people I know, I use the technology to answer questions, figure out what that song is, who was in that movie, or just to break the boredom.  Facebook is built around that fact that we all like to feel liked, and that it's nice to get a reply or a "like" to something you've said.  I have found myself checking back when I'm bored to see if anyone has liked my wit and wisdom, and to encourage them to do so, I'm glad to share my "like"s as well.  Turning to the gadgets becomes a habit if you are facing a bit of downtime, and what harm does a wee game of Angry Birds do?

So while I watched my daughter's latest riding lesson, which was just a bit different to the last riding lesson, I could easily have been solving a puzzle, composing a witty update to Facebook.  But as she rode around the arena, would she have felt I was present?  And what will she remember of the holiday?  In this case, what she won't remember is her Dad being distracted.  She might remember him watching.  And she might canter one of these days, and I'll see her do it. 

And surprisingly, work managed well without my intervention.  I lasted the week without even cheating.  Maybe I should avoid email during work time as well (actually, maybe not).  Someone might notice.  Or worse, no-one might notice.

Dealing with information overload

It's often been said that we have so much information available to us these days that we are overloaded. So many emails to read, so much on the web, TV, radio, press, magazines, whatever. And I far prefer to go somewhere a friend has recommended as good for information, rather than hope that my selection of key search phrases on Google gets me there.

And with that in mind, these are the main items in my current web-toolbox.


www.mindtools.com
A treasure-trove of easy to digest information about business, management, and self-enhancement. Subscribe for free to the newsletters.


http://blogs.hbr.org.

Recommended by one of my colleagues on the Poyry Business Academy, it's like the business pages of your favourite paper, but better.


http://msdn.microsoft.com.
For all your detailed queries on things microsofty, especially programming and development.


For news:


http://news.bbc.co.uk, obviously
http://www.facebook.com for news particular to me.
http://www.linkedin.com for news particular to my business side
http://www.irishtimes.com (or whatever your "quality newspaper" is). Read it as a student at home in Ireland as they had a clever policy of charging less than a tabloid to buy it in college, hoping to get you hooked. Now reading on the ipod touch!
http://www.dilbert.com, etc. because it's not all work.


And how do I keep track of the useful articles, information, advice etc? I can't keep it all in my head, so I use Microsoft OneNote (which is part of the licenses from Microsoft for Office Professional Plus) and send the relevant pages into the notebook, straight from Internet Explorer with a single button click. It's searchable, and shareable, so that the information can be gathered and shared within teams or elsewhere. Probably the best new programme from Microsoft in decades, but not too many folk seem to know about it. Ask your IT people why you haven't got it on your desk. And if you have, try it!


What would you recommend to me?

Processes

I chose the title of this blog to be deliberately vague, as there are a number of ways that the "Process" word applies to my life.

Firstly, my qualification is in Chemical and Process Engineering.  In the oil industry, we tend to refer only to the process part of this title, and all chemical engineers are called "Process Engineers" (when they're acting as chemical engineers that is.  One of the joys of the Chemical Engineering degree is that a fair number of us end up with lots of other job titles.)

Secondly, a lot of what I do is more related to how things get done, as workflows, rather than simply joining unit operations together to make a process.

Thirdly, we tend to take information from a lot of sources, process it, and come up with conclusions and recommendations.  Not to mention how hard it can be sometimes to see how what makes sense to us adults is processed and fed back in a slightly different form by our children.

And finally, I'm getting quite interested in photography, and while we no longer send photos off to the lab to get processed, a lot of the art of good photography now is how you take the raw pictures and using Photoshop or whatever, process these into good photographs.

So that's kind of where I'm coming from.  What's your part?

Looking a few moves ahead

I used to play chess at school, even was part of our school chess team.  Suffice it to say that there was not severe competition for places on the team, and I used to play black on the last board: on the sixth board of six, it was a gamble to try to place me up against a weaker player on the less preferred colour, thus winning some surprise points at the end.  It did work, and we had some good fun in the process.  Remember that this was the days before immersive computer games, Facebook, and that it rained a lot in southern Ireland (and the chess club was indoors and dry).

What I remember of my style of chess play was that I tended to play very aggressively, hoping to win before I ran out of pieces.  We never played timed games, we got to leave the all-boys school, and my style of play meant I finished early and had some time to chat to the opposite team, even if they happened to be female.

What brings me to this trip down memory lane?  Well, my daughter is now getting towards the age where she could start learning chess, and the Lewis Chessmen exhibition in Aberdeen whet my appetite.  My chess board is safely in the loft, but I saw a chess game on Amazon for my PC at a highly competitive cost (less than a fiver), and I bought it.  The game allows you to pit yourself against simulated players of similar ranking to yourself.  So I've been playing for about a week now.

My ranking is not improving much, and part of the problem is that I'm not in the mode of watching the rest of the board, and get quite caught up with my own strategy, becoming quite surprised when I suddenly lose my queen, or find myself in checkmate, seemingly out of nothing.  I'm sure I'll improve with practice, but I guess that given that I was used to winning as often as not 20 years ago, I need to get back into the way of thinking about it.

It made me wonder about whether we're the same at work.  Do we spend a lot of time looking one move ahead, not trying to figure out what the big picture is, and arranging our attack and our defence accordingly.  Do we not see the risks of losing our key players to the opposition, just because we are not focusing on the correct part of the board.  And can we improve this if we practice?  What would that practice look like?