Abstract
I was greatly honoured to receive the President’s medal from Lord Oxburgh at our February Council meeting and formally commence my term as President of the Institute. Ron has achieved a great deal in his Presidency, overseeing the implementation of a Governance process which will enable us to move forward emphasising a spirit of openness and inclusivity. I echo his emphasis on the desirability of engaging across the membership and look forward to working with each and every one of you in promoting the very best of measurement and control in the coming year both within the Institute and within the wider engineering community. I know you will wish to join with me in thanking Lord Oxburgh for his very great efforts as our President. He will be a hard act to follow, but I am sure with your support there is much we can achieve.
It is an exciting time to be an engineer! Our value to society is central to the wellbeing and economic development of society. The most recent report from the Royal Academy of Engineering (RAEng) and the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) reveals the engineering sector is responsible for £280 billion of the United Kingdom’s gross value added, one-fifth of the total.
There are, however, challenges ahead. We need many more engineers, and those engineers need to be appropriately trained and supported throughout their careers. ‘The State of Engineering’ report from Engineering UK in 2015 projects the need for 1.82 million people with engineering skills from 2012 to 2022. This means we need to double the number of engineering apprentices and graduates entering industry. Our agenda of increasing and professionally developing our membership is thus extremely timely. Within the Institute, we should not underestimate the challenge of attracting and sustaining this greatly increased workforce, particularly given that our expertise is frequently a hidden technology. At the heart of my first column as president is a call to arms. To promote the art of measurement and control, we must be far more outspoken than may be our natural tendency. We must use our journals, meetings and access to social media to shout about the many applications we engage with on a daily basis that have a positive impact on the life of individuals whether it be producing energy, food or water, supporting the transport systems we use to move around or engaging with any of the many advances in healthcare to name but a few. I look forward to learning more about the contributions of you all in the months ahead.