Educating engineers to manage technology: an international comparison

The United States and Australia are compared in terms of: (1) the historical growth of their engineering professions; (2) the structure of their engineering professional organizations; (3) the prevalence of engineers in management positions; and (4) the education of their engineers for management responsibilities. It is concluded that Australian engineering education lagged behind that of the United States in growth and in elimination of all but four-year degree programs as the basis for professional qualification. They are about 25 years behind the American pattern in the concentration of engineers in the population and in manufacturing employment, but are catching up. Half or more Australian and American engineers move up to management positions, but the concentration of engineers in top management is far less in either country than it is in France, Germany, or Japan. Over the last decade there has been a surge of interest in management education among Australian engineers