Educating Engineers for the 21st Century: The Industry View

Executive Summary This report presents the results of a study undertaken by Henley Management College on behalf of the Royal Academy of Engineering to investigate UK undergraduate engineering education requirements in terms of the current and future needs of the engineering industry. The research was based on a combination of in-depth interviews with industry practitioners, focus groups with recent graduates, and a large-scale survey of firms within the industry. Newly-recruited engineering graduates are used in a wide range of job roles. Whilst research and development, design and production/manufacturing are the most prevalent activities within the sample studied, engineering graduates are to be found across the product lifecycle and throughout the value chain. As a result, many graduate engineers are likely to find themselves in roles which do not necessarily involve hands-on specialist engineering. To fill these roles engineering firms look for skills and attributes in two broad areas. The first is a set of defining skills that are unique to the engineer and which encompass the domain of technical skills. These include a sound knowledge of the engineering fundamentals within their discipline, built on a solid base of mathematics. Other highly sought-after attributes in this domain are creativity and innovation plus the ability to apply theory in practice. The second skill set includes the social and interpersonal skills and attributes that enable the engineer to operate in a commercial working environment. These include communication skills, team-working skills, and business skills, which for entry-level graduates primarily mean awareness of the commercial implications of engineering decisions. Engineering firms use a wide range of methods to attract and develop the engineering graduate talent they need. Although advertising is the most widely used approach, many companies work closely with universities to identify suitable candidates Work placements also play an important role in the recruitment process and candidates who have gained relevant work experience while at university are more attractive than candidates without such experience. In terms of skills development once in work, whilst nearly one-third of companies have no formal scheme in place, 70% of firms do offer some type of formal graduate development programme. Overall, respondent firms report that they are neither satisfied nor dissatisfied with their ability to recruit appropriately skilled engineering graduates from UK universities. There is some evidence, however, both of skill shortages (where there is a lack of appropriately qualified graduates available to be recruited) and skill gaps (where …