Here is your monthly dose of my Canadian engineering news created for licensed and aspiring engineers, geoscientists and technicians in Canada.
- Stephanie Quon, a recent engineering graduate, received the prestigious Engineers Canada Gold Medal Student Award in 2022 for her outstanding leadership, contributions to society, and volunteerism. She has been actively involved in promoting engineering and advocating for diversity and inclusion within the field. Quon has used her platform to inspire and encourage others to explore engineering careers, sharing her experiences and passion for the profession.
- Nelson Lee, a Year 4 CompE student from the University of Toronto, won the 2024 Troost ILead Difference Maker Award for outstanding leadership, community impact, and vision. The $50,000 award supports his continued growth. From childhood, Lee understood the ways in which societal divides can impose challenges on individual's growth and has strived to create opportunities for his peers.
Experience the power of Vi, your evolving personal trainer residing in bio-sensing earphones. With Vi, workouts become 10x more motivating, fun, and effective. Each day, Vi tracks, learns, and coaches you to real results, enhancing your fitness journey while enjoying music and hands-free calls.
Discover the Smart Water Bottle from Toronto, Ontario: your all-in-one hydration companion. With a built-in TDS water quality sensor, it tracks intake, analyzes water quality, and offers personalized hydration reminders.
Introducing Spiri: an agile Linux device blending sensors, cameras, and cloud support flying robot. Built on four core principles - creation, balance, autonomy, and community - Spiri adapts to your passions, shaping itself into anything from a courier to a playmate.
What technology or gadget are you currently enjoying and would recommend to other aspiring and licensed engineers? Let us know in the comments below.
Here are the news links to every Canadian Association. If there is anything beyond the standard stuff (elections, new appointments), I'll try to list them below. The news tends to slow down during certain parts of the year (e.g. Summer, X-Mas).
- APEGA News
- APEGS News -Job Opportunity-Business Analyst
- APEY News
- ASET News
- EGBC News -Volunteers Sought for EDIT&R Working Group
- EGM News -Call for Abstracts-2024 Ingenium Professional Development Seminars
- Engineers Nova Scotia News -Award Nominations Now Open
- Engineers PEI News
- NAPEG News
- PEGNL News
- PEO News -St. Catharines resident fined $5,000 for use of professional engineer's seal
Enhance your job search by crafting tailored resumes highlighting technical expertise. Read this article to find tips that will help elevate your career prospects through your resume.
Head over to our recruitment page, where you can send us your resume and enter our select candidate pool. We'll contact you if your resume matches one of our client's open jobs.
Search all 300k eng. jobs | Use my three career-hunting tips for better success.
Effective communication is crucial for engineers managing teams. Learn about the importance of communication, teamwork, and other non-technical skills that will help you excel in a very technical field.
- Join Grady Hillhouse, renowned civil engineer and educator, in his captivating TED Talk as he explores the power of everyday wonders and problem-solving through his acclaimed YouTube series, Practical Engineering.
- In this engaging TED Talk, Alexandra Medina delves into her personal journey of conquering anxiety and embracing math and science, shedding light on the challenges many students face with these subjects.
“Engineering problems are under-defined; there are many solutions, good, bad, and indifferent. The art is to arrive at a good solution."
– Richard James
Thanks for reading, and have a great month!
Gavin Simone, P.Eng. (AB), LEED AP
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Thanks for reading! This month, I’m asking:
Q1 What are the most common angles you need to measure or find in your engineering work, and what tools do you use to do it? Do you rely on digital angle finders, bevel protractors, combination squares, or other methods?
Q2. How has the shift to remote and hybrid work models impacted your engineering collaboration and productivity? What tools or strategies have you found most effective for staying connected and aligned with your team?
Q1. The most common angles I measure in my engineering work is to estimate the angle of inclination of a pipe supports required for installation of pipelines and piping networks. The equipment utlized for this service are a spirit level ranging pole to estimate verticality of pipe supports, and a total station survey instrument to estimate the Coordinates of the invert and top level of the pipe supports to determine the offset for the vertical.
Q2. Remote / Hybrid work has positive impacted productivity for the following reason.
a. effective collaboration with work colleagues from different time zones of the globe
b. Cheaper cost of project administration buy conducting online training with resource person abroad thus removing cost of flights, accommodation, travel stress associated with Face to Face training.
c. Conducting factory acceptance test with Original Equipment Manufacturers for long lead items imported from abroad thus removing the schedule impact associated with official trips
d. Attending to official duties in the comfort of your home thus relaxing all official protocols and attitude required for working at the office.
e. Flexibility to work extended hours as is convenient to have a favorable work /life balance.
f. Flexibility to attend to personal and family emergencies during work hours should they occur
Q1: The most common purpose to measure an angle in my professional life is to locate column positions with respect to the reference column if they are on an irregular grid. I have been involved into Health assessment and creating of as built drawings for very old buildings. So measuring angle to correctly locate the other columns in plan.
Q2: Shift to remote working has indeed boosted productivity as it helps save a lot of travel time and unnecessary distraction that may arise during the travel period. On the other side, it does have negatively affected the people skills as we do not have an in-person interaction. An Hybrid work culture helps balance the best of both.
A.2 I believe the Hybrid work model creates a good work/life balance. With the use of ms teams, it’s easy to colaberate with your team members. So much so, that even when I am in the office I find myself using ms teams, instead of walking to the next floor.
For Q1: I use the Leica Laser tools to measure the angle at site. Pretty precise and digital.
For Q2: We use MS Teams on our video call meetings every week. Chat message is so accessible whenever you go back of what was discussed.
Answer for Q2: Certainly it’s a hard pick for someone that enjoy office or field work. Operation teams respond better to in person collaboration and remote or hybrid puts the effectiveness to back seat. I work around traditional phone calls and FaceTime whenever possible because emails or on desk meetings are lesser effective.
A.1 I sometimes work with analog and RF sensors and instrumentation. So commonly I need to measure phase angles, e.g phase response from a bode plot which can be generated using specialized equipment or an oscilloscope; or for RF signals using a VNA (Vector network analyzer).
A.2 Remote work is fine when collaboration is minimal or mostly just an update on progress. Regularly calling on everybody in a meeting for feedback helps to ensure they’re all invested and engaged, however nothing replaces in person collaboration.
A1) To measure angles related to frame structures and material handling system, I’ve often use combination set. Recently, we switched to Laser one.
Q1: Ensuring that HVAC equipment is level is essential for optimal operation. This can often be an oversight and is easily missed on sloped roofs / mech room floors.
Q2: Remote work is challenging as self discipline is key. I personally find the 8 hour day at home to be difficult over a long period of time. I have reduced my hours to maintain a high quality of work outout per hour.
Q1 What are the most common angles you need to measure or find in your engineering work, and what tools do you use to do it? Do you rely on digital angle finders, bevel protractors, combination squares, or other methods?
A: With working in Hydraulic tube manufacturing, we have to measure customers custom bent tubes and reproduce them on CNC bending equipment. The geometry and complex angles makes this difficult and we have to rely on 3D scanning software to transfer the tubing into CAD where we can accurately measure.
Ans. for Q2, it boosted my productivity, but it reduced our personal and social activities. However, we’re making a continuous effort to stay connected with our team through virtual chats and weekly team meetings.
remote work has impacted positively as it allow to connect with team with ease
A2. Hybrid work models turned out to be good actually. With the online collaboration tools like Google Workspace and Jira, the way of works have been improved to say the least.
A.1 Laser angle tool is helpful when checking that an elevator entrance frame is straight and plumb in a hoistway.
In my asphalt lab work, occasional angle measurements are important for pavement testing. I find digital angle finders and combination squares useful tools for checking slopes and alignments.
Remote and hybrid work has improved the work efficiency in greater way, keeping in mind that how the job role is. Global remote lunch and learn sessions are proven successful useful using tools like teams, sharepoint etc.
A1: I use Leica LiDAR equipment to measure and model existing conditions
A2: Google workspace including Google Chat has worked well for us. We also have a few in person days which creates a good balance.
A 2. Hybrid and remote work has allowed my team to access a larger telent pool. MS Teams and project tracking tools like Monday let us manage the distributed workforce.