Member Spotlight: Ian Muir Friday, 20 October 2017

For this edition of Member Spotlight, we're delighted to feature the engineering experience of Mr Ian Muir, Hong Kong Chapter's President and Executive Director of Ports and Marine at AECOM.

 

When did you first know you wanted to be an engineer?

At University, actually. I came out of secondary school with a decent set of marks in maths, physics, chemistry etc and a good tertiary entrance score that gave a wide range of options, but was pretty clueless about what I wanted as a career. I came from a family-owned manufacturing business background and worked on the shop floor during school holidays, so I guess there was some expectation on my part that this would be a natural progression after schooling. I think my parents had probably seen too many ebbs and flows of the market cycle over time, with a parallel effect on the family’s bank account, and so quietly steered me towards higher education along the lines of a ‘Be whatever you want to be, just make it a good one’ theme.   I enrolled in an Electrical Engineering degree at QIT, as it was then, based on an interest I then had in electronic circuitry. QIT ran a common first year with the Civil and Mech courses at the time as a lot of the universities do, and it was probably the three quarter mark in that first year that I decided a career in Civil Engineering was the way ahead for me. I have to say I made the most of the student lifestyle during the remaining three years of the course, but 33 years on from that decision point, I haven’t looked back.

What is the best piece of advice you have been given?

Keep it enjoyable. You are going to be doing a lot of it, so make sure you have fun in what you are doing.

What are your top two career highlights?

I have only really had one so far that has lasted since I graduated, so will have to get back to you on how it turns out. A great ride so far. If you want an example that sheds a bit more light, I would say the people I have worked with along the way.

How does being Chartered assist in your career?
I think it provides a formal recognition of having achieved a level of competence in the profession and the CPD requirements contribute towards maintaining and expanding competence. The Chartered qualification has been a major benchmark for Engineering careers in Hong Kong for a long time, to the extent that it is career limiting not to have it, so in my case it has been a necessary element of maintaining an upwards career trajectory.   


What advice do you have for graduate engineers?
Immerse yourself in your subject matter and ask lots of questions. The 10,000 hours to proficiency rule has its detractors, but has tended to ring true in my experience, and so the first few years out from uni should really be about learning your craft and laying down a solid foundation of core competencies in your field to carry with you and build upon as your career progresses. I have experienced a lot of graduates who are chafing to get straight into commercial matters and management issues, whereas, in my view, the focus should be firmly on self-management in the development of engineering competence. Management comes soon enough.     

Oh – and convert your EA Student membership to Graduate membership of course.

How has the profession changed over your career?
That’s a broad question. We still seem to do the same things, we just do them differently. My subjective take on the matter: There appear to be more, and more specialised, courses offered by the universities, and therefore more engineering specialists, as opposed to generalists, are produced.  I think design, at least in the Civil mainstream has become more commoditised and so organisational structure has become flatter – I guess this dovetails with there being more larger, more technically complex multi-disciplinary projects on the boil at any one time that need assembly of a large amount of grunt. The professional workforce would appear to be more mobile and therefore the expectations of long tenure with the one employer are possibly reduced. The structure of engineering companies has also changed - there is obviously still a broad spectrum operating in the marketplace – from the partnership and privately owned company model that operated something like a guild and was prevalent when I graduated, to publicly listed giants with huge numbers of staff and a different outlook on generating value. The use of information systems and information technology has obviously significantly impacted how we do things in a major way. Litigation is on the up.

The above notwithstanding, I think – or at least I hope – the fundamentals of the profession haven’t changed and that technical excellence, quality of delivery and acting in the Client’s interests remain at the forefront of our professional responsibilities. Also, it is still very definitely a people game. A return to time charge fee structures based on a healthy multiplier rather than lump sum fees would be nice.

Who (living or dead) would you like to sit next to on a plane and why?
Pretty much anyone who has the joint ability hold a conversation and know when to stop talking – so I guess that means the living. I have had some pretty interesting, endearing and thought provoking conversations and exchanges with a wide variety of people in a wide variety of places, sometimes in transit, sometimes on a plane, none particularly famous, so happy to stick with the common person as a yardstick and for inspiration. In any case, Branson, Buffett et al are more likely going to want to catch some shut-eye and aren’t prone to divulging the real secrets anyway. Could be worth it, though, because then I’d be sitting up the front in First Class as well.     

What was the most recent thing you have done to promote the profession of engineering?
I hope that my term as President of the EA Hong Kong Chapter will have provided continued positive stewardship of the Chapter, the validity of EA and benefit to the members in the various activities we provide. Additionally, we have been able to achieve a more comprehensive exchange with the Consulate General, other professions and organisations in Hong Kong through the Support Australia Group in recent years, which means that Engineers have a seat at the table and are seen as an active part of the professional community.

 

Viiew the upcoming events for the Hong Kong Chapter here