For the Betterment of Human Welfare

The short "story" below is an email I sent on November 1, 2017 to the 260+ employee-owners at my company - Vaughn & Melton Consulting Engineers, Inc. Prior to joining this outstanding organization, I owned a small marketing firm and came in contact with many types of companies, but none like the company I now call home. If you get anything from my post below, I hope you can takeaway the magnitude of what it means to LOVE what you do and LOVE where you work. If you don't, then find somewhere you can. I am living my dream of doing what I LOVE to do and a company that appreciates my work and, more importantly, appreciates me. #vaughnmeltonstrong

To my Vaughn & Melton cohorts - November 1, 2017:

Since I am not a professional engineer, but work within a professional services firm that contains both professional engineers and professional surveyors, I wanted to know more about why we do what we do. So, I began researching the roots of our profession. One of the things that caught my attention was the Engineer’s Creed that the licensed professional must swear an oath to uphold.

I was blown away with the words I read and quickly realized why engineers and surveyors are a different breed of people – and sometimes misunderstood as being “too serious” and perhaps stigmatized as being “introverted”. Well...I now know why this group of people are in fact serious and can be somewhat introverted. Our professional engineers and surveyors carry a heavy weight on their shoulders to serve us – all of humankind – to make where we live better and the way we live better. This is serious business and requires much introspection of the individuals that take this oath.

Wow. I never knew the magnitude of what “we” do for the publics (the humans) we serve.

Take a few minutes to read the Engineers’ Creed below. Let the words soak into your mind and then look around you, to your family, friends, co-workers, and the myriad others you come in contact with each and every day.

The people you see are impacted by what we do and how we do it. We are more just an organization of people coming to work every day to earn a paycheck. We are, in fact, a group of people that have an obligation to serve – and as the Engineers’ Creed so eloquently states “to serve for the betterment of human welfare”

Engineers' Creed

As a Professional Engineer, I dedicate my professional knowledge and skill to the advancement and betterment of human welfare.

I pledge:

To give the utmost of performance;

To participate in none but honest enterprise;

To live and work according to the laws of man and the highest standards of professional conduct;

To place service before profit, the honor and standing of the profession before personal advantage, and the public welfare above all other considerations.

In humility and with need for Divine Guidance, I make this pledge.

~ Adopted by National Society of Professional Engineers, June 1954

I am proud to be part of Vaughn & Melton,