Mapping career success competencies to engineering leadership capabilities

Societal expectations of twenty-first century engineers have dramatically changed over the past few decades. There is a need to educate engineers not just in technical subjects, but also in many non-technical areas including globalization, communication, and leadership. There has been a growth of engineering leadership education programs offered by postsecondary engineering institutions. The effectiveness of these programs is often measured by the student´s acquisition of skills, without considering the benefit of these skills on the students´ careers. Using the career success competencies model, this paper seeks to determine if engineering leadership education impacts career success. The theoretical mapping analysis indicated a positive relationship between engineering leadership education and career success. The most significant competencies related to an engineer´s career success were career insight, proactive personality, openness to experience, and lifelong learning.