How Time Flies

I still almost can't believe that I'm going into my fourth year of working. It feels like the time between graduating and now has gone double or triple as fast as the time between 1st and 4th year at University. 

This really hit home on Saturday when I spent the majority of my day at a workshop hosted by EWBSA (Engineers Without Borders South Africa) for the UCT Student chapter, which had the aim of exposing the students to the EWBSA Project Methodology. There were about four of us who attended as not so recently graduated, working professionals, there to observe and chat with the students about our experiences in the working world.

It was great to be able to interact with these students and find out a bit more about the projects that they had planned for the year. We also had some interesting discussions on some of the more intangible, but nevertheless important, aspects of project management, such as how one keeps their project team motivated and the importance of defining your project correctly. 

On a personal level, it gave me an opportunity to reflect on what I have learnt since entering the working world and compare what I knew straight out of varsity with what I know now. Even though it feels like just yesterday that I graduated, I've definitely learnt a bit since then and have grown in my professional capacity. It also freaked me out a bit to think that the second years that I met would have been in Grade 7 when I was in matric - too crazy for words, surely I'm not that old?!

And on that note - I hope you all have a great week. My project at work has just stepped up a notch into the stage of "crikey, we've got 3 weeks of development left before we have to start testing" phase, so I'm going to be putting in some extra hard work before I leave for Namibia on Friday and be ready to work hard again when I get back next next Monday. If I get a chance, I'll be posting some pictures on Instagram and Facebook - so follow me if you want to see what we're getting up to!

Our camping box all packed up in preparation for our
Namibia trip!

Can We Afford to Not Design For People?

At the beginning of this year, Frosty and I were approached by one of our friends, asking if we would be interested in getting involved in starting up a Western Cape Chapter of Engineers Without Borders South Africa (EWB-SA). This is something that I'm so SO excited about and I will definitely keep you informed on how things go with getting things off the ground.

As one of our first major team-buildings we are going through a 7 (ish) week course that is all about Human Centred Design (HCD). This is a free course that is offered by +Acumen, which is a branch of a non-profit organisation who aim to tackle the issues of poverty in a way that is most beneficial to the people who are being helped.

The first session got off to a great start. It definitely opened up our eyes to how difficult it can sometimes be to obtain a solution to a seemingly simple problem that will be used by the people you're designing the solution for. I think one of the biggest thoughts that it triggered in me is:

In our communities, businesses and own lives, how can we
ensure that our objective "people oriented" design?

It's a question aimed to spark discussion and thinking. I don't know the answer. What do you think?

I've only had a chance to breeze through the rest of this course, but let me tell you, I think it's going to be amazing! Looking at design from a more "human" perspective is something that has always fascinated me.

As engineers* we are so often told that we were taught to think. But thinking only gets you so far. Often, designs are brilliant, but don't get adopted by the people they were meant for because of some small factors that have a huge impact. I'm really hoping that this course will help me both personally and professionally. By the end of it, I hope my design thinking has been broadened and I will be able to come up with designs that make people happy.

*We have two guys with non-engineering BSc degrees as part of our team and interestingly, they ARE taught to design things with people in mind a lot more than engineers are. I find it incredible that this is the first time we've had these types of discussions with them, seeing that I've know these guys since 2nd year! I can't wait to see what else we'll be learning with this!