2 Engineering Projects Simulation
Timothy Boye
This simulation was developed for introducing first year engineers to the importance of concepts beyond the technical. It is run as an introduction to the Engineers Without Borders Challenge but can be adapted to many other situations.
In developing a simulation it is important to extract what are the learning objectives and remove the rest from the scenario. This scenario focuses on communication and respect for others’ knowledge. This allows issues such as First Nations handling of knowledge sharing to be introduced as rules for the community and how they communicate, so that the students learn of some of these different aspects in a practical way.
The rules are simple but encapsulate aspects that create a lot of conflict and error in projects, such as community people not willing to share with those they do not know.
Materials Needed
- ½ a lego box per zone (1 box to share per 2 zones)
- 1 x Saibai Island Community Residents Packet
- 1 x TSIR Council Packet
- 1 x Big Ideas Engineering Consultancy Packet
- 1 x Additional Worksheets bundle
Required sheets are found here
Preamble
There is a lot more that goes into working as an engineer than students might think. Rarely do engineers have a single task to complete and often engineers may be working on multiple projects at different stages of completion at the same time. In addition, there are many pressures on all stakeholders including the engineers which can impact project decisions and outcomes, such as KPIs, other responsibilities, budgets, differing priorities etc.
This task aims to simulate this environment as best we can so students can reflect on these issues, ways to approach work, and how important it is to involve the community and stakeholders in engineering design.
In summary this task aims to:
- Assist students in meeting new people as an icebreaker
- Simulate realities of working in engineering
- Rarely working on a single task/project
- Projects are almost always in a complex environment where no one has all the answers
- Ideals are tested through other pressures (KPIs, costs, etc)
- Provide an experience that leads to reflections regarding how human-centred engineering and the design process improve outcomes and are needed, and the differences between working for, with, and by.
Setup
| Participants | This is a zone-based activity.
Students will only interact within their zone and with their tutor.
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| Student Groups | Students in the zone are split into three groups:
1. Saibai community members, 2. Torres Strait Islands Regional Council administrators, and 3. Big Ideas Engineering Consultancy engineers.
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| Each Group Receives | Their packet which contains:
– A brief for their group with the game rules and details – Several role cards which the group will assign – Reporting forms for reporting at the end of each week
The Council and Engineers will also have in their packet: – Budget request forms for asking for more money – A budget tracking form for tracking expenditure – A map of the region for travel expense purposes
The Engineers will also have access to: The box of lego to purchase prototyping materials
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| Background
(Tutor version) |
The residents of Saibai Island are fed up with poor services to the island and the council is struggling to meet the needs of the community alone. The council has hired the engineering consultancy firm to investigate the community issues and prototype solutions.
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| How the Simulation Works, In Summary
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1. All teams will start work on their assigned tasks from their packet (role assignment and a worksheet).
2. Teams need to complete their tasks by their deadlines and within budget. 3. Teams need to report to you, at a minimum, at the end of each week 4. The engineers will lead the main project to investigate and improve services to Saibai Island and have until the end of “week 3” to do so.
Tutors have numerous avenues for adding or taking away pressure from each group, with the aim being to make it difficult to complete the simulation, without being too overbearing and causing everyone to fail at everything.
5. After the simulation, run a reflection in zones on how it went, what they can learn from the chaos (and hopefully some but not total failures) etc. 6. Get some students to share back some key reflections to the room.
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Game Mechanics
| Tutors Role | The tutors role is to monitor each group and provide additional pressure as needed to maintain the adrenaline and distraction from the main project, without going too overboard and making it obvious we want them to fail, at least in some ways.
To allow the tutor to provide direction and pressure to each group as needed, the tutor plays three roles which all boil down to a high-ranking boss of each group (Chief Engineering Officer, Council General Manager, or the community member’s employer).
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| Worksheets | The tutor will have several worksheets (such as crossword puzzles) they provide to groups at the beginning of each “Week” and as needed to ensure the groups are under pressure. These provide a simulation of competing priorities and distraction on other tasks.
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| Reports | Groups are provided several forms, these serve as real-world simulation (documentation etc), further distraction from the project, and a way to help the tutor keep track of groups.
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| Weeks | The simulation is over 3 weeks, each week is 10 minutes. At the end of each week the group will submit a report to the tutor. The tutor can provide performance concerns here if budgets are running high or tasks are not getting finished, as a way to make the boss role more real and provide more pressure.
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| Additional
Tutor Abilities / Notes |
In order to keep the students on their toes, tutors may:
– Assign additional worksheets e.g., “One of our other projects has made it to the next stage, your team need to complete this part to progress it further” – Shrink budgets e.g., “We’ve had a very bad quarter, and the company has to cut costs, I am afraid I need to pull 15% of your remaining budget” – Fire a team member (send them to another group as a new employee) e.g., “your work has not been meeting our expectations, I am afraid we’re going to have to let you go, I hear the council is hiring” – Demand impromptu reports e.g., “Hey team, I’m getting a lot of questions from the board, can you give me an update on your progress?” – Experiment with your own ideas to simulate work.
Careful not to overdo it, there is a fine line between “under pressure and distraction”, and “clearly we can’t win this, why bother trying anymore”.
In order to take pressure off tutors could: – Suggest the engineers travel to speak with the council. – Suggest the council travel to speak to the community or engineers. – Suggest the engineers travel with the council to the community. – Etc. However, don’t be afraid of having teams struggle, the goal is to get “half way there”, not to succeed fully. We are modelling a bad project so we can reflect on better ways to do it.
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| Costs and Budgets
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The engineering team and council have an assigned starting budget.
– They must track their own expenditure and report it to you at a minimum in the weekly report. – They can submit a request for additional budget but you do not have to grant it or grant the full amount. Remember we want them to make mistakes and to be under pressure, but we still want them to be able to make some progress and stay engaged. Approve budgets where a team REALLY needs it, otherwise “sorry the company can’t afford to spend any more on these projects at this time, you’re going to have to cut costs” – There are only two expenses: o Travel costs (It costs money to fly to another team to speak with them) o Lego brick costs (materials for prototyping) – Both teams have the price for these expenses and their starting budget on their cards.
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| Incomplete Information
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Each group has some important information to truly succeed at the project and they will need to ask the right questions of the other groups to learn it. In particular:
– The community knows a lot about local materials, local conditions, etc – The council knows some materials are local and they can acquire them cheaper for the engineering team Some roles, such as the elders, know more than others in their group.
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| Travel, ‘Interest’, and
culture limitations |
– Teams can only interact if the initiating team pays to travel to the other team, so they need to make the most of trips or spend a lot of money
– Teams spend money on accommodation while they are travelling per minute! This gives them a pressure to ask less questions and go home to encourage them to miss important things. – The islanders have seen many fly-in-fly-out teams come and go, and nothing has changed so are not as receptive to assist yet another team as you would assume. – Islanders are not going to interact much with someone they don’t know so strangers need to be introduced formally, relatedly, they are not going to bother the elders until they know and trust someone new.
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| Reflection | After the activity reflect with your zone on what worked well, what didn’t work well, was the project a success, do all groups agree, what might we do differently. Some additional suggestions are below:
– You may wish to provide a summary of what you saw to the students to help with the reflection (eg, if you saw the engineers thought they’d solved the problem but saw the community were wondering what was happening). – Check in with some of the roles, do the team leads feel like they were listened to, do the senior staff feel like they were respected, etc, do all the roles/students have the same perception of the team’s success/failure? |
Running the Game
This is a game where the effects of poor communication are felt quickly. The role cards all have different information so the teams need to communicate to find this out and to learn each other’s knowledge. They are not told this at the start.
When running the game students will often become confused about what to do. As noted, we do not want them to withdraw from the exercise. Tutors can assist with ideas for what to do to avoid people feeling too confused. Alternatively tutors can intervene with extra tasks to increase the tension and reduce the group ability to focus on communication.
Reflection on Game
The students find that they have attempted to use their technical skills but what was needed was the extra skills like teamwork, communication, and respect. These are more important for the success of this project. Issues that arise include lack of communication within the teams and between teams (representing the stakeholders). Rarely do the groups achieve much of their goals, so this raises good discussion about why they did not.
Also the rules for the community provide just a brief idea of the cultural conflict between the approach of a professional engineer and the community professionals or knowledge holders with whom they are working. This conflict again focuses on communication, as that is the key take away of this simulation.
One aspect that also is clear, the community can itself build the buildings and structures they need, however that requires a community team with a strong leader, who can grasp the situation, the needs, and the resources, and run with a solution within the team. Mostly teams are too confused by the new rules and the new situation to grasp this process.
This part of the exercise reflects what it is like for First Nations communities to be confronted with the changing government policy over the years: firstly mission policy; marginalisation and assimilation; then self-governance (with little funding); The Intervention; and so on. We can see the debilitating effect that lack of control over basic decisions has in the long term when we put teams into such new contexts with new rules they are not familiar with.
