Research for Engineering

It was the inaugural of the 7 Days Workshop on Research Methodology for Engineering.

Here are my views:

Good afternoon.

I am very happy to be present at this inaugural workshop on Research Methodology for Engineering. Glad that this is one of the first activities by the newly formed IEEE Student Branch at the University.

IEEE stands for Advancing Technology for Humanity. It's the Professional Home for the Engineering and technology community worldwide.

At a glance, I can tell you about IEEE that there are 400000+ members across the globe, in 340 Sections – IEEE Student Branch Shoolini University falls under Delhi Section.

I am currently a Senior Member of IEEE, the IEEE Ambassador in India, and the Chair of the PR&P Standing Committee of the Section. I celebrated my Silver Jubilee with IEEE at the beginning of this year. In the next 17 years, I look forward to completing my IEEE Century – when my age plus my IEEE experience becomes 100 and I will be called a Life Member.

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IEEE is a great platform for personal and professional growth. It helps build, maintain, and nurture relationships – connections as we call them.

Coming back to the topic of the workshop i.e. Research Methodology – there are great speakers who will be interacting with you all for the next 7 days – please learn as much as you can. I have a few points with my nearly 4 decades of experience in the corporate world as a Trainer & Consultant.

The three most important factors in research are Validity, Reliability, and Credibility of your results. This will depend on how valid, reliable, and credible your data is. This discussion will be incomplete without the CIA triad of information security i.e. confidentiality, Integrity, and Availability of your data, information, and results.

Run Research as a project

My strong recommendation is to run a research as a Project and follow all good practices of project management including:

a)??Initiate – define the objective, scope, constraints, risks, success criteria etc.

b)??Plan - ?develop detailed activities and schedules with required resources

c)??Execute – run research per plan, keep in mind various milestones and deliverables, manage changes – which should be by exception only

d)??Monitor & Control – progress vs plan, risks, costs, quality, and communication

e)??Closure – evaluate performance based on criteria set in the first stage, document lessons learnt – if any, prepare a final report, get sign-off from the research sponsor/ guide

My Top Tips?

It is imperative to keep in mind, the 5 lessons that I have leant in these 38 years of my professional journey:

1.??Plan and follow the plan - deviations must be by exception only

2.??Train and get trained - no one is perfect, be open to improvements through mistakes

3.??Deliver Excellence - in everything that you do

4.??It’s good to talk - ask for help if you need it

5.??Always blow your trumpet - let people know what you have done and how

This means publishing your research and one of the best platforms is IEEE Explore.

Oh yes, I did not mention AI – there is a lot of noise about generative AI’s negative impact on meaningful research, and I am sure there will be deliberations around that in the next 7 days. Here is my bit – I use my ‘I’ before and after the AI!

With this, I wish you all the best for the next 7 days and the life ahead. My sincere thanks to the organisers for allowing me to interact with you all during the inaugural.