Observed practices of design engineers

Abstract

While there are numerous studies documenting the skills and abilities of experienced designers and engineers, research is needed to document the specific practices or behaviors of design engineers, a subset of creative engineers who solve complex problems. To document observed practices of design engineers, twelve experienced engineers were asked to describe an expert design engineer, someone who always has the solution when others do not. Using inductive thematic analysis, nine observed practices with 30 subtopics were identified from 186 data points. The observed practices of design engineers include being collaborative, confident, creative, independent, intuitive, inquisitive, motivated, systematic, and versatile. Eight additional data points document varying observations of design engineers’ interest in mentoring or management. While participants spoke with reverence about the design engineers, some observed practices could have a negative connotation, such as being egotistical, conservative to a fault, and not good at public speaking. One realization from this paper is that studies generally report admirable practices to replicate, when potentially negative practices can help engineering educators to better prepare students for industry. Lastly, this article provides engineering educators with a mapping between the observed practices of design engineers and the graduate attributes used in accrediting Canadian engineering programs.

Introduction

A broad range of abilities is required of engineers, including data analysis, problem-solving, teamwork, communication, and professional ethics.^1–5 Engineers must have fundamental technical knowledge, the ability to apply this knowledge to a specific situation, and the capacity to communicate the result interpersonally and through writing. According to engineering accreditation bodies in the United States and Canada, students training to be engineers must demonstrate competence across numerous abilities.^6,7 After entering the workforce, practicing engineers will begin to specialize, gaining experience through the particular demands of the position in that industry or field. Though engineers require diverse skills, they naturally gravitate towards their strengths and further develop their innate abilities.

Recognizing that there is a multitude of skills available for engineers to develop, some engineers may excel at the intricate analyses while others excel at high-level project management tasks. There is a subset of engineers who focus on complex, challenging problems, who can inexplicably produce solutions when other engineers cannot. Described as design engineers, they have an uncommon ability to creatively produce design solutions to open-ended problems. Though speaking more broadly about designers in any discipline, Dym et al. ⁸ explain “designers generate, evaluate, and specify concepts for devices, systems, or processes whose form and function achieve clients’ objectives or users’ needs while satisfying a specified set of constraints.” Design engineers are the subset of engineers who are particularly adept at innovating within specific bounds, finding potential in the disorganized, and optimizing available resources.

The question becomes, what is it about these particular engineers that allow them to excel at design activities? Koen describes design as a complex series of behaviors. ⁹ Rather than focusing on the abilities or skills of engineers (found in accreditation criteria), Koen's definition offers an alternative means to explore the seemingly ineffable essence of design engineers: through observing their practices. If the behaviors of these skilled problem-solvers can be explored and extracted, perhaps they can identify potential design engineers in university or entering the workforce. These novice design engineers could be encouraged by instructors or managers to develop their design skills and pursue specialized design positions. By studying the designer, we can better understand the practice of design. With a better understanding of design, we can better prepare students for practice in industry.

Using unstructured interviews, a qualitative study was performed to ask the question: What are observed practices of design engineers? Following the warning from Yilmaz et al. ¹⁰ that designers have difficulty describing their own design process, we did not interview design engineers about their own practices. Instead, we asked 12 participants with engineering, design, and management experience to describe a fellow engineer who is adept at finding the answer when no one else could. The data were reviewed using thematic analysis, and we identified nine observed practices of design engineers.

Background

To situate this study within the field of engineering design research, we will describe the theoretical framework, define the terminology, explore the notion of expertise in design, and document relevant studies of behaviors and practices of designers and engineers.

Theoretical framework and positionality statement

We are professional engineers and academics of European descent. One of us identifies as a woman, and one of us identifies as a man. As design instructors, we believe that studying expert design engineers can help define the goals of design pedagogy. We chose not to interview design engineers directly or to observe their behavior ourselves (such as in a phenomenological study), because the subjective nature of determining who the expert design engineers are necessitated its own study. Rather than contact people to help recruit expert design engineers, our study explores why those contacts would recommend the particular individuals. The findings from this study could aid in the identification of expert design engineers for future phenomenological or interview-based research, reducing the subjectivity in recruitment.

The theoretical framework for this study is based on an individual constructionist paradigm, in which learning is cultivated through active discovery, exploration, and interaction with one's environment, as proposed by Piaget. ¹¹ Foundational to active learning pedgagogies, ¹² knowledge is formed through experience and processing. Observing the practices of design engineers can provide engineering educators with information to construct active learning opportunities for students to cultivate similar design practices. Psenka et al. ¹³ offer recommendations on how to translate constructionist learning in engineering design pedagogy, and they observed the need to identify designer behavior “to allow students to take action and build their engineering knowledge for gaining deeper conceptual learning.” This study helps to document designer behavior.

Clarifying terminology

While this study is focused on the practices of a design engineer, it is important to distinguish the differences between similar, yet distinct concepts. To clarify the terminology used throughout this manuscript, we will define the terms skills, abilities, knowledge, behaviors, and practices, then differentiate the terms design and design engineering.

The terms knowledge, skill, and ability are closely linked in education and management settings. The United States government used a knowledge, skills, ability (KSA) framework to assist in hiring decisions. In this setting, knowledge is defined as a “body of information applied directly to the performance of a function.” A skill refers to the measurable manipulation of data or things such as operating a vehicle, and an ability is the “power to perform an observable activity at the present time” such as organizing tasks. Here, knowledge is an applied mental process, skill is a practiced or learned quantifiable demonstration, and ability is unquantifiable and more complex demonstration. ¹⁴ This definition of ability aligns with engineering accreditation boards’ use of the term, requiring university programs to document that students have an “ability to” demonstrate certain outcomes, such as “‘an ability to communicate.”^7,8

In Bloom's original 1956 taxonomy, knowledge is the base level in the cognitive domain. ¹⁵ It was renamed to ‘remembering’ in the 2001 revision, emphasizing the simplicity of the task. ¹⁶ In a discussion on knowledge, Biggam distinguished factual knowledge, which would be similar to Bloom's definition, from practical knowledge, which is gained through experience. ¹⁷ A NASA report explained that knowledge is what is “necessary to master the concept,” ¹⁸ similar to the KSA framework defining knowledge as applied information. Knowledge, then, is foundational.

The NASA report next explained that a skill is defined as “having the requisite knowledge and the ability to apply that knowledge effectively.” ¹⁸ This aligns with the KSA framework as well, combining knowledge and ability in order to demonstrate the skill. According to Gero and Mano-Israeli, technical skills “can be learned and are relatively easy to measure, such as the use of software.” ¹⁹ These are distinguished from the interpersonal and social skills that are needed to function in society or accomplish a task. Note the similarity to KSA framework to be measurable. A definition from the nursing field adds a value statement, explaining a skill is “a learned ability to practice in certain ways that are valued by others.” ²⁰ Skill is the next level of complexity, as the application of knowledge.

More complex than knowledge, skill, or ability, for Koen, “design is behavior. It is something the engineer does. If we say that a person is designing something, we should be able to look at the individual and observe him or her actively doing something.” ⁹ Engineering design “is not one single, simple, isolated behavior. Instead, it is a large assortment of activities technically called a repertoire of behaviors that are interdependent and interconnected in complex ways.” ⁹ “Purdue's future engineer” is described as being innovative, adaptable, and curious, ²¹ idealizing particular behaviors and practices. Though we use the terms “behaviors” and “practices” interchangeably throughout the paper, we selected “practice” to describe the themes to emphasize the profession of engineering.

Finally, throughout this manuscript, the general term “design” or “designer” refers inclusively to the broader fields of design practice, including but not limited to architecture, fashion, industrial design, product design, and engineering design. ²² When specifically pertaining to the engineering field, “engineering design” and “design engineer” are used, denoting a necessity for domain-specificity.

Expertise in design

To understand the continually evolving nature of design and designers, the literature on expertise in design was reviewed. The evolution from novice to expert designer has been documented in numerous studies.^23–28 The progression requires a transition from instruction and learning to experience and application. ²⁹ This progression is further defined by Lawson and Dorst into seven levels of expertise in design. ³⁰ As the expertise of the designer increases, their design approach develops from convention-based, to situation-based, and finally strategy-based. ³⁰

From publicly available interviews with designers and a literature review on design knowledge and skills, Gulari analyzes the metaphors that are used to describe aspects of design. ³¹ Design expertise is like climbing a ladder and the designer is described as a hero (reflecting how “design expertise is overestimated by designers”) and a catalyst (bringing about innovation and facilitating change). ³¹ Røise et al. ⁵ provide a classification of four archetypes of designers from interviews with seventeen design professionals. Designers were described as either traditional, externally-oriented, user-oriented, or visualization-oriented. ⁵

In the realm of architectural design, Lawson and Dorst ³⁰ propose a classification of design considering the nature of design activities (formulating, representing, moving, evaluating, and managing), layers of design expertise (seven categories from naïve to visionary), and levels of design activities (project, process, practice, and profession). Dorst and Hansen ²⁷ found that when presented with a troublesome paradox, experts rely on their expertise and approach the problem from a broader angle to reconsider the problem.

A comprehensive review of the literature by Crismond and Adams concluded that an expert designer is able to frame a problem, perform research, possess idea fluency, perform deep drawing and modeling, evaluate alternatives, perform valid tests, troubleshoot effectively, iterate designing, and finally reflect on the experience. ²⁴ These skills correspond to steps in the design process, which expert designers regularly employ.

Distinguishing novices from experts, Ahmed, Wallace, and Blessing found that novices used trial and error whereas experienced designers employed specific strategies. ³² Experts designers are more likely to iterate through the design process quickly rather than operating linearly.^25,33 Additionally, experts are solution-focused, moving from problem space to solution space more quickly than novices, ²⁶ narrowing the field to a single idea quickly. ²⁵ Lawson and Dorst propose this narrowing because experts recognize the problem, similar to how a chess master plays chess. ³⁰

The documented examples of progressions of design expertise justify performing a study on experienced design engineers. If there were no evidence of an evolution of expertise, there would be no reason to study experienced designers as compared to novice designers. Also, these sources can be used to compare against the findings.

Practices of designers

Numerous studies have documented the requisite knowledge, skills, and abilities of design engineers,^3,25,32–34 including the ubiquitous description from Dym et al. of designers’ ability to “(a) tolerate ambiguity through a divergent-convergent thinking process, (b) think in terms of a bigger picture, (c) handle uncertainty, (d) make decisions, (e) think as part of a team in a social process, and (f) think and communicate in several languages of design.” ⁸ To approach this body of knowledge from a different angle, what does the literature say specifically about the practices or behaviors of design engineers?

Design cognition, originally found in protocol studies from the 1960's, ³⁵ refers to the mental processes such as problem solving and memory, encompassing the skills, abilities, and practices required to be able to design. In a literature review, it was found that design cognition studies focused on six topics: design process, cognitive processes, research methods, user, design artifact, and the designer. ³⁶ The papers were further classified, and practices of designers were found in papers on the design process, designer, and cognitive processes. It was posited that reflective behaviors (or metacognition) are an emerging area of research. ³⁶

A literature review exploring the personal identity of designers documented personal attributes and skills of designers. ³⁴ Design skills are defined as the required capabilities to carry out design tasks, such as communication and project management. ³⁴ Personal attributes, defined as characteristics or inner motivation, were developed from the literature: confidence, creativity, emotions, empathy, ethics, leadership, motivation, openness, responsibility, and social abilities. ³⁴ In a second study by the same authors, designers, professors, and managers were interviewed to document differences in perception of designers’ personal identity. ³⁷ It was found that each group focuses on a different attribute of the designer: managers focus on the empathy and interpersonal aspects of the designer (client-oriented), professors focus on the creativity of the designer (contribution-oriented), and designers focus on the successful outcome (practiced-oriented view). Empathy, creativity, and motivation are highlighted behaviors of designers.

In an examination of three case studies, Mindler uses the jester metaphor to describe the designers’ ability to playfully challenge supervisors and inspire transformation through employing creative expression and exploration. ³⁸ The qualities, strategies, and practices of the designer as jester motif are expressed as free speech, frankness, provocation, inducing change through humor and wit, reframing, opening up horizons, and likeability. ³⁸ As a jester, the designer displays strong interpersonal and innovative practices.

Wrigley proposes a transformative business model to incorporate ‘design innovation catalysts’ into companies, where these graduate students spend part of the week in an industry setting addressing complex problems and part of the week in a studio collaborating with other design catalysts. ³⁹ Through interviews with the design catalysts and their industrial counterparts (called “design champions”), knowledge, skills, abilities, and personal qualities were documented. Design catalysts were found to be open-minded, optimistic, cheerful, and motivational. ³⁹ They are also comfortable in the unknown and able to trust the design process instead of anticipating the outcome. ³⁹ Through studies on design catalysts, personal attributes, and metaphor, the behaviors and practices of designers are documented in the literature.

Practices of engineers

Next, we explore studies focused on practices of engineers that employ design thinking and “habits of mind,” which are two design frameworks. Design thinking, popularized by the Innovation Design Engineering Organization (IDEO) company, is essentially the “cognitive activity carried out by designers while they are designing.” ⁴⁰ Design thinking is a collection of mindsets and practices to foster collaboration, solving open-ended complex problems using a human-centered approach. ⁴¹ Brown describes the following five observed characteristics of designers who exhibit design thinking: empathy, integrative thinking, optimism, experimentalism, and collaboration. ⁴² Using these practices, Blizzard et al. created an instrument with nine items that was completed by nearly 7,000 first-year university students interested in engineering during introductory English classes across 50 universities in the United States. ⁴¹ The participants who identified as possessing design thinking traits were also high-achieving students, pursued careers that address societal problems, and sought opportunities for growth. ⁴¹ Coleman et al. ⁴³ repeated this survey for engineering students in their final year and found that self-assessed design thinking traits are less common in fourth-year engineering students as compared to students in their first year.

The concept of habits of mind, or “intelligence-in-practice” extends beyond knowledge to include skills and practices. ⁴⁴ If intelligence is the habitual persistence to understand concepts or situations and improve them, then habits of mind are behaviors that allow intelligence to flourish. From a list of 16 habits of mind originally defined by Costa and Kallick, ⁴⁵ Lucas and Hanson ⁴⁶ proposed six engineering-specific habits of mind that were confirmed through interviews with engineers: systems thinking, problem-finding, visualizing, improving, creative problem solving, and adapting. Recognizing the importance of life-long learning, these skills or abilities were supplemented with seven practices described as the learning habits of mind: open-mindedness, resourcefulness, reflection, curiosity, collaboration, resilience, and ethical considerations. ⁴⁶

Through case studies, interviews, and literature reviews, research describes designers as catalysts and jesters, employing frameworks of design cognition, design thinking, CDIO, and habits of mind. The engineering-specific studies document students’ self-assessment of design traits and practices of engineers as a whole. While there are studies on practices of designers and practices of engineers, there is a gap in the literature that is focused on the intersection of the two, necessitating a study on the practices of design engineers.

Method

Qualitative research allows the richness and depth of data to develop, ⁴⁷ in order to better understand a particular event or perspective. ⁴⁸ We used a generic qualitative inquiry approach rather than a specific ontological or epistemological method, ⁴⁹ combined with interview protocol, a methodology found in similar studies,^5,50,51 and thematic analysis ⁵² in order to address the question: What are observed practices of design engineers?

Participant data

To ensure a diversity of participants across education levels, years of experience, gender, engineering disciplines, industries, and geographic locations, we employed stratified purposeful sampling. ⁴⁹ Inclusion criteria were engineers with the following characteristics:

At least 10 years of experience in an industrial setting,

Design experience, either in their current or a former position, and

Management experience.

In order for participants to describe the practices of a co-worker who excels in design, they must have sufficient experience with the context themselves, both in engineering and specifically in design engineering. We deemed ten years of industrial experience as a reasonable threshold to ensure participants acquired a variety of experience in more than one team or project. Management experience was also required as managers regularly evaluate the performance of employees, and therefore they have experience gauging the design ability of their co-workers. We did not specify that the participant had to be the manager of the design engineer that they described, only that they had management (and thus observational) experience. Table 1 shows demographic data, organized by discipline.

Table 1.

Participant data.

Discipline	Location	Years of experience	Gender identity	Level of education	Industry
Civil	Atlantic Canada	20–29	Man	Bachelors	Utilities
Civil	Atlantic Canada	20–29	Woman	Bachelors	Utilities
Electrical	Atlantic Canada	10–19	Man	Bachelors	Renewable power
Electrical	France	30–39	Man	Bachelors	Aerospace
Industrial	Southern US	10–19	Woman	Masters	Mass production
Mechanical	Western Canada	20–29	Man	PhD	Acoustics
Mechanical	Midwest US	40–49	Man	Bachelors	Petro-chemical
Mechanical	Atlantic Canada	10–19	Man	Bachelors	Utilities
Mechatronics	Atlantic Canada	20–29	Woman	PhD	Marine robotics
Software	Eastern US	10–19	Man	Bachelors	Aerospace
Systems	Eastern US	20–29	Man	Bachelors	Aerospace
Systems	Western US	20–29	Man	PhD	Aerospace

Participants reported experience in numerous industries across the United States and Canada, with one participant in France. The diversity of the sample should ensure that experience is not limited to one industry or discipline, but rather welcomes the experience of engineers from multiple engineering disciplines and industries. Three participants identify as women (25%). Four participants have graduate degrees (33%). A sample of 12 was determined to be reasonable for this study as the findings are not intended to be representative of the greater population. According to Patton for qualitative research, the ideal is to sample “to the point of redundancy.” ⁴⁹ For smaller projects that use thematic analysis, Braun and Clark suggest a sample of 6–10 participants, whereas a medium study would have 10–20 participants. ⁵² Guest, Bunce, and Johnson concluded that twelve participants should suffice for research “in which the aim is to understand common perceptions and experiences,” as they found 92% of the codes generated in 60 interviews were identified in the first 12 interviews. ⁵³

Data collection and analysis

We conducted unstructured 30 and 90 min interviews through videoconferencing software, over the phone, or in person, to allow for widespread geographic participation. Rather than speaking in the abstract about general practices of designers, we asked participants to describe someone that they work(ed) with who is especially adept at design. This movement from abstract to concrete allows for more specific data, moving from the hypothetical to the experiential. Each interview began with the following statement:

Describe someone you work(ed) with who was a great designer, perhaps your mentor or someone who has worked for you, who always seemed to know the answer to a difficult problem. When you looked at their solution, you would think, “that is so simple, why didn’t I think of that?” Do you have someone that fits that description?

Participants were redirected to the research question with prompts inquiring about the positive and negative practices of the individual, lunch patterns, social interactions, mentoring, acceptance of feedback, and how these practices compared to those of other engineers.

During the interviews, we took field notes and performed member checks with participants to ensure the data that were collected matched what participants intended to say. This aligns with Cho and Trent's recommendation that “data collected are accurate in terms of a vis-a-vis agreement with participants.” ⁵⁴ After the member checks were completed, we used inductive analysis to extract short phrases or sentences which identified unique practices of design engineers into 194 data points. Rather than using theoretical thematic analysis, we elected to use inductive analysis because it is data-driven and does not attempt to seek evidence of a theory. ⁵⁵ Further, we utilized reflexive thematic analysis instead of using a codebook or formal framework. ⁵⁶ As explained by Braun and Clarke, “thematic analysis involves the searching across a data set – be that a number of interviews or focus groups, or a range of texts to find repeated patterns of meaning.” ⁵⁵ Examining data points across the twelve cases, we identified 30 sub-topics and then thematically grouped the sub-topics into nine themes or observed practices of design engineers. Eight of the data points were collected together and are reported in the findings, but they are not included as an observed practice of design engineers because the observations are inconsistent. Figure 1 is a visual representation of the divergent-convergent data analysis process that was followed.

Figure 1.

Visual representation of divergent-convergent data analysis process.

In qualitative analysis, there is no particular threshold that must be met in order for a pattern to be considered a theme. ⁵⁵ However, to ensure the themes represented observations from multiple participants, we calculated statistics relating themes and participants. We found that each participant provided an average of 16.1 data points, ranging between 9 and 26 data points per participant, (shown as circles in Figure 2) and contributed to an average of 6.8 themes (shown as triangles).

Figure 2.

Number of points and themes per participant.

Figure 3 is a visual representation of the statistical synthesis of the average number of points per participant and per theme, and it also shows the average number of participants per theme. We found that each of the nine themes contained an average of 20.7 data points, ranging between 14 and 30 data points per theme. Shown as a feedback loop in Figure 3, an average of 9 participants provided data points for each theme, with a range of 8 through 12 participants per theme.

Figure 3.

Synthesis of points, themes, and participants (average values).

Findings: observed practices of design engineers

In this section, we present findings on the common patterns from participant observations and do not intend the results to be representative of all design engineers or interpreted as an archetype of a single design engineer. Design engineers have been observed to be collaborative, confident, creative, independent, intuitive, inquisitive, motivated, systematic, and versatile. Each of these nine themes and the corresponding subtopics are listed in Table 2, shown in Figure 4, and described in the following sections.

Figure 4.

Observed practices of design engineers.

Table 2.

Observed practices of design engineers organized by theme and subtopic.

Themes (9)	Subtopics (30)
Collaborative	Pleasant, light-hearted, optimistic, and outgoing affect
	Respected by co-workers because will do ‘grunt’ work
	Team player, with almost everyone
Confident	Willing to defend solution but receptive and incorporate if sound reason
	Knows limitations, admits mistakes
	Negative: Can be egotistical
Creative	Innovative
	Sees possibilities
	Thinks outside the box
Independent	Constantly learning from a variety of sources, independent learner
	Likes to be on the forefront of innovation, constantly curious
	Independent worker who owns the problem and wants less oversight
Intuitive	Empathetic, understands client need
	Focuses on important details
	Recognizes patterns, can synthesize information and forecast
	Understands context
Inquisitive	Talks to anyone in company about technical issues, but can be blunt
	Seeks input, talks through problem with people with different opinions
	Would small talk with any individual in a social setting
	Negative: Not the best public speaker, better 1 on 1
Motivated	Competent and has a natural ability to design
	Eager, motivated by interest in the project
	Motivated by knowing why design is important
Systematic	Adaptive
	Good with time management, works to find a solution to be efficient, promotes regular iteration and testing early in process
	Systematic and breaks a problem down
	Negative: Can have perfectionist tendencies, conservative to a fault
Versatile	Develops a deeper understanding from experience, gains ‘battle scars’
	Has multi-disciplinary technical knowledge, including use of heuristics
	Has a variety of interests outside the office

Collaborative

When thinking about colleagues who were great designers, 10 out of 12 participants described individuals who were team-oriented, optimistic, engaging, and outgoing. Observed practices include that the design engineer recognized their role in the bigger picture and was willing to perform menial tasks, earning respect from their co-workers, so long as they were recognized for their contribution. However, design engineers were described as willing to sacrifice team cohesion for efficiency and quality, in order for the team to succeed. One participant explained, for a design engineer, “teamwork is important.” Another participant described that design engineers “try to be helpful,” and a third participant stated design engineers “will do small stuff.”

Confident

Eight out of the 12 participants explained that the design engineer they observed was confident in their ability, but knew their limitations. The design engineer was willing to admit mistakes and ask for help. They were open to feedback and criticism, not only to ensure that they had the best possible design, but also because they thoroughly considered the alternatives and strongly supported their conclusion. However, some design engineers were described as so confident of what they consider within their ability, that they could be perceived as egotistical, sure that their processes and conclusions were sound. A participant explained, “you can challenge them on the underlying reason [for your disagreement with them] and they will listen, but they need the reason because they spent extra time to be sure they were right.” Another participant stated that design engineers “try to solve a problem first, but admit when they need help.”

Creative

Nine of the participants unsurprisingly observed that the design engineer was creative and willing to think outside the box. The creative colleagues could come up with many solutions and can see possibilities where others could not. One participant shared a negative practice of design engineers, explaining that due to their innovative nature, the design engineer they described could be unwilling to accept a more mundane approach if it is too straightforward. Another participant explained “they are excited when doing something outside the mold, not constrained to a thought process.”

Independent

Eight participants described their colleague as taking ownership of the problem and being invested to find the answer. While the design engineers are observed to work well on a team, recognizing the skills of others and their own limitations, they prefer to complete their tasks independently. Too much management could be stifling, causing a loss of interest in the problem. Because the design engineers were described as being motivated by curiosity, they would teach themselves and were constantly learning from various sources of information. One participant explained, a design engineer “challenges themself, googling, a self-learner.” Another participant described their colleague with a “willingness to try new things” and “take risks.”

Intuitive

Eight participants explained that the design engineer they observed had an innate ability to understand the problem, ignore extraneous details, empathize with the client, and understand the greater implications and nuances of a problem. When troubleshooting, the person seemed to know what questions to ask and where to look. This is the most intangible of all the observed practices, but applicable. As one participant described, design engineers “understand the bigger picture” but also “know when to do nothing.” A second participant explained that design engineers “predict what will go wrong, and are many steps ahead.”

Inquisitive

Nine of the 12 participants observed that their colleague was constantly asking questions and seeking feedback during the problem-solving process. They surrounded themselves with people who held diverse perspectives and treated everyone with an equal level of respect. The design engineers were described as genuinely curious and eager to understand not just what people believe but why they hold that belief. Sometimes this unbridled curiosity was perceived to be blunt or rude and could challenge social norms, especially in reporting structures. Design engineers were described as using lunch as a time to network, and that they were willing to discuss any topic. Though not generally strong public speakers, design engineers were observed to relate well with small groups. A participant explained, design engineers “seek input in the beginning if they are unfamiliar with the project and in the middle to validate the idea.” A second participant related that design engineers “ask a lot of questions, they have no fear of looking dumb.”

Motivated

Eight participants explained design engineers as needed to understand why a project or task is important, to see it in the bigger picture. Though described as driven by their curiosity and desire for innovation and efficiency, the observed design engineers could become extreme and the strong levels of motivation could put them at risk of burn-out or becoming a workaholic. The colleague was described as possessing a natural ability to make gut decisions. Two of the participants suggested that whereas design engineers may not be the most technically skilled, their motivation and drive compensated to adequately bolster their position in a company. One participant explained the design engineer as “eager, [they] love the problem solving process,” and “have a natural ability to cut through the chaff.” Another participant relayed that design engineers “practice to improve ability.”

Systematic

Every participant discussed the systematic ability of design engineers to break down a problem and execute tasks in an efficient manner. In order to be most efficient, design engineers were described as testing often, iterating frequently, and not afraid to abandon ideas or admit failure. This adaptive approach shows great flexibility. While four of the participants suggested that design engineers move on to the next challenge once a problem is almost complete, three participants suggested that design engineers have a need to optimize the solution infinitely, seeking a perfect solution. One participant explained, their colleague was “adaptive, they have no disciplined approach to the design process.” A second participant stated that design engineers are “doers, not perfectionists, and they get frustrated with slow development.”

Versatile

Lastly, 8 of the 12 participants observed that their colleague was interested in a broad range of topics, with a variety of abilities and experiences in different aspects of a company. The person would often employ heuristics to quickly make assessments about a design and use their experience to communicate effectively. In university, they may not have had a great GPA but were involved in many activities. They were described as having a variety of interests outside of work and learning from their experiences to develop deeper understanding. One participant explained that their colleague had “a variety of experience in different parts of the company” and offered that “maturity helps.” Another participant described design engineers as “well read.”

Outlying data points

There were 8 data points from six participants that remained from the 194 data points, concerning the desire of a design engineer to manage or mentor others. This was not summarized in a theme due to the conflicting observations, however, the data points are listed in Table 3 to provide complete reporting and transparency.

Table 3.

Outlying points grouped together regarding interest in mentoring or management.

Interest level	Data points (8)
Interested	Good at mentoring
	Understand how to task people according to their abilities (x2)
	Good reviewer and reviewee
	Wanted to mentor but mentee didn't like the style
	Sets unrealistic expectations
Not interested	Doesn't want to judge people
	Role is less managerial

Some participants described their colleagues as good at mentoring and interested in doing so, as two participants observed that their colleague can task people according to their abilities. Two participants explained that while their colleague was interested in mentoring, their mentoring style was not appreciated or they were not able to set reasonable expectations. Two of the colleagues were described as not interested in mentoring or management, as it distracted from solving exciting problems and the person did not want to judge people. Further study on this topic is required before conclusions can be drawn.

Discussion

When taken together, these observed practices describe an outgoing person who may overstep at times but is genuinely curious about the world around them and driven to complete a goal. They are not perfect, as they are observed to be stubborn, egotistical, or too perfectionistic. However they are creative, friendly, willing to talk one-on-one with anyone, and always eager to learn more. It should be noted that some of the subtopics can be perceived as contradictory: “can be egotistical” as compared to “team player.” This supports the notion of fluid, impermanent beings who change over time, even moment to moment. We are not suggesting that design engineers robotically display these traits at all times, nor is this a “recipe” for a design engineer, but by observing practices of a design engineer, we are documenting practices or tendencies. That is the nature of behaviors as opposed to abilities. It is rare to lose the ability to complete a task, but a person's behavior can fluctuate due to stress, lack of rest, hunger, or myriad other reasons. In this section, we will compare the findings to existing literature and comment on the existence of the negatively-worded traits observed by participants.

Following Cho and Trent's recommendation for qualitative research, we compared the observed practices to the literature to ensure data are “confirmed to be truthful based upon a factual reference.” ⁵⁴ Though no research was found specifically on the subset population of design engineers, we compared findings to literature on designers and engineers, as shown in Figure 5. According to Blizzard et al., engineers who possess design thinking optimistically pursue challenging problems (motivated), seek input from others (inquisitive), are open to experimentation (systematic and creative), thoroughly consider the problem (systematic), and are collaborative with multi-disciplinary experience (collaborative). ⁴¹ In this comparison, six of the practices map to the five aspects of design thinking, though this is not a one-to-one comparison. Being systematic appears twice among the design thinking elements, and two elements have two traits mapped to them.

Figure 5.

Mapping relevant literature and observed practices of a design engineer.^{24–26,33,34,38,39,41,46,57}.

Nine of the ten personal attributes in Kunrath, Cash, and Kleinsmann map to all nine observed practices (though not as one-to-one mapping). ³⁴ The personal attribute on “ethical considerations” is not addressed in this study, and upon realizing this, we initiated a thorough review of the themes, subtopics, and points for any commonality. The only relevant data point states that design engineers “consider the long-term and social impacts and scope of work.” This data point is categorized in the “understands context” subtopic within the intuitive theme. Because it was not supported by other data points, there was no subtopic created for ethical behaviors. This is an interesting gap in the observed behaviors. Perhaps it is implicitly assumed as a characteristic of all engineers and not unique to design engineers. However, no true conclusions can be drawn from this lack of data. The absence of “ethical consideration” does not imply that design engineers are amoral or willing to bend the rules; that would have emerged as a theme if it were discussed by participants. However, the uniqueness of <1% of data points pertaining to the ethical responsibility of an engineer warrants future confirmatory studies to probe into this question specifically.

The engineering habits of mind by Lucas and Hanson were represented in seven of the themes, ⁴⁶ and the designer as jester motif by Mindler was represented in six of the nine themes. ³⁸ It is notable that three studies mention the iterative nature of design thinkers, which map to the systematic practice.^25,26,33 Looking across the ten studies, the systematic theme is represented in nine of the design and engineering studies, which aligns with rigorous, iterative, and efficient nature of problem-solving. Though the effect is exaggerated by the presence of three studies focused on iteration, the systematic theme is the most represented both among participant data (as all 12 participants contributed to this theme) and the literature, even after excluding the three studies. The motivated, intuitive, and confident themes are the least represented in 10 literature selections, suggesting they could be unique practices of design engineers (as opposed to designers or engineers). A confirmatory study could probe into the potential uniqueness of design engineers being motivated, intuitive, and confident.

Looking next at the subtopics, while the larger themes were represented, some of the subtopics were not found in the literature. For example, the following subtopics were not addressed: admits mistakes, talks to anyone in the company, has a variety of interests outside the office, and possesses multi-disciplinary technical knowledge including the use of heuristics. In a study on the use of heuristics (defined as strategies employing readily available information and standards), Yilmaz et al. ¹⁰ found that both mechanical engineers and designers employ heuristics, and the results in this study supplement their work to confirm that design engineers are also observed to employ heuristics.

The three negatively worded subtopics about design engineers were not represented in the literature: egotistical at times, not a great public speaker, and perfectionist tendencies - conservative to a fault. While not intending to place a value statement on good or bad behaviors, as participants spoke warmly and reverently about their colleagues even while describing less desirable behaviors, it is interesting to consider that the practices that can be perceived as negative are not more present in the literature. By only documenting the positive traits, only part of the story is being offered. Are we sanitizing findings to avoid offending egos? By following the example of a design engineers’ tendency to be blunt, we posit that a design engineer has positive and negative traits, and both should be documented for a more holistic, accurate representation. Thus, it should be noted that this study documented twenty data points containing observed practices of design engineers that could be perceived as negative.

Lastly, to be included in this study, every participant had to have: design experience, management experience, and more than 10 years of engineering experience. In Kunrath, Cash, and Kleinsmann, professors, managers, and designers were interviewed and their contributions were analyzed as separate sources of information. ³⁷ It was found that each group viewed designers differently. It could be interesting to consider what effect conflating two of the roles (management and designer) into a single person had on this study. In the follow-on confirmatory mixed methods study, moderating variables could be whether the participants have management or design experience to determine the effects.

Implications

Using the newly defined observed practices as a construct, a confirmatory deductive study could be developed for a broader audience, particularly for the themes that are found less commonly in the literature (motivated, intuitive, and confident). Additional topics to explore are:

whether participant's management or design experience are moderating variables,

the ethical behavior of design engineers,

the desire (and ability) of design engineers to mentor or manage, and

perceived negative behaviors of designers, engineers, and design engineers.

Embracing Psenka et al.'s recommendation to identify design behavior and translate this to the classroom for deeper learning, ¹³ the observed practices of design engineers can be utilized in the university environment, particularly through design courses. For example, spending more time explaining why a project or assignment is necessary could inspire students to complete the task (motivated), and explaining that design engineers use iteration could improve students’ design (systematic). Students could be encouraged to foster their curiosity (independent) in a broad range of topics, to ask questions (inquisitive), and participate in extra-curricular activities (versatile). Table 4 proposes a mapping between the observed practices and graduate attributes that the Canadian Engineering Accreditation Board (CEAB) uses to accredit an engineering programs. ⁷

Table 4.

Mapping design practices to CEAB graduate attributes.

CEAB Graduate Attributes7 (12)	Observed Practices (9)
1 A knowledge base for engineering: Demonstrated competence in university mathematics, natural sciences, engineering fundamentals…	Versatile (multi-discipline, technical)
2. Problem analysis: An ability to use appropriate knowledge and skills to identify, formulate, analyze, and solve complex engn problems…	Systematic (breaks down a problem)
3 Investigation: An ability to conduct investigations of complex problems …synthesis of information in order to reach valid conclusions.	Intuitive (recognizes patterns, synthesizes)
4. Design: An ability to design solutions for complex, open-ended engineering problems….	Creative (innovative)
5 Use of engineering tools: An ability to create, select, apply, adapt, and extend appropriate techniques, resources, …	Motivated (competent, eager)
6. Individual and team work: An ability to work effectively as a member and leader in teams, preferably in a multidisciplinary setting.	Collaborative (team player, respected)
7. Communication skills: An ability to communicate complex engineering concepts within the profession and with society at large.	Inquisitive (chats, not confident presenting)
8. Professionalism: An understanding of the roles and responsibilities of the professional engineer in society, …	Confident (but knows limitations)
9 Impact of engineering on society and the environment: An ability to analyze societal and environmental aspects of engineering activities.
10 Ethics and equity: An ability to apply professional ethics, accountability, and equity….
11. Economics and project management: An ability to appropriately incorporate economics and business practices including project, risk…
12. Life-long learning: An ability to identify and to address their own educational needs in a changing world in ways …	Independent (constantly learning)

1. Note: Graduate attribute text has been summarized for brevity.

The ability to recognize patterns and synthesize information (intuitive) is found in the third graduate attribute: investigation. These connections can provide design instructors with evidence-based teaching practices to help students understand the importance of developing skills such as life-long learning. If designers who are praised for their abilities are seen as constantly learning (independent), students can be encouraged to do so. Additionally, connecting the communication graduate attribute with the inquisitive findings that design engineers were observed to chat with anyone but were not the strongest public speakers could encourage the promotion of more presentation opportunities in design courses. Project-based learning, particularly through design courses, presents an ideal pedagogical method to identify and develop the observed practices.

Documenting the observed practices of a design engineers can be useful in industry as well, to identify potential design engineers early in their career, so they can be mentored to hone their design skills and develop their creative nature. Recognizing the benefits of having broad experiences (systematic), the candidates could be intentionally exposed to work in different sectors and disciplines. They could be encouraged to have hallway conversations (inquisitive), seeking the opinion of many people. Companies looking to spur innovation could design office space to encourage these “collision” conversations and host networking lunches to allow sharing across projects. Finally, managers could recognize the independent nature of design engineers and reduce oversight to encourage the design engineers’ ownership of the tasks, improving overall productivity. Thus, the observed practices can inspire and influence professional practice.

Limitations

The findings of this study collect complex, impermanent practices into larger themes, and are not intended to be conflated into a static representation of the ideal design engineer or generalized as true for all design engineers. Though participants have experience in diverse industries, each design setting is unique. Additionally, some demographic data were collected for the participants, but not for the design engineers themselves.

Participants provided observations of a particularly inspiring designer that they each worked with, and just as in observational studies in which the researcher is the observer, Patton explains “What people ‘see’ is highly dependent on their interests, biases, and background.” ⁴⁹ The observations are impacted by the observer's culture, environment, and experiences. For example, someone who values public speaking might be more attentive to someone who is not good at public speaking. However, we attempted to reduce these effects by ensuring redundancy of data and by selecting participants with practice observing others through their management experience. Additionally, as the research is framed within an individual constructionist paradigm, where learning is acquired through practice and environment, the beliefs and experiences of both the participants and researchers influenced the data, data analysis, and resulting themes.

Conclusion

The study sought to identify observed practices of design engineers, a subset of engineers who are particularly adept at problem solving. We documented nine themes and 30 sub-topics to describe behaviors of design engineers according to twelve engineers with industry, management, and design experience. Design engineers were observed to be collaborative, confident, creative, independent, intuitive, inquisitive, motivated, systematic, and versatile. There were eight additional data points on the observed desire of design engineers to be mentors or managers, suggesting future study.

Comparing the themes to the literature, we found the nine observed practices of design engineers were well-represented in existing studies on designers and engineers, particularly for the systematic theme. During this comparison, we realized that our study uniquely documents observed practices which could be perceived as negative, while other studies do not. This gap creates the potential for future exploration into why research only documents positive behaviors and more extensive study of potentially negative traits. Lastly, we offered a mapping between the CEAB graduate attributes and the observed practices to provide engineering educators with pedagogical reasons to investigate how to incorporate practices of design engineers into their courses. Further research is recommended to use deductive analysis to determine whether the observed practices are representative of the larger population of design engineers. As Brown explained in an article about design thinkers, “Here, as a starting point, are some of the characteristics to look for.” ⁴² Until confirmatory studies can be performed, this research offers insight into practices of engineers who are effective designers, as observed by their colleagues.