EG Issue 6/2019

Ahead of the game Fun and games – and serious business – for software engineers

Issue 6/2019 Real-world ready?

Are today’s engineering graduates ready for the real world?

A force for good Engineers helping out where they're needed most

It shakes, therefore I am When philosophy meets earthquake engineering

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Contents

In this issue

12

18

48 30

12 Ahead of the game Software engineers are integral to New Zealand’s growing game development industry.

But while their hard work often helps people play, it’s more than just fun and games.

18 Real-world ready? Online, open plan, blended learning – the way engineering’s being taught has changed, so are today’s graduates real-world ready?

30 Next stop: Otago Branching out in Otago.

48 It shakes, therefore I am What happens when philosophy and earthquake engineering meet?

Features Engineering New Zealand Te Ao Rangahau PO Box 12 241, Wellington 6144 New Zealand P 04 473 9444 hello@engineeringnz.org www.engineeringnz.org GENERAL MANAGER – MARKETING AND COMMUNICATIONS Bridgit Sissons bridgit.sissons@ engineeringnz.org 04 474 8943 EDITOR Jennifer Black editor@engineeringnz.org DESIGN MANAGER Angeli Winthrop ADVERTISING SALES advertising@engineeringnz.org 04 473 9444 SUBSCRIPTIONS hello@engineeringnz.org CIRCULATION ABC audited net circulation for the six months ended 30 September 2018.

New Zealand 13,011 Print ISSN 2537-9097 Online ISSN 2537-9100 EG ONLINE PDF versions of EG are available for members on our website.

PRINTING Your cover is printed on Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) approved and elemental chlorine free (ECF) paper.

The inside pages are Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification (PEFC) approved and elemental chlorine free (ECF). EG is printed using vegetable-based inks made from renewable sources. Printing and fulfilment by Printlink.

Please recycle your plastic wrap – it’s New Zealand made and 100% biodegradable.

DISCLAIMER Advertising statements and editorial opinions expressed in EG do not reflect the views of Engineering New Zealand, its members, staff, or affiliated organisations unless expressly stated.

This issue of EG was published in March 2019.

12 Ahead of the game Software engineers are integral to New Zealand’s growing game development industry. But while their hard work often helps people play, it’s more than just fun and games.

18 Real-world ready? Online, open plan, blended learning – the way engineering’s being taught has changed, so are today’s graduates real-world ready?

24 A force for good Engineers can make a real difference in disadvantaged communities but how do you find out what’s needed, where?

30 Next stop: Otago Branching out.

Best practice 38 Rules of engagement For engineers, getting the community on side means getting them involved.

40 Immigrant engineers face a tough reality Skilled engineers emigrating to New Zealand can encounter unexpected cultural and workplace challenges.

43 Building trust in the profession While nobody wants a complaint against them, early resolution can help increase trust in engineers.

44 Sea views There’s a multitude of people whose key focus is keeping the sea at bay.

Shorts 48 It shakes, therefore I am What happens when philosophy and earthquake engineering meet?

51 Day in the life A typical workday for this engineer includes testing drone noisereduction technology at the park.

52 The secret life of engineers By day, he leads a team of transport planners and traffic engineers but beyond work, he’s heavily involved in a men’s barbershop-style chorus.

55 C-Suite EG talks to engineer Gretta Stephens, Chief Executive of BlueScope’s New Zealand and Pacific Islands-based businesses.

56 Bedside table The President of ACENZ’s reading choice is influenced by her passion for challenging perceptions and celebrating differences.

57 Review 59 Obituaries 60 Engineering Genius

MAKE YOUR VOICE HEARD THEY’VE STOOD FOR NOMINATION – NOW IT’S UP TO YOU TO DECIDE OUR FUTURE BOARD. Voting in the Engineering New Zealand Board election is open until 15 March.

Check your emails for your link to vote, or get in touch at hello@engineeringnz.org

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Engineering Envy #52

Harrier Jump Jet Is it a helicopter? Is it a plane? No, it’s the Harrier Jump Jet, a single-engine fighter-bomber developed by the British and acquired by the United States Marine Corps.

It was originally built by Hawker Siddley and first flew in 1966. While models vary, the Harrier doesn’t need conventional runways as it can take off vertically. Powered by a vectored-thrust turbofan engine, the Harrier can carry a range of weapons including rockets, bombs, air-to-air missiles and air-to-surface anti-ship missiles.

AV-8B Harrier II Engine

Length

Maximum speed

Height

Wingspan

Weight

Rolls Royce 1,041kph 9.25m

Around 14m 3.5m 14,061kg

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What they said

Editorial

07

Let's lead

“… a testament to the world-class skill and talent we have in the structural engineering sector, right here in New Zealand.”

CEO of Holmes Consulting (NZ) Hamish Nevile CMEngNZ CPEng on Perry Bridge scooping top pedestrian bridge award at The Institution of Structural Engineers’ Structural Awards 2018 in London.

“I can be a kid from a rough neighbourhood who loves to rap and is also a level five machine-learning engineer.

And others can too.”

Google AI Engineer/Rapper Brandon Tory

“If the test building performs well, New Zealand engineers can be confident that the new design methods will protect buildings from significant damage during earthquakes, avoiding the need for costly and disruptive structural repairs or demolition.”

QuakeCoRE researcher Rick Henry MEngNZ on a successful test of a two-storey precast concrete building on a shake table in China.

“We’re hoping it will be something of a tipping point for solar projects in this country.”

Engineering Manager of Timaru-based solar infrastructure firm Infratec, Keith Scoles MEngNZ, after winning a major solar installation contract with Auckland’s Watercare.

Nau mai koutou katoa.

As I look at the year ahead for the profession, I reflect on the strength, purpose and leadership role of Engineering New Zealand’s technical and special interest groups. A key focus this year is to better support, and build stronger relationships with, these groups.

This is in the same way we’ve focused on diversity and inclusion, strengthening our branches, galvanising member support and promoting thought leadership.

There’s a deep relationship between our technical leadership aspirations and our four strategic pillars: connection, credibility, influence and recognition.

Our communities rely heavily on our ability to plan, design and create built environments to help them be resilient under changing economic, social and environmental conditions. In this context, our technical leadership is essential and will continue to come under the spotlight.

We are leaders, with some of the most amazing and innovative designs and built environments found anywhere in the world and our projects get recognised on the world stage. We’re also being

challenged, and unfortunately there are examples where quality is lacking in design and construction, and performance is substandard. It’s our responsibility to address these outcomes. No one else can. The point is, technical leadership is essential and without it, we cannot lead as a profession.

This edition of EG celebrates engineering professionals who are using their skills to carry out humanitarian work, and engineers helping build New Zealand’s growing gaming sector – one with an incredible side venture that helps people learn to use motorised wheelchairs. In these pages you’ll also see engineers who are innovators and entrepreneurs with successful start-ups in the tech and medical spaces, the first female president of ACENZ, and we highlight two more of our technical groups. These people are all excellent examples of leadership – my thanks to them and all the other individuals and groups in our profession who are doing great work and making a real difference to our communities and our country.

Dean Kimpton FEngNZ President, Engineering New Zealand

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Waste not want not WRITER MATT WINTHROP

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A Christchurch engineer considered whether single-use medical devices could be sterilised and sold back to hospitals, then set out to make it happen.

It’s a unique business model that seemingly breaks the rules of simple economics: put discarded products back into the supply chain multiple times, each time selling them back to the very buyer who threw them away. Yet engineering entrepreneur Oliver Hunt’s company, Medsalv, does that while providing a solution to New Zealand’s hospital waste challenges.

Oliver says hospitals around the country

promotes single-use items and specifies this on many products, even though they can be made re-useable, and hospitals pass on the costs to the public.

“The waste created by this process goes to landfills and incineration.

Products whose sterilisation date is passed are scrapped rather than reprocessed. Meanwhile, the hard-earned export-generated currency to purchase the products is sucked back out of the country; and currently competition from within New Zealand is negligible,” James says.

He says New Zealand is “being held to ransom” by the orthopaedic companies,

discard huge amounts of medical devices every year, using them once before disposing of them for good. Although difficult to quantify, the volume of this type of equipment ending up in landfills every year is thought to be in the tens of thousands of tonnes. Not only does that mean a substantial footprint on the environment, it translates to a large cost for the health budget.

Medsalv partners with hospitals to reprocess non-invasive, single-use devices that would otherwise have gone to a landfill, and returns them to hospitals to re-use. And it’s all at a lower cost than hospitals would have paid to replenish their stocks with brand new devices, Oliver says.

The idea for Medsalv came to him one night in a conversation with his uncle James Burn, an orthopaedic surgeon.

“We were talking about the healthcare budget. My uncle told me throwing more money at health isn’t necessarily the best solution, as it’s more about finding ways to improve efficiencies in the health sector,” Oliver says.

“He showed me his garage where he had all these unused single-use medical devices that couldn’t be used because the packaging had expired yet they were probably fine. He reckoned he had about $400,000 worth of devices sitting on the garage floor.

“He said I should gamma irradiate these to sterilise them and sell them back to the hospital. That’s pretty much what led to

but there are solutions.

Oliver researched how others had approached reprocessing medical devices in New Zealand, and their challenges. He started his company as part of a project for his Masters of Engineering in Management at the University of Canterbury. In early 2018, aged 24, he won the $100,000 Dream Believe Succeed Award, which helped make the concept commercially viable.

Oliver says Medsalv is the only company that reprocesses medical devices in New Zealand, describing the work as “reverse engineering”.

“When we sell something back to the hospital, we become the manufacturer of record, standing behind that device as any manufacturer would. We have robust quality systems in place that give us the ability to do this, and we are currently implementing ISO 13485 [the internationally recognised quality standard for the design and manufacture of medical devices] to build on our quality standards and the integrity of our processes.”

As the manufacturer of record, Medsalv needs to know everything about the device – how it formed, what’s inside it, what might go wrong with it – to create the company’s own design file for the device.

For commercial reasons he won't talk about specifics around the reprocessing techniques his company uses. However, he says they can include anything from using special machines like hydrogen

the idea behind Medsalv.”

James says the orthopaedic industry

peroxide gasifiers to sterilise the equipment, to simply removing debris

Throwing more money at health isn’t necessarily the best solution, as it’s more about finding ways to improve efficiencies in the health sector.

or reassembling broken parts by hand.

“We do visual inspections on every single device multiple times, which is more than you’d expect for a brand new, batchmanufactured, single-use device. We look at them many times over to see if there’s any contamination or damaged parts – anything that could cause discomfort to patients or prevent the device from performing its intended function.”

Currently, Medsalv provides services to DHBs that comprise about a quarter of New Zealand’s population, and to some private hospitals. That’s expected to grow, with plans to expand into a larger reprocessing plant in Woolston, Christchurch.

Oliver says the company saves hospitals at both ends of the device lifecycle, because it sells to hospitals for a lower price and removes waste.

In time, he says, Medsalv could shave up to $100 million off the amount spent on health every year, adding that it's a very "back-of-envelope figure", based on what’s already being done in the United States "and extrapolating it to the New Zealand context". Nonetheless, Oliver believes Medsalv is extremely well placed to make a difference one way or another, “given the current political climate and focus on sustainability and lifecycle cost”.

Volunteer Vacancies Urban Planning and Resilience Adviser Solomon Islands Support the implementation of the Honiara Urban Resilience and Climate Action Plan (HURCAP), providing knowledge management and advocacy support. To implement this work you will design, develop and implement a training programme for planners and other urban professionals as well as support outreach to target communities. Working directly with government stakeholders you will play a key role in advising on climate change initiatives across urban policy in Honaria.

Be part of influencing climate change work in urban Honaria.

The Institute of Petroleum and Geology (IPG) Timor-Leste IPG reports on geological and seismic data to support the development of extractive industries and information on earthquake hazards in the region of Timor-Leste. We’re looking for three volunteers to work alongside them:

Earthquake Hazard Adviser In this role you will work with local technicians to build their skills in scientific data gathering, earthquake hazard mapping; and modelling analysis and reporting. You will also work with IPG management staff to develop capability in the areas of project planning, management and budgeting.

Geological Engineering Adviser Drawing on your experience of geological engineering you’ll work with IPG staff to produce maps and scientific reports on geological phenomena in Timor-Leste. You’ll also support drafting technical SOPs for geological surveying and reporting within the organisation.

Hydro-geological Adviser We’re looking for a hydrogeology professional to work alongside IPG staff to develop new standard operating procedures for gathering, analysing and reporting on hydrogeological phenomena. You will also work with IPG management staff to develop their capability in the areas of project planning, management and budgeting.

This is your opportunity to help build local capability to make a sustainable impact on hydrogeological data analysis in Timor-Leste.

VSA volunteers receive a living allowance and accommodation, insurance, and medical costs are provided. Travel arrangements are organised and funded by VSA along with other costs.

To find out more about our vacancies please visit our website www.vsa.org.nz

This assignment offers an opportunity to make a sustainable impact on earthquake preparedness in Timor-Leste.

Connecting people – transforming lives

18 Real-world ready?

24 A force for good

30 Next stop: Otago

Features

12 Ahead of the game

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Screenshot from role-playing game Ashen, developed by Wellington studio A44. Image: A44

EG 6/2019

Feature

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Ahead of the game

WRITER MATT PHILP

Software engineers are integral to New Zealand’s growing game development industry. But while their hard work often helps people play, locally-created video game technology is also helping make life easier for people facing serious mobility challenges.

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When software engineer and game developer Peter Curry caught up with his electrician father Michael recently, he was reminded of the parallels between their two seemingly disparate areas of interest. In his spare time, Michael works with his hands to solve engineering problems, restoring printing presses and building clocks.

“He showed me a mechanism that he’d just built to transfer the motion of a pendulum to a cog, and it seemed very applicable to what I do,” says Peter.

“We’re using similar techniques to solve similar problems, it’s just he works in a physical space, and I work in a virtual one.”

In 2013, Peter and his brother Robert conceived the puzzle strategy video game Mini Metro, which was released on PC platforms in 2015, and on iOS and Android the following year. A deceptively simple, minimalist game that challenges users to design the most efficient subway system across a range of cities, it became a surprise hit. In fact, Mini Metro’s earnings continue to fund the brothers’ Wellington-based studio, Dinosaur Polo Club, which at the time of writing was about to hire two more staff, bringing the total headcount to 10.

Dinosaur Polo Club is one of around 40 professional game development studios in New Zealand, a number that admittedly includes plenty of one-person bands.

Nevertheless, the game development industry is a growing economic force, potting total revenues of $143 million last year, almost all of it overseas earnings.

“New Zealand developers are making games on the world stage, and Kiwis are constantly on awards lists,” says Michael Vermeulen, outgoing Chair of the New Zealand Game Developers Association (NZGDA), which has been lobbying government to recognise the industry’s export potential.

Peter Curry

It’s an amazing thing to take your piece of code, apply it to a 3D model someone else has designed, then watch it start moving around.

– Brook Waters

“We believe that by 2026, we can grow to become a $1 billion industry. Canada and Finland had industries similar in size to ours a few years back, and they’re massive now.”

The engineers “make it sing” At the heart of game development is a unique marriage of creative talent and engineering smarts, with a third of the New Zealand industry workforce consisting of programmers, most of them with software engineering pedigree.

“Engineers are integral to game development,” says Michael, whose resume includes working as Lead Game Designer for the role-playing game Ashen, developed by Wellington studio A44.

“They bring the ideas of the creatives to life; they ensure a game is playable on a device and make it sing.”

That collaboration is key to the appeal for game industry veteran and software developer Brook Waters.

“It’s an amazing thing to take your piece of code, apply it to a 3D model someone else has designed, then watch it start moving around, see your artificial intelligence propel it to go whack something with a sword. That’s a magical process.”

Brook, who was involved in establishing the seminal New Zealand development outfit Stickmen Studios, is the co-founder of Christchurch-based MTech Games, which has used video game development techniques and virtual reality technology to create a simulator-like wheelchair trainer for people with paralysing spinal injuries. (See sidebar story.)

Clearly, game development is about more than shootem-ups and swordplay.

“In New Zealand, we tend to do a lot of game development for serious purposes,” says Brook, citing earlier Stickmen projects such as a game controller device to help people recovering from strokes and another innovation aimed at children with spina bifida.

>>

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1

2

1. Development and screenshots of Dinosaur Polo Club's Mini Metro game.

2. Dinosaur Polo Club's studio in Wellington.

Images: Dinosaur Polo Club

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>> Players construct and manage their own space station in the game Stationeers by Dunedin-based studio RocketWerkz. Image: RocketWerkz

“Video games are the ultimate tool for engagement,” Brook explains.

“Typically, when you are talking about rehabilitation or therapy, the difficult part is keeping people engaged, because it’s frequently tedious. In video game development we’re masters of getting people to do tedious stuff, over and over again – and loving it.”

It’s also a stimulating field in which to use your engineering skills.

“I’ve heard it said that rocket science and game development are the two pinnacles of software engineering. People have to have really good maths skills – software engineers working in the games industry probably all end up with an understanding of quaternions and vector mathematics and all the rest of it.”

Brook says a civil engineer might be dealing with stress and finite element analysis, but the game programmer is dealing with the same sorts of objects in a virtual world that have to have the same quasi-physical properties.

“We do a lot of physics modelling in games. There’s a natural synergy there that means we often get involved in engineering projects – ‘gamifying’ a piece of hardware already in use.”

As the industry has moved more towards designing games for smartphones, some of the more exacting technical challenges have fallen away. Yet, as Peter Curry says, there are always issues that need to be solved.

“Games are still where the fastest, most performancehungry stuff happens, especially now with augmented and virtual reality. If you are on that bleeding edge of

That’s certainly how Amy Harman views it. A graduate of the Auckland-based Media Design School, she did a Bachelor of Software Engineering, specialising in Game Programming before landing a role as a programmer at Dunedin’s RocketWerkz studio.

“With traditional software work, there’s not much room for creativity,” says Amy. “But in game development there’s a lot more freedom for design and the challenges are more unique.”

At RocketWerkz, everyone has creative input into game ideas, regardless of their job.

“I enjoy the problem solving. There are always a bunch of problems to solve every day and dealing with them often takes several iterations. You definitely need a lot of perseverance, and a willingness to learn.”

As a female programmer, Amy is part of a small subcategory of an already modest minority: just 21 percent of employees in the local industry are women, even though nearly half of game players are female.

“It’s seen as a bit of a boys’ club, and can seem quite intimidating,” she says.

Irrespective of gender, it’s still a fledgling industry and the pathway for would-be developers is not yet clearly blazed. In recent years, some tertiary programmes specialising in game development have popped up, including degree courses in Auckland and Wellington.

Michael Vermeulen says the NZGDA advises people to pursue a software engineering or creative technology degree, rather than a programme that's specifically games-focused, and sees great value in internships.

technical innovation, there are a lot of cool challenges to get stuck into,” says Peter.

Another route, of course, is to start your own independent studio and try to crack the next big thing.

Feature

then rehearse more difficult scenarios – catching a bus, negotiating a shopping mall – before taking on the real world.

Thanks to 3D scanning, they can also become familiar with a virtual version of their home environment before they leave the rehab unit.

“We’re using our video game technology to solve a real-world engineering problem and human factor issues,” says MTech CEO Brook Waters.

“How do you train people to use a wheelchair when they have limited time with an occupational therapist, and the training itself can be exhausting?”

He says getting occupational therapists to take people out and negotiate the real world is an important part of recovery.

“Using virtual reality, we can have people do that a lot more, to go to different airports, negotiate a shopping centre from almost empty to pre-Christmas rush, and so on. It’s much better training than you could ever afford to do in real life.”

The simulator, which was first unveiled in 2015 and has been tweaked since, is also able to gather more data than an occupational therapist could by observing.

“The person is in the virtual environment far longer, and everything they do is monitored. Metrics are kept about their collisions, their improvements and their performance on particular tasks.”

When you consider that the average spinal patient in New Zealand doesn’t leave their house for the first two years, the virtual trainer may prove to be the passport to a better, more socially engaged life.

VR wheelchair trainer

Learning to use a powered wheelchair can be an exercise in frustration – and danger.

Heavy, and with high torque, they’re difficult to master, and accidents are not uncommon among new users. Cue MTech Games’ Virtual Reality Wheelchair Trainer, the equivalent of a flight simulator for “wheelchair pilots”, aimed at people with high-level spinal cord injuries.

The trainer has been devised using MTech’s expertise in game technology, in partnership with Callaghan Innovation and the Burwood Hospital-based Burwood Academy of Independent Living (BAIL). It allows newly paralysed people to get to grips with their wheelchair,

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Students building and testing amplifier circuits in the new Electronics Laboratory at the University of Canterbury. Photo: University of Canterbury.

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WRITER JENNIFER BLACK

Real-world ready?

Online, open plan, blended learning – the way engineering’s being taught has changed alongside a changing industry.

But are today’s graduates ready for the real world? >>

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It wasn’t like that in my day.

It’s a well-worn line, but reflecting on changes in the way engineering’s being taught today, it’s likely to ring true for all but the most recent graduates.

Professor Gerard Rowe CMEngNZ, Deputy Dean of the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Auckland, says one of the biggest changes in the engineering industry is the type of employers.

“Forty years ago, most of our graduates would go into large infrastructure companies like the New Zealand Post Office, the New Zealand Electricity Department, New Zealand Railways and the Ministry of Works.”

Now, there’s a far wider range of employment opportunities and the University prepares graduates for three different streams of work: infrastructure, manufacturing – requiring an innovative approach

While maths and engineering sciences remain fundamental, course changes include more emphasis on the interaction between engineers and society, Dirk says. There’s increased coverage of professional ethics, environmental impacts, health and safety and biculturalism, including incorporating a Māori worldview into engineering projects.

Gerard Rowe says the primary reason teaching and learning methods have changed in recent years is due to “the ubiquity of internet access”.

“The lecturer is no longer the sole source of information.”

Teaching has moved away from students sitting in large lecture theatres to incorporating digital technology and the provision of online resources and recordings.

But with increased online learning comes new dangers.

as New Zealand can’t compete with bulk offshore manufacturing – and “non-engineering activities”.

Engineering graduates are keenly sought for the latter roles because of their excellent team work, problem solving and communication and analysis skills.

“Such graduates might go and work for merchant banks, for companies like McKinsey or non-government organisations.”

A 35-year veteran of the University’s teaching staff, Gerard acknowledges it’s a big shift from when he was a student. These new career streams require a curriculum that touches on a broad spectrum of areas.

“Any one of those sectors might look at our curriculum and say: ‘you haven’t got as much as we would like in this area’. That’s because there’s only so much you can do in four years and you’re trying to cover all of those potential employment groups.”

The University responds to the changing nature of engineering in part by introducing new programmes. In addition to the long-standing trio of civil, mechanical and electrical engineering, it offers chemical and materials engineering, engineering science, biomedical engineering, mechatronics, computer systems engineering and software engineering, with an additional new specialisation planned.

“It requires students to take ownership of their own learning, to have done the pre-reading and activities so that they’re well-equipped to participate fully in class,” says Gerard.

If anything, now there’s too much information available online, and learning’s more focused on problem solving and application.

– Dirk Pons

It’s clear that teaching and learning styles are changing.

“It used to be that learning was first about getting privileged access to esoteric information, and then knowing what to do with it,” says University of Canterbury College of Engineering Academic Dean, Dirk Pons FEngNZ CPEng IntPE(NZ).

If anything, now there’s too much information available online, Dirk says, and learning’s more focused on problem solving and application. Lecturing is now less about pushing information at students and more about

He says the danger is that almost all the engineering courses are concept based.

“In leading students through that, you need to be sure that you create activities to help them master these concepts and you need to do that in the correct order.”

A mixed, or blended, learning approach is needed, including authentic, engaging, hands-on activities to help students master concepts.

But while today’s students might be so-called digital natives, that’s not so for much of the teaching staff.

“We’ve really reached a point where it’s clear that someone like me, a subject matter expert, can no longer be expected to do it all on their own,” says Gerard.

Enter learning designers, the first of which has recently joined the University of Auckland’s Engineering faculty.

motivating them and helping them develop knowledge and skills.

These are education experts who can identify and leverage online learning opportunities.

New teaching tricks

>>

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Above: First-year University of Auckland students use multidisciplinary learning spaces to build and test their bridge designs. Photo: University of Auckland

Gerard Rowe

Dirk Pons

Michael Edmonds

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EG 6/2019

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Tertiary institutions are also changing their physical environments to align with new styles of teaching and learning. New buildings favour flexible spaces that are rapidly reconfigurable for lecturing, group work and conducting experiments.

But is Big Brother coming to a university near you?

Perhaps, but the intentions are good.

The University of Auckland wants to use technology to check whether students have logged on to a learning management system, accessed resources and opened lecture recordings.

“Armed with that sort of information we can at least categorise students and can identify early those who are at academic risk and reach out to them,” Gerard says.

The art of work

Engineers as leaders

The industry is grappling with how best to apply technology that, used in the right way, will enhance roles, says CEO of Holmes Consulting (NZ) Hamish Nevile CMEngNZ CPEng. As artificial intelligence and other rising technologies are increasingly used for the more simple and repetitive tasks, human engineers will have an advantage with creativity, and problem solving.

Hamish believes there should be more emphasis on celebrating the “artistry and elegance” associated with great engineering outcomes.

“We need to make engineering sexy again.”

He says part of the challenge preparing graduates for engineering jobs is that the “real world” for engineers is rapidly changing.

“There’s no question that there’s a gap between the academic theory taught at university and the practical realities of problem solving in real time on real-life projects, and the gap is ever-widening.”

Holmes helps bridge the gap with Holmes University, an ongoing graduate programme that includes regular group training and workshops on technical aspects of design and business skills such as communication and managing customer relationships. It also includes on-the-job training, mentoring and external training courses.

“Feedback from graduates is that it gives the start of their working life real shape and purpose, and they feel far more

The University of Auckland includes professional development throughout its engineering degree, but Gerard acknowledges there needs to be more focus on training engineers to be leaders.

“We’re feeling quite uncomfortable that, over the last 20 or so years, we’ve seen a decreasing number of engineers in positions of influence in large companies than was previously the case.”

For instance, in the past, the Chief Engineer of the New Zealand Post Office was a very significant role, Gerard says.

“If you look at what those infrastructure companies have become, engineers aren’t necessarily in such key leadership roles. We are certainly mindful of the need to provide experiences that will equip our graduates to become leaders no matter which of the industrial sectors they actually finish up in.”

confident and equipped to deal with project work.”

“Instead of falling asleep in class, they skip class altogether and watch the video recording at a more

“Students are the same as they’ve always been” Do students themselves change from generation to generation?

Gerard says there’s no reason to expect today’s students are any less intelligent and capable than they were 40 years ago. Rather, the change is in how they respond to teaching and assessment styles.

He’s concerned the National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA) encourages secondary school students to study to the assessment and teachers to teach to the assessment – particularly if they lack confidence with a subject such as physics.

Down south, Dirk agrees it’s not the students that have changed.

“Students are the same as they have always been: intelligent, curious, fun-loving, sometimes lazy, occasionally doing crazy things.”

Their behaviour is the same, but the medium for expression is different.

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1. Collaborative work pods in the new Engineering Core at the University of Canterbury.

2. One of the University of Canterbury’s closed-circuit wind tunnels.

Photos: University of Canterbury

convenient hour. Instead of being bored in class, they distract themselves with social media on their tablets.”

When it comes to bridging the gap between the tertiary world and the workplace, Dirk sees it as a series of different contributions.

“Universities teach and advance the practice field with new knowledge. The professional body sets the practice expectations. The engineering industry employs the graduates and performs the commercial work. I think it works well.”

He applauds employers with formalised professional development programmes and says Engineering New Zealand’s Emerging Professional Membership is a good way to recognise the transition.

Technical techniques

students. Head of Engineering & Architectural Studies, Dr Michael Edmonds, says the engineering industry expects graduates to have strong soft skills alongside technical skills. The Engineering & Architectural Studies Department has increased its collaboration with other programmes as a way of developing such skills, for example with engineering students having design students as “clients” for a project. Ara, too, has created new teaching spaces to promote collaboration, including a multidisciplinary lab for all practical civil engineering work.

Technical institutes attract a range of student ages, cultures and backgrounds and Ara has worked to make classes more inclusive. Michael says one third of Ara’s engineering students are international and one third are over the age of 25, due in part to the appeal of part-time study options.

Polytechnics such as Ara Institute of Canterbury are also seeing changing expectations from employers and

“And we do have a reputation for having a more practical focus and our qualifications are shorter.”

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Tonga's main island, Tongatapu.

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A force for good WRITER AARON WATSON

Engineers are in a great position to make a real difference in disadvantaged communities but the challenge can be figuring out what’s needed where – and how to get involved. >>

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When water engineer Sifa Pole MEngNZ volunteered to help repair Tonga after Cyclone Gita, he didn’t expect to be handed a hammer.

But this exposed him to one of the truths of humanitarian engineering – you are only as useful as you make yourself.

“It’s not like a day-to-day job where you are given a task list or a contract. They don’t have this structure. You have to figure out what you will be doing, where you can apply yourself and what you are needed for,” Sifa says.

“I’m decent with a hammer but not that good.”

Finding a way to help means finding out what the people you are helping are trying to achieve. And for the first week of his four-week visit, that meant repairing roofs, hammer in hand.

Cyclone Gita in early 2018 was the most intense cyclone

Sifa spent some time scoping the problem, researching solutions online and planning for ways to mitigate the issue of grey-water soakage pits failing to drain quickly and becoming potential sources of mosquitos and disease.

It was challenging as the houses were near the sea, there were limited resources and the water table was high.

It also turned out there was a capacity factor.

“One household was a centre where people would come for a shower,” he says.

Sifa researched affordable solutions and recommended a “simple filtration system” where the inhabitants could repurpose effluent for irrigation.

recorded in Tonga. For many in the kingdom, it was a tragedy. Two people were killed, 41 injured, 171 homes destroyed and more than 1,000 damaged – among a population of just over 100,000, spread across 36 inhabited islands.

chance to go back after Cyclone Gita, he jumped at it.

His wife was the catalyst – she is a trainee doctor and was heading to the islands on an internship. He decided to accompany her.

“I thought I could have a holiday, or do something meaningful. We still managed to sneak off to one of the outer islands for a few days.”

The experience left him converted to volunteering and the couple are now talking about making it a regular part of their lives.

“That’s the plan. I said to my wife just the other week that we should make this a three-yearly thing.”

Solving water issues Sifa is a water engineer whose day job is Operations Controller – Wastewater Transmission for Watercare Services in Auckland. He is a Tongan by heritage and the President of South Pacific Engineers for Excellence, a collegial group that works for the advancement of Māori and Pacific people and increasing the awareness of indigenous technology in the engineering profession. His stint in Tonga was in association with Habitat for Humanity and Caritas (an international Catholic mission).

In his second week, he travelled with the Caritas Tonga director and learned about the projects that the group was undertaking. Visiting the small town of Popua on the main Tongatapu island, he found a group of houses that had water issues. The grey water and sanitation problems meant it was a situation in which his engineering expertise could prove more valuable than his strong arm.

You have to figure out what you will be doing, where you can apply yourself and what you are needed for.

– Sifa Pole

A strange kind of homecoming Sifa is a Tongan by way of Otahuhu. When he got the

A humanitarian in all of us For Sifa, making connections and raising his awareness of the situation in Tonga – and where he could help out – was eye-opening. He recommends engineers make the time to volunteer, where they can.

“It is worthwhile just being in countries that are not doing as well as New Zealand and being grateful for what we have got. But being able to give back to Tonga was such an awesome experience.”

His advice for those interested in volunteering is to make contact with a professional support group.

“Have a look and see where you can best apply yourself.

There’s a humanitarian in all of us. The trouble is in making the connection and finding a group to give back to.”

Making connections One place to make connections in the volunteer world is Engineers Without Borders NZ (EWBNZ). Chief Executive Dane Hart MEngNZ says the group works on the premise that engineers are a force for good.

“Engineers design buildings that don’t fall down in earthquakes, engineers design water supplies that don’t get contaminated,” Dane says.

“But access to that knowledge is not available equally around the world and EWBNZ seeks to address this imbalance.”

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1. Water engineer Sifa Pole MEngNZ. 2. Providing additional roof straps for a damaged house in Tokomololo, Tonga.

3. Pre-inspection photos in Tofoa, Tonga.

4. Installing new roof beams for additional support in Ha’ateiho, Tonga.

Photos: Sifa Pole

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Diploma in Global Humanitarian Engineering University of Canterbury offers a DipGlobalHumanEng that combines courses in the humanities and social sciences with service-based experiential learning.

Students work on community-identified engineering issues and projects. The Diploma can only be completed in parallel with a Bachelor of Engineering with Honours degree, in any engineering discipline.

>>

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Improving water security 2

1. Site of proposed water gallery in Aitutaki, Cook Islands.

2. Pump station for an existing water gallery in Aitutaki, Cook Islands. Photos: Victoria Clark

Beca’s Victoria Clark MEngNZ is one Kiwi engineer who has made a difference in the Pacific.

Working through Volunteer Service Abroad (VSA), she has contributed to a project to make the water supply more reliable in the outer islands of the Cook Islands.

Victoria says most of the outer Cooks rely on one primary water source, which provides little security in times of drought and is a heightened risk as climate change affects water supplies.

“The quality of water received at a household level is generally not drinkable so people are required to boil or treat their water prior to consumption.”

She worked with local government employees under the Office of the Prime Minister to improve water security through technical advice and upskilling local staff.

For the island of Aitutaki, Victoria designed a water infiltration gallery to distribute non-potable groundwater around the island. It’s a structure, usually a pipe, surrounded by gravel, used to collect groundwater that’s then pumped out for use. She was also involved in scoping future water projects.

For the island of Atiu, which solely relies on rainwater for both potable and non-potable water supply, she worked on upgrading an existing groundwater well and tank.

Victoria says living and working in a foreign country was challenging but presented an invaluable opportunity for personal and professional growth.

“The Cook Islands don’t have many of the luxuries we take for granted here in New Zealand – like unlimited internet and variety of affordable food. The locals really inspired me with how they make use of the islands’ limited resources.”

This is an extract from Victoria Clark’s report on her time in the Cook Islands. For more information see vsa.org.nz

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EWBNZ members with students from a technical training school in Samoa.

Photo: EWBNZ

EWBNZ focuses primarily on the Pacific.

“One of the things we do is take engineers from New Zealand and pair them with local engineers in the Pacific to build up their capacity.”

EWBNZ connects New Zealand engineers into communities and helps the Kiwis prepare for the cultural differences they will encounter.

“One of the challenges is learning to work effectively in an unfamiliar environment. Engineers in New Zealand understand our social context to some extent. When you are in a different country, that social and cultural context changes. You cannot do technical work in a vacuum.

“We spend quite a bit of time teaching the concepts of human-centred design to our volunteers and the importance of understanding the social/community context.”

The organisation also runs a range of programmes including a school outreach to raise awareness of humanitarian engineering, and Pathways to Development

Dane says one of its most important partnerships is with Volunteer Service Abroad (VSA – see sidebar “Improving water security”).

“We are really proud of this partnership. We supply the technical skills – and they have a lot of relationships in the Pacific. It’s a good match.”

workshops to teach engineers about other ways to work sustainably in developing communities.

“What I’m aiming to do is start to engage the experience of more senior engineers too.”

Sustainable approach Making sustainable improvements is not as simple as it may seem, he says. And this makes the community relationships held by VSA very important to the success of EWBNZ’s work.

“Engineers working in developing communities often tend to think that you can make something or build something without involving the end user… but you will achieve better outcomes if you work with the community as equal partners.

EWBNZ has around 500 members but Dane notes “we do tend to be the younger generations”.

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Next stop: Otago

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Branching out

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WRITER JENNIE CLARKE There are many engineering feats that could rightly borrow the phrase “Pride of the South”. As Engineering New Zealand now has two branches in Otago, the Dunedin Branch and the recently formed Central Otago Branch, EG brings you two highlights from each location.

Engineering dental reconstruction

Otago population

202,467 Otago land area

36,292 km

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Engineering New Zealand branch membership Central Otago

Dunedin

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Did you know…

After an initial boom in the late 1800s, Dunedin grew more slowly in the early 20th Century, providing workforce stability. Engineering – the railway workshops and other firms – accounted for nearly 30 percent of the city’s workforce.

A $130 million facelift for New Zealand’s only national centre of dentistry is underway at the University of Otago in Dunedin. A new, state-of-the-art 8,000-square-metre clinical services building is due for completion in early 2019. The adjacent 10,000-square-metre 1960s dental school, the Walsh building, should have its refurbishment completed later this year. An impressive 1,800-squaremetre atrium and social space will bridge the gap between both structures.

The new build boasts high-spec dental chairs, integrated radiography and an expanded, enhanced operating theatre suite. The refurbished Walsh building, which has a Category 1 heritage listing, will house research laboratories, academic offices and teaching spaces.

A tight inner-city location with another university construction project directly opposite meant restricted site access, complicated construction logistics and structural components designed to exacting size requirements.

The construction has made use of an eccentrically braced frame with replaceable active links, which is a seismic strengthening system used a lot in the Christchurch rebuild. This cleverly achieves large, clear spaces within the floor plate to accommodate the 200-plus pod-enclosed dental chairs that tessellate across the floor.

The building process made use of 3D modelling to achieve a complicated service fit-out. It’s a high-need structure in terms of services – think surgery spaces and dental chairs, medical gases, suction lines and digital cabling.

Meantime, seismic retrofitting of the Walsh building will see six-millimetre-thick steel plates applied to each side of the structure’s internal concrete walls. It’s a more slimline approach than the customary supplemental concrete wall reinforcement, and one that’s about maximising prerequisite floor space while realising equivalent strengthening benefit. >>

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Engineering a waterfront redevelopment Dunedin’s waterfront regeneration and redevelopment vision has been described as transformational for the city.

While it has had a long gestation, with the bridge concept first mooted in 2005, the latest design, featuring dramatic green-inspired architecture, shows that good things do often take time.

From the start, this project has been about reconnecting the central city with the harbour. It aims to bring significant public amenity benefits for locals, job creation value to the local economy, and a must-visit destination for national and international tourists.

But it’s also about much more than that. The redeveloped Steamer Basin will become a centre for future-focused industries such as sustainability research and the high-value technology and digital sector. From the mollusc shell-shaped cultural centre and five-star hotel to the waterfront walkways, eco-tourism centre and the Sustainable Futures building, it’s a metaphor for the city’s desire to remain competitive and retain talent as part of a resilient regional economy.

In late 2018, engineering and environmental feasibility assessments repositioned parts of the complex, including the cultural centre and hotel, to existing land behind the wharf area. This effectively eliminated the need for additional reclamation, meaning lower costs and a simplified consenting process. Now, existing wharf areas will simply be rebuilt to accommodate walkways and cycleways rather than bear any significant structures.

Stage one of the project will see a landmark “gateway” footbridge constructed, linking the city to the waterfront.

Also, there will be a new wharf on the northern edge of Steamer Basin, building platforms to its north and west, the Sustainable Futures building and a public open space ready for use.

While the Dunedin City Council has $20 million earmarked for footbridge funding, a bid for the remainder of stage one funding has been made to the Provincial Growth Fund. A decision is expected in early 2019.

curve and angle away, making the most of outstanding river views.

Geological modelling of ground conditions was completed towards the end of last year. Hydrographic surveying of the river bed revealed deep river channels, sizeable rock outcrops and deep-seated shelves. The most prominent outcrops will accommodate the bridge foundations.

Alongside current New Zealand seismic standards, the design process considers climate change and flood event predictions. Modelling revealed potential for some serious river level rises. Consequently, the new bridge will be constructed at a slightly higher elevation than the existing structure.

If design timing and funding approvals go to plan, construction could be underway by the second half of 2020.

Engineering a good drop

Crossing the Clutha River in Central Otago, the 134-yearold Beaumont Bridge is one of the oldest on the country’s highway network. As the single-lane bridge, governed by a traffic light, reaches the end of its economic life, design for a new two-lane bridge has begun.

This $20 million project will see a new bridge located immediately downstream (south) of the existing structure.

Like its predecessor, it will provide a critical transport link on State Highway 8 between Milton and Roxburgh, albeit with a far smoother flow of traffic and a notable reduction in engine braking and associated noise levels.

Last year, New Zealand wine celebrated its twenty third consecutive year of export growth. With an annual export value of $1.7 billion, the sector sits at number eight in the country’s most valuable export list, along with fresh fruit exports. And wine tourism is becoming a big business.

New Zealand’s stunning vineyards are a huge drawcard for the 27 percent of international visitors who visited a winery in 2017/18, and whose holiday spend equates to 52 percent more than the average visitor.

Seventeen kilometres north of Cromwell, tucked away in the Bendigo Hills and overlooking Lake Dunstan, is one of Central Otago’s star wineries, the 25-hectare Prophet’s Rock. Known for its Pinot Noir, Riesling and Pinot Gris, some of its plantings date back to 1999.

A 1,300-square-metre winery complex is currently under construction, complete with a covered receivables’ area for harvested grapes, a pressing and crushing facility, a fermentation hall with a small laboratory off to one side, and two temperaturecontrolled barrel halls.

The engineering trick here was pace, condensing the design and build into a short, vintage-dictated timeframe. The winery is located on a hillside site with a bad access road, in a region with a booming construction market.

Preliminary design in May 2018 led straight into detailed design. Early contractor engagement allowed the design to be tailored to the supply chain and facilitated an ahead-of-schedule shop drawing process for the precast concrete and structural steel. As design was finished and consents submitted, steel was ordered and production programme spots secured.

Construction began in November, with excavations and foundation pours interrupted by unseasonal

Similar in form to Queenstown’s striking Kawarau Falls Bridge that was completed in 2018, the new bridge will

snowfall and days of heavy rain. It’s likely to be completed in late 2019.

Engineering a river crossing

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With thanks to the following contributors: University of Otago Dental School: Adam Moffat MEngNZ, Associate – Structural Engineering, Beca (Dunedin); Beaumont Bridge: Rob Bond CMEngNZ CPEng IntPE(NZ), Work Group Manager Geotechnical and Environmental, WSP Opus (Alexandra); Dunedin Waterfront Vision: Nicola Pinfold, Group Manager of Community and Planning, Dunedin City Council; Prophet’s Rock Winery: Matt Williams CMEngNZ CPEng, Associate, Batchelar McDougall Consulting Engineers (Wanaka).

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1. Model of University of Otago’s new dental school.

Image: Beca 2. New waterfront buildings will connect Dunedin city to the harbour and reflect the region’s vibrant culture.

Image: Architecture Van Brandenburg 3. Concept layout plan for the new Beaumont Bridge. Image: NZTA/WSP-Opus 4. 3D structural revit model of the Prophet Rock Winery complex. Image: BM Consulting

Snapshot At 153m high and 93m wide in Zabeel Park, Dubai, UAE, the Dubai Frame won the Tall or Slender Structures Award at The Institution of Structural Engineers’ Structural Awards 2018. Two rhomboidal towers are connected by a sky bridge at the top for 360-degree city views. Photo: The Institution of Structural Engineers

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40 Immigrant engineers face a tough reality

43 Building trust in the profession

44 Sea views

Best practice

38 Rules of engagement

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EG 6/2019

The sooner you can go out and talk to people about what you’re doing, the more likely you are to bring them with you.

Crestani's Community Engagement Manager, Janet Luxton, talking with locals at Fieldays.

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Rules of engagement SHELLEY CRESTANI

For engineers, getting the community on side with a project is more than just a tick box. It means thinking hard about how they can get involved.

As an engineering professional, you’re an expert at what you do. You have the experience and no doubt a fair few letters after your name. It’s why you’re trusted and why people get your help to solve complicated problems. And yet, when it comes to a project, whether it’s a road, a bridge or a new wing at the hospital, there’s another group of people with an expertise that’s hard to match. This is the locals – the people who live, work or travel in the area where your work is taking place. They know it better than anyone and will have to live with whatever you build.

More than ever, it’s important that you bring these people with you on your projects. Recent news coverage about infrastructure projects like cycleways shows just how necessary this is. The community has greater expectations than ever about having its say, and rightly too. Social media also makes it very easy for people to let you know when they’re unhappy, and when there’s enough noise online, you can be sure the mainstream media won’t be too far behind.

So, what does that mean for you as an engineer? How do you make the most of local knowledge while still getting your job done to a high standard? It can be done, and done well, if you take a few things into account – golden rules for community engagement.

project. For engagement that really matters, that gets the best results for both your project and the community, start thinking about it early. The sooner

Be transparent about the impact of change – both positive and negative On a similar note, it’s important to be open with the community about the pros

you can go out and talk to people about what you’re doing, the more likely you are to bring them with you. And we mean talk, rather than hiding behind social media.

Be brave, front up.

We’ve worked on a tonne of road safety infrastructure projects and will go out and talk to people as soon as we know what road we’ll be working on, simply to get their views on what the problems and hazards might be. And they’re not always the things we’d expect.

and cons of any project. This isn’t the time for spin – if you don’t properly explain the changes your project might mean for people, they will feel ripped off. Being honest and transparent works best and it’s the right thing to do.

Use plain English There’s no chance of bringing people with you if you don’t use the language they use. This means leaving the technical jargon at the office. This can be harder than it sounds – the closer you are to a project, the less likely you are to know what needs explaining. For this reason, it’s always good practice to test your message before you go out into the community. And remember, this isn’t a case of dumbing it down, it’s opening it up for understanding.

Start talking to the community early and influence the business planning process.

Be honest about people’s ability to influence Be open about how much input people can have or they’ll only be disappointed with the outcome. Maybe there are parts of your project that are a given – you wouldn’t expect a layperson to tell you what steel to use. But in our experience, every project has its wriggle room, the parts of it that can benefit from feedback

So often, engagement is treated like an add-on, or a tick box near the end of the

and engagement with stakeholders and the community.

Reflect the local perspective in your final plan Finally, if you are going out to talk to people, then it’s important you show them what you’ve done with their feedback.

Engagement should be a genuine conversation. On our safety projects, people have given us advice on how they use the roads we’re working on, explaining the way an intersection might become dangerous during rush hour, or why we need to leave a gap in a road side barrier so school buses can pull over. This gets used in project plans that we then share back with them.

As engagement professionals, this is what we’re there for: to get a result that works, one that uses the best of your project team’s expertise as well as the knowledge that only comes from living and working in a community.

Shelley Crestani is the Managing Director of Crestani Engagement, a nationwide team of community engagement experts. Shelley and her team have worked on infrastructure projects in almost every corner of the country, helping to ensure community and stakeholder buy in.

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Immigrant engineers face a tough reality Skilled engineers emigrating to New Zealand for better opportunities can encounter unexpected cultural and workplace challenges, but there’s a

and have a pretty good idea of what to expect, the reality of joblessness and having to take “odd jobs” is still a cruel shock. This is especially so for older, well-

network when they arrive, we encourage them to make up for lost contacts by becoming a joiner. This means joining community groups, professional

support group in place of people who have been through the same things.

As New Zealand becomes increasingly culturally diverse, this trend is also seen in our workplaces. And some businesses are developing strategies to attract international interest in their vacancies, even though they’re aware this will bring its own challenges. Our society can no longer deny the sometimes-uncomfortable realities of cultural diversity.

The prospect of moving to a new country as an immigrant can be exciting, especially as a skilled engineer who might imagine there are many great opportunities waiting for them. However, people may find it’s not easy to quickly establish a dream career in a new country.

Instead they might well face a lot of new challenges and struggles. For those contemplating a move, or for the newly arrived, it’s important to have help from experienced local engineers and relevant organisations.

Engineering New Zealand’s Special Interest Group of Immigrant Engineers (SIGIE) helps to settle immigrant engineers into meaningful, professional employment in New Zealand. This means helping with continued training, professional development, employment, career counselling, and social and professional networking. We come across a number of similar challenges with immigrant engineers and we’re able to help people work to overcome these.

established engineering professionals.

Starting at the bottom twice in a lifetime is not often a welcome prospect and it’s that much harder, both physically and psychologically, when people are getting older.

Some employers don’t want to hire an employee who mightn’t understand how things are done in New Zealand. This could range from greeting clients to the words chosen in writing a formal business letter.

Each country has its own work and cultural expectations and immigrant engineers might need to be guided through some of these when they start at a workplace in New Zealand.

While there is no consensus on New Zealand culture, some aspects particularly influence the process of searching for a job. It’s necessary to convince potential employers that you are competent, a quick learner, can self-manage and that you’re easy to get along with. Unfortunately, telling them is not enough. Here, you need to demonstrate these attributes with stories about yourself, your experience and your accomplishments. The stories need to also show you understand the cultural expectations and they’re an important part of marketing yourself. This can be particularly challenging for people whose cultures practise humility.

Getting settled in a new country often involves extensive help from others.

Securing a new job might happen through networks of friends, relatives and connections – and in New Zealand,

associations, sports teams or other groups that will put people in contact with people they wouldn’t ordinarily meet.

It’s important to attempt to socialise and get to know these people. Shyness is not an option. As an immigrant with a small network, you no longer have access to those childhood friends, former employers and relatives who could introduce you to an employer.

Immigrant engineers express concerns people will feel obliged to help them, even if they don’t necessarily want to. With friends and family and wider networks, yes, it might be an obligation and we suggest they consider repaying the favour in some way. But we also suggest they remember that sometimes repaying favours and obligations comes on a longer time scale – even into the next generation.

A very generous and helpful person once said, “Your obligation is to do the same for someone else, when you can.”

While most new immigrants have done some research, talked to others

networking is the norm. For immigrant engineers who don’t have an established

This article was prepared by members of Engineering New Zealand’s Special Interest Group of Immigrant Engineers’ committee. Find out more about the group at sigie.org.nz

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Best practice

43

Building trust in the profession HELEN DAVIDSON

While nobody wants a complaint against them, the way the profession handles and resolves complaints can help increase trust in engineers – particularly when early resolution is achieved.

The start of a new year is a good time to take stock and reflect on complaints received over the previous year and the lessons we can learn from them.

In 2018, Engineering New Zealand received 47 new concerns and complaints about our members and Chartered Professional Engineers, and closed 41 of them.

Of those 41 concerns and complaints closed, 17 were resolved through our early resolution process, 23 were dismissed through our formal process and one was upheld by a Disciplinary Committee.

Concerns closed through our early resolution process took, on average, four months to resolve. On the other hand, complaints that proceeded through our formal process took, on average, 14 months to resolve.

Many of the complaints that proceeded through to the formal process could have been resolved through early resolution.

With such considerable differences in resolution timeframes, early resolution costs an engineer’s business less money, is more efficient, less stressful and better protects the reputation of the profession in the eyes of the public.

For example, in one case last year

calculations, sketches and documentation for their house renovation and deck.

They raised concerns with us that the engineer did not adequately supervise the intermediate engineer working on the project and failed to respond to the complainant’s concerns and requests for a copy of the geotechnical report. The complainant stated their view that the engineer had a cavalier attitude regarding their obligations to clients. The engineer disagreed with parts of the complainant’s account of events, and a claim in the Disputes Tribunal was also in process between the parties.

At first glance, with different accounts between the parties and a dispute process in play in the Tribunal, you might assume these concerns could not be resolved through early resolution. But they were.

Following a mediation, the parties agreed a settlement whereby the engineer agreed to undertake professional development and an audit. While the complainant initially entered our process with a negative view of the engineer, the engineer’s business and the profession, the process and the engineer’s positive approach to resolution rebuilt that trust.

Here’s what the client told us: “The outcome was, for me, totally unexpected. And the real outcome – a genuine shift in both mine and the engineer’s view of each other – was profound. I now have huge respect for the engineer. What they faced fully, and then

a member of the public engaged an engineer to provide them with engineering

did, has enormous mana.”

And it took less than six months.

This is a great example of how we can use complaints, one by one, to build the profession's credibility. The lesson to take away is that if someone raises concerns with us about you, it is in everyone’s best interests for you to work with us to achieve early resolution.

Of the 41 concerns and complaints closed in 2018, 37 were about structural engineers. There are many reasons why structural engineers may receive more complaints than other engineering disciplines. Recent earthquakes put structural engineers in the spotlight and structural engineers often have more direct and frequent contact with their clients, who are usually members of the public.

Drilling down on the data, 12 of those 37 concerns and complaints related to structural engineering work tied to Canterbury earthquake insurance claims.

We’re confident our work with the Greater Christchurch Claims Resolution Service (GCCRS), which we reported on in the December 2018 edition of EG, will provide a more appropriate and efficient process for resolution of most of these concerns. Our work on the GCCRS was a direct response to what we were seeing through complaints and another great example of how we are using the lessons learned from our concerns and complaints process to build trust and confidence in the profession.

Helen Davidson is General Manager – Legal and Policy at Engineering New Zealand.

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Opinion Dr Tom Shand CMEngNZ CPEng IntPE(NZ) is a Technical Director of Coastal Engineering at Tonkin + Taylor and the current Chair of the New Zealand Coastal Society.

Photo: Lloyd Homer

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Sea views TOM SHAND CMEngNZ CPEng IntPE(NZ)

It takes extreme weather events like ex-tropical storms to focus public attention, en masse, on coastal hazards and sea-level rise. Meanwhile, every day in New Zealand there’s a multitude of people whose key focus is keeping the sea at bay and their expertise and views are sought at a national level.

The summer of 2017/2018 brought an unusual sequence of destructive storm events to many parts of our coast. These ex-tropical storms tracked from the north onto New Zealand further west than usual, descending into the Tasman Sea and down the West Coast, before crossing the country. They brought strong northerly winds, driving unusually large waves and storm surges onto north- and north-westfacing coasts. Several of these systems also coincided with particularly high tides, further exacerbating their potential to cause damage.

Suddenly the spotlight was on coastal hazards and sea-level rise.

In several locations, damage of lifeline infrastructure connecting communities has resulted in questions about how long these lifelines can be guaranteed to be repaired and replaced following these types of events. And questions about when we need to reconsider the long-term future of vulnerable communities. Engineers are often at the forefront of these discussions and in developing solutions that are robust, adaptable and resilient.

as pressure for land for development in coastal areas and city fringes increases.

However, much of this land is vulnerable to coastal hazards such as erosion, inundation or tsunami.

A new guidance document from the Ministry for the Environment (MfE) suggests a precautionary approach in assessing the potential for hazard over a long time frame (more than 100 years) as a community will outlast an individual building or piece of infrastructure. This is intended to encourage developments to be set back from the coastline to avoid the main hazards. Traditional erosion management responses such as seawalls to protect land are hard to justify in these areas with the current regulatory framework, although improvement in existing natural features, such as beach and dune enhancement, are supported by national policy such as the New Zealand Coastal Policy Statement .

There are also challenges in areas where existing development is, or is likely to be, exposed to coastal hazards over the coming years. Theoretically, options for mitigating the hazard range from relocating away from the hazard (managed retreat) once the hazard becomes problematic; “soft” options such as enhancing natural features; through to protecting against the hazard with seawalls or other hard structures. To date, planned managed retreat has not been successfully implemented in these areas.

structural options, decisions tend to focus on land protection with less ongoing cost and uncertainty rather than maintaining or enhancing community values and amenities. Recent work on long-term strategies in the Hawke’s Bay provide a more flexible strategy to cover the 100-plus year period, recognising the complexity and uncertainty of adapting to climate change that include a range of possible measures over the planning timescale.

The New Zealand Coastal Society (NZCS) is a technical interest group comprised of coastal and port engineers, coastal scientists, planners and managers from industry, academia and government.

As a multidisciplinary group, members take a lead in producing research and guidance on topical issues such as improving New Zealand’s resilience to coastal hazards and climate change and implementing solutions. The NZCS dedicated an issue of its publication, Coastal News, to last summer’s storms, including the meteorology driving the events, the statistical probabilities and the impacts as observed on the ground.

Some NZCS members led the revision of an MfE document, Coastal Hazards and Climate Change: A Guidance Manual for Local Government in New Zealand. The document provides updated sea-level rise projections, guidance for assessing hazards and a framework to help councils manage and adapt to the increased hazard risk. Find out more about our work

New Zealand coastal communities face some major challenges in coming years

In comparing natural or nature-based enhancements with more traditional

and publications at coastalsociety.org.nz

The Diversity Agenda kicked off in April 2018 as a way to jumpstart the diversity and inclusion efforts across the engineering and architecture industries. The ultimate goal?

Reaching 20% more women in roles in those fields by 2021.

One year on, here’s some of the amazing things we’ve accomplished.

78

Founding Partners and Change Makers

5

engaging panel discussions and events across the country

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Ready to be a part of the movement?

Sign up today at bit.ly/diversityagenda

interviews with leaders across the engineering and architecture industries on diversityagenda.org

51 Day in the life

52 The secret life of engineers

55 C-Suite

56 Bedside table

57 Review

59 Obituaries

60 Engineering Genius

Shorts

48 It shakes, therefore I am

EG 6/2019

48

WRITER ALEXANDRA JOHNSON

It shakes, therefore I am

Shorts

49

We need to be measured and consider all the effects of whatever regulatory approach we may take.

Philosophy and earthquake engineering may not seem intrinsically related, but for one Wellington structural engineer they’re inherently connected.

earthquake safety implementation programme, Jenni returned to New Zealand and worked as a Design Engineer with Novare Design. While working on the design of seismic strengthening of

imagine. We need to think about the whole system. Engineers see pretty clearly the performance aspect of that, but there is more to it when you are thinking about the whole building code system.”

Jenni Tipler CMEngNZ CPEng is a Senior Structural Engineer at the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) where she's dedicated to the pursuit of safe and effective earthquake building codes and policy.

Initially drawn to engineering by her engineering father’s enthusiasm for the profession, Jenni studied Engineering and Philosophy at the University of Auckland.

It was in her fourth year of study that she found where her career passions lay.

“My fourth-year project was focused on the seismic performance of adobe buildings. I was attracted to them partly due to their environmental sustainability and partly because of earthquake safety – they don’t tend to perform very well in earthquakes,” she says.

“I came to realise that within the field of structural engineering, earthquake engineering is particularly interesting – analysing building performance becomes a lot more challenging when the building is moving. There is also the human aspect: people are hurt in earthquakes so I saw it as a chance to do something meaningful.”

Several years of study overseas further enriched Jenni’s knowledge. She studied in France and Italy where she achieved a Masters in Earthquake Engineering and Engineering Seismology through the Erasmus Mundus programme. She was then awarded a Fulbright Scholarship, and studied at Stanford University, gaining a second post-graduate engineering degree.

an unreinforced masonry building in Wellington was a highlight, she retained her passion for policy and regulation, something she ties into her interest in philosophy.

“Both are essentially about making logical decisions based on a number of different factors for the benefit of society.”

MBIE funded Jenni’s Fulbright scholarship, and in her application she stated her overall goal was to be in a position to influence policy. So, after the studies and working as a designer, that was where she wanted to take her career.

She heads a team of engineers from various disciplines and her role is broad.

“Our branch looks at the whole building system, and while our team is mostly focused on performance settings and the building code, we are also involved with giving technical advice to other parts of MBIE.” The wider branch also works to ensure there are enough skilled workers and appropriate regulation around certain occupations, like engineering, and looks at the safety of building products.

When problems arise, there is rarely an obvious solution.

“That’s part of the role, you have to look at all the different ways you can address issues. We need to be measured and consider all the effects of whatever regulatory approach we may take.”

Jenni acknowledges there are some misconceptions about MBIE in the engineering sector.

A common misconception is that MBIE isn’t actively listening to the sector.

“But we definitely do. We have for example recently set up, with Engineering New Zealand, a building code technical risk advisory group, bringing together a number of different organisations and individuals who have a role to play in the building sector. This provides a forum where we can discuss issues and develop recommendations of how to deal with emerging risks in the industry.”

Do engineers think MBIE codes are too stringent?

“No, I think probably the feedback from the engineering sector is more that the building code should be stricter. But there is a difference between where the minimum building code is set, which absolutely must be met by law, and beyond code, which may be best practice in the industry.”

Jenni says MBIE offers complex and interesting work for engineers.

“There is an opportunity to bring about important national changes and really make a difference. MBIE is a big place and is really good at investing in the development of their people.”

Part of her team’s focus for 2019 is on helping the government achieve KiwiBuild targets.

“KiwiBuild houses tend to sit more in the medium- to high-density space compared to single-storey residential homes.”

These buildings are becoming much more complex and regulations need to

After a year working at the City and County of San Francisco on their

“I think the work that we do is a lot more complex than other engineers might

keep up with those changes, she says.

Our commitment At MAS, we’re committed to doing what we can to make a positive impact on the health and wellbeing of future generations of New Zealanders, and to a more sustainable country.

It’s why we’ve implemented a socially responsible investing approach across $1.4 billion of superannuation funds and insurance reserves and do not invest in the manufacture and sale of armaments, tobacco, or the exploration, extraction, refining and processing fossil fuels.

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ay in the life

Seamus Rowe oversees and develops test platforms for technology company Dotterel, which he co-founded in 2015 with his two brothers. Dotterel develops and integrates a suite of noise reduction and audio enablement technology for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). Seamus’ role includes heading the integration of Dotterel’s noise reduction suite to drones, applying his 3D design, piloting and debugging skills. He applies noise-design theory from Dotterel’s engineers to develop manufacturing techniques for drone solutions.

06:10 Wake up, pack food and get ready for work.

07:00 Arrive at work, have breakfast, walk down the road with co-workers to get coffee and fresh air.

07:30 Check my emails for any urgent items then check on the 3D printers to make sure all overnight prints completed without issue. Restart any print failures and clean completed prints.

08:30 Test the fit of 3D prints on the drones. Most of the 3D prints are test prints in polylactic acid (PLA) before being manufactured with a mill or printed in carbon-filled nylon (CF-Nylon).

As our company is focused on noise reduction technology for drones, I also work on finding and quantifying changes we make to the drone and the expected result. Once I’ve worked through changes with the team, I work on designing any jigs or parts we need in Autodesk Fusion 360.

11:00 Dotterel has a management or tech team meeting depending on the day. The management meeting covers the main company goals, how they relate to current business goals and opportunities and how the technology development aligns. In the tech meeting we go over each person’s current project, progress and issues so people can contribute ideas and solutions.

12:00 Lunchtime. Dotterel is located at LevelTwo, a deep tech hub in Parnell.

Deep tech refers to technology that’s based on tangible engineering innovation or scientific discoveries and advances.

LevelTwo has a shared lunchroom so some days I eat there, otherwise I go outside to have lunch at the park or at one of the eateries around Parnell.

13:00 Designing parts. Depending

cover any issues, from drone calibration to

on projects, we head to a local park to test fly a drone or go to more specialised sites to test our larger drones. We also work with The University of Auckland and its acoustics department. We regularly test at their anechoic chamber, depending on the

design issues. I help by looking over logs of the drone flights to see any problems.

project. Another task around this time is helping test or create new test rigs.

09:00 Informal talk with tech team to

Seamus Rowe Emerging Professional Member Based in: Auckland Role: Co-founder and Mechatronics Lead, Dotterel Education: Bachelor of Engineering Technology, Manukau Institute of Technology, 2017

16:00 Get back from testing and debrief with the team about any early results or testing issues and how we can solve them. We usually split up tasks to help overcome issues faster and discuss how that would impact our current timeline.

17:00 Put on headphones to help me think through challenges without distraction. Sometimes problem solving involves searching and trawling through forums. Then I start the long overnight prints for parts that we need the following day.

17:30-18:30 Depending on traffic, leave for home and have dinner with my girlfriend at her place or go out for dinner.

20:00 Relax by playing some games or watching Netflix.

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Nathan Harper leads a team of five transport planners and traffic engineers focused on improving Hamilton’s safety and accessibility. Outside of work, he’s

How many people are in the choir?

About 35 men, aged between 19 and mid-80s. One man has been in the group since it was formed in 1992 and many

Nathan Harper MEngNZ

part of the men's barbershop-style chorus Mighty River Harmony and he's just won a scholarship to Harmony University in Nashville, Tennessee for a week in July.

have served more than 20 years.

Education: Bachelor of Engineering (First Class Hons), University of Auckland, 2002; Masters of Engineering, University of Auckland, 2006

Are you from a family of singers?

Our house was always filled with singing and music, and car trips as kids had Phantom of the Opera or Les Misérables playing on repeat. My grandmother was a singer and my mother has a fantastic voice, but my sister would tell you she is the singer in the family (probably true).

When did you first start singing in a choir?

In my early years at secondary school, then I was a backing singer while playing guitar and bass in rock bands, then lead, plus I was in school musicals and other singing groups.

How much time do you spend on singing-related activities each week?

Around six to eight hours a week on average (not counting bedtime songs for my daughters). Most of my practice is singing in the car on the way to and from work.

Do you have a specific role in Mighty River Harmony?

Barbershop has four singing parts, and I am the “lead” part section leader. We sing the melody and it’s my job to help my guys sing our part correctly against the other three parts. About a year ago I was also made the assistant director, so I help run weekly rehearsals and direct/conduct at times.

Where and when do you sing?

We rehearse for about two and a half hours on a Tuesday night and sing at events twice a month – concerts, prizegivings, shopping malls etc. We also do the occasional funeral.

What do you love most about being part of this chorus?

There’s something uplifting about singing in harmony with a group that improves your mood. The best part is when you “lock and ring” (see below) the chords in the song in perfect harmony with the other guys. I can take or leave some of the songs, but you get addicted to the ringing chords. I regularly can’t go to bed when I get home from rehearsal, as I'm too buzzed to sleep!

Do you compete?

We compete in the annual Barbershop Harmony New Zealand convention every year. In 2017 we won the NZ Chorus Cup at the Pan Pacific contest in Sydney – the first time Mighty River Harmony had won it since 1992.

What are some audience favourites from your current repertoire?

“Who Will Buy” from Oliver, “Bring Him Home” from Les Misérables, “You’ll Never Walk Alone”, best known as the Liverpool football supporters’ anthem, and “Crazy Little Thing Called Love” by Queen.

Role: Associate Director – Transport Advisory, AECOM Based in: Hamilton

What’s your favourite type of event to sing at?

The big shows in purpose-built theatres are the best. The Gallagher Academy of Performing Arts at the University of Waikato is a fantastic singing venue (AECOM designed it!).

Are there parallels between engineering and singing?

Absolutely. Music is based on harmonics and mathematics, but barbershop singing takes it to new levels. When one singer sings a note, they generate harmonic overtones or tones above the note they’re singing. If all four parts sing perfectly in harmony, the overtones overlap and reinforce each other, making them resonate. The combined chord has more than four notes and it “rings”. Barbershoppers are always trying to lock and ring chords to get that elusive sound that only comes if you’re extremely precise and make your voices sound like one. As with engineering, you need to be very exact and work together as a team.

What instruments do you play?

I keep a good collection of instruments in our house but guitar is probably my passion (I have six of them). I recently bought an old drum set that I’m learning to play. My two girls love having a go on that and on my grandfather’s piano.

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Shorts

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–Suite

Gretta Stephens Based in: New Zealand Steel, Glenbrook Role: Chief Executive of BlueScope’s New Zealand and Pacific Islands based businesses (NZ&PI) Education: Bachelor of Science and Bachelor of Engineering (Hons), Monash University, Melbourne, 1991

What part of your background or training as an engineer best prepared you for a chief executive role?

Engineering skills that serve me well in my role include analytical and critical thinking, problem solving and clear communication. Engineers tend to frame problems in a positive way as challenges and opportunities, which is motivating. My experience in the early days of my career working on the shop floor in operations keeps me grounded. It’s our operators and tradespeople that mine the sand, make the metal and form it into our products, so it’s important not to get disconnected from their day-to-day reality.

You were previously General Manager of NZ Aluminium Smelters. What were the biggest factors influencing your decision to change roles?

This move was about continuing career development. The role leading the New Zealand and Pacific Islands part of the BlueScope portfolio has more complexity and brings with it the challenge of learning

a new industry. In addition, the opportunity to grow my career while remaining in New Zealand was very attractive as my next role within the previous business would have required me to move to another country.

You moved from the bottom of the South Island to near the top of the North with this change. What advice do you have for other leaders contemplating relocating for a role?

Moving is always a big decision and is often harder on your family than it is on yourself. They need to be on board. It is important to spend time looking around the region, housing, schools etc.

From a professional standpoint, do your due diligence on the company you are joining, as cultural fit and aligned expectations are extremely important to a successful transition. The interview process is two-way.

You’re Australian born, what are your observations about the biggest differences being a chief executive in New Zealand as opposed to Australia?

While I wasn’t a chief executive in Australia, one of the things I have enjoyed in chief executive level roles in New Zealand is how small we are as a country. It means we can have strong productive networks between corporates, through industry associations such as Business NZ and with government.

commodities cycle to ensure we are a business that is resilient through all the ups and downs. Steel is a globally-priced commodity, as are many of our raw material inputs, and the prices vary quite dramatically. For long-term sustainability we cannot be losing money when prices are at the extreme ends of the cycle.

And in the long term?

It’s an enormous challenge managing the transition to a zero-carbon economy when the technology of producing steel inherently produces carbon dioxide. The majority of our emissions are the result of the chemical reaction to produce iron from iron oxide. Coal remains an irreplaceable raw ingredient in steel production anywhere in the world – carbon in coal is the essential ingredient for extracting iron from iron sands. Whilst we have been proactive in supporting innovative technologies being developed such as LanzaTech and CarbonScape, the reality is there are currently no alternatives for the use of carbon in steel manufacture.

What is your company’s biggest focus in the short term?

What advice do you have for other engineers aiming for the C-Suite?

Don’t be in too much of a hurry. Take opportunities to broaden your experience.

The further you move up the tree, the less being a good engineer will determine success. You also need to learn leadership, influencing skills, health and

For NZ&PI it is to ensure our business is cash break-even at the bottom of the

safety, continuous improvement and the commercial side of business.

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Ida Dowling’s role at Commute Transportation Consultants primarily focuses on writing business cases, bringing together all the arguments to support an investment proposal. Ida is passionate about challenging perceptions and celebrating differences. She got involved with ACENZ because she wanted to broaden her understanding of the industry, understand the challenges of running a professional services business, share her messages about leadership and career development and encourage diversity at senior levels.

What’s on your bedside table?

A fun photo from my wedding – I love it because it was such a special day in my life and in addition to my husband and me, it also shows our bridesmaids and groomsmen, people who are so important in our lives and have made us who we are. The Economist; Michelle Obama’s new book Becoming; The Kitchen Science Cookbook by Michelle Dickinson and Go Girl – A storybook of epic NZ women by Barbara Else.

want them to grow up knowing girls can achieve anything and they truly can do anything that boys can. Michelle Obama’s book reinforces that success comes from working hard, being true to your principles and being authentic. It also emphasises that women do generally bear a greater burden of balancing career and family and this sometimes leaves even the most successful woman feeling as though she is doing neither job particularly well.

Based in: Auckland Role: Association for Consulting and Engineering Professionals (ACENZ) President and Principal Transport Consultant, Commute Transportation Consultants

How do these publications help you, personally and professionally?

The Economist presents wide-ranging, thoroughly researched, well-written articles about a range of topics and issues every week. It’s great for dinner conversations and for arguing with people who think they know it all. As for The Kitchen Science Cookbook, I hugely admire Michelle and her mission to make science and engineering accessible to

What is the top book you’d recommend to other engineers?

Think Smarter: Critical Thinking to Improve Problem-Solving and Decision-Making Skills by Michael Kallet. Solving problems is at the heart of what we do as engineers.

I rarely use the information I learned at university in my day-to-day work – things move on and technology changes.

But every day I’m confronted with new problems to solve and as a consultant, the skill I sell is to think of new, better ways of

Education: Bachelor of Engineering (Civil) (Hons), University of Auckland, 1998

all young people – this is also one of my passions. Go Girl is for my boys, as I really

solving them. Increasingly, computers will do most of the traditional things people

Ida Dowling CMEngNZ CPEng IntPE(NZ)

Shorts

think of when they think “engineer” but the ability to think critically is unique and (I hope) long lasting. Engineering is applied thinking and that is what this book

R

57

eview

highlights – the questions to ask and how to get to the heart of the real problem.

What book has most influenced your career?

Lean In by Sheryl Sandberg. I used it as the basis for a lot of initiatives that I established through the Diversity Committee at Jacobs. It really made me aware of the way I interact with people, especially as my natural tendency is to sit back and let others do the talking.

It helped me to understand this meant people could perceive me as competent but not a leader.

What work-related books are on your must-read list?

The Design of Everyday Things by Donald A Norman, a classic about the way people use the things engineers design.

Can you give some examples of what you like to read for fun?

Wonder by RJ Palacio. This book is about empathy, compassion and acceptance.

Butterfly by Yusra Mardini, the journey of a young Syrian refugee from Damascus to Berlin then to the Rio Olympics.

Speed read ——Ebook/paper copy I’m old school. I love holding an actual book and seeing all my favourites lined up on my bookshelf.

——Library/own I can’t bear to give back my favourites.

——Bookmark/turn down page I like the idea of a bookmark, but they always seem to get lost. You can’t lose a page!

99% Invisible Independently produced podcast focusing on design and architecture 99percentinvisible.org Pink lighting is used in some housing blocks in the UK to deter teenagers from gathering as it accentuates skin blemishes. It’s one of many methods of “unpleasant design” or “hostile architecture” – think uncomfortable park benches, bus stops with only a leaner, blue lighting in public toilets to discourage drug use – aimed at controlling behaviour in public places. This is just one of the many topics explored on the 99% Invisible podcast, which looks at the thought that goes into the things we don’t think about – the unnoticed architecture and design that shape our world. Did you know Americans were able to order kitset houses through the Sears Catalogue from 1908–1940? The building material would arrive in a train car, its door secured with a small red wax seal. And who knew a blind mechanical engineer brought cruise control to modern cars? Have you ever thought about the ethical considerations for architects when designing spaces for solitary confinement in prisons?

If you’re a fan of collecting interesting facts, squirreling away information for quizzes, or you just want to broaden your mind and learn a little more every day, 99% Invisible is certainly worth a listen.

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59

Obituaries

Alan McGregor Peart 1922–2018 Alan McGregor Peart FEngNZ, of Hamilton, was a civil engineer and a World War II fighter pilot. He was well known as one of New Zealand’s last World War II fighter aces. At 19, after 12 weeks’ training, Alan became a qualified pilot. Serving actively for more than three years, he flew a Spitfire for the RNZAF and RAF over Europe, North Africa and against the Japanese over Burma. He was classed as an “ace” pilot after achieving more than five victories. He reached the rank of Flight Lieutenant and was awarded a Distinguished Flying Cross.

Alan wrote a memoir, From North Africa to the Arakan, detailing his time in 610 Squadron, serving against the Germans and the Japanese.

After the war, he became an engineer and spent more than 40 years as a civil servant.

At the Ministry of Works he helped build the Maraetai Power Station and he was the senior designer for the Auckland International Airport.

Alan was a member of Engineering New Zealand for 72 years. He was first elected in 1946, becoming a Fellow in 1975. He was a registered engineer for 48 years, from 1953– 2001.

Harvey Paul O’Sullivan 1950–2019 Harvey O’Sullivan FEngNZ trained as a mechanical engineer and worked in the electricity industry for more than 40 years. He was a long-standing Electricity Engineers’ Association (EEA) Board Member, and Secretary, then Chair, of the EEA Safety Standards and Procedures Group. He also served on the Certification Board for Inspection Personnel for nine years, including as Deputy Chair. Harvey was also a regulatory consultant to the petrochemical industry for more than 20 years, primarily in the pressure equipment, pipelines, gas and hazardous substances equipment categories.

He first joined the EEA in 1995 when he was Technical Services Manager for the Electricity Corporation of New Zealand. His value as a safety/technical adviser, advocate and industry leader was quickly recognised and he was elected to the EEA Board in March 1996. He later moved to the consulting sector working in the generation, transmission, oil and gas and high hazard sectors. Harvey contributed to the electricity industry as a leader, advocate, adviser and strong supporter of industry safety best practice. He also worked on electricity guides, publications and national and international standards.

He joined Engineering New Zealand in 1982 and became a Fellow in 2002. He died in Wellington in January after a short illness.

EG 6/2019

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Engineering Genius

Box of tricks

Cardboard Engineer Mat Bogust’s Think Packaging is an Auckland-based structural packaging design studio focused on cardboard creations. The company works on local and global projects to create dielines and hand-cut prototypes. Some clients want cardboard products for marketing purposes, while others want a unique package for their product. One example is The True Honey Co. selling Manuka honey for up to $240 per jar.

The custom pack needed to work for four glass jar sizes. Think Packaging worked with Marx Design creating CAD-drawn dielines and hand-cut/ assembled mockups.

Decided on a triangular segment that cradles the jar to create an impact zone. Fully suspended, it creates a 360-degree grip on the jar, allowing zero movement. Segments open to reveal the honey jar inside.

Designed a perfect-fit outer-wrap to adhere to each segment.

Further alterations until achieved repeated successful drops from 1.8m, meaning no need for bubble wrap and foam protectors.

Created a tear-strip to accentuate the product’s premium nature.

A drop test.

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HERE’S TO CHALLENGING THE “EASIER SAID THAN DONE” MENTALITY. ARE YOU READY? Come along as we look back on our year, revise our Rules and celebrate our 2019 class of Fellows on 29 March.

For more details about the AGM and Fellows’ Dinner, visit engineeringnz.org