This blog will consist of my interview with my dad whom had experience with engineering technology.
I received permission from Mr. Olson (my teacher) for interviewing my father, and I also received permission from my father for allowing me to interview him.
Here is some basic information about him:
Name: Michael J. Cox
Specific Degree: Bachelor of Science
Place of Employment: United States Navy
Contact Information: coxrocks50@hotmail.com
Here are the questions that I had asked him, and the responses that I got from my father about them.
Please describe your engineering field.
Gas-turbine engineering, he was the Chief Engineer for a guided missile frigate in the United States Navy. He was responsible for two LM2500 gas-turbine engines for primary propulsion and two diesel engines for auxiliary power. He also was also a gas turbine inspector for the Commander, Pacific Fleet's Propulsion Examining Board. He would fly all over the Pacific to Japan, Hawaii, and the West Coast Naval Bases to inspect the Engineering plants of all surface combatants. These included, carriers, cruisers, destroyers, and frigates.
What is your current job title?
He is a Commander in the United States Navy, and his designator is a Surface Warfare Officer.
Please describe your particular job and duties.
As the Chief Engineer, he was responsible for 75 engineers for the operation and maintenance of the ship. He and his engineers provided heat, electricity, propulsion, and fresh water for a crew of 350 people on the ship.
What is your average work schedule?
When his ship was in port, he would arrive at the ship at 6:00 A.M. and depart around 7:00 P.M. five to six days a week. When the ship was underway, he worked for 18 to 20 hours a day seven days a week. The ship was underway about 2/3rds of the time conducting operations and training for deployment.
Starting with high school, describe your educational background chronologically.
He took college focused AP and Honors classes like trigonometry, chemistry, and physics in high school. In college he took calculus, differential equations, electrical engineering, and chemistry. He received a masters degree in international business. After college he took various engineering courses with the navy.
If you had it to do over, related to your career or education, would you do anything differently?
He felt like that he was satisfied with his education and careers he took and wouldn't change a thing because each event that he took led to the next event and that greatly benefited him.
What advice would you give to me as someone interested in pursuing a career path similar to yours?
The advice he gave was to go to Naval Academy, or if I can't do that I should go to the Naval ROTC at another university.
Here are my reflections on my interview with my dad.
What surprised me the most in my interview with my dad was that he put in a ton of time when working at his ship when it is in port and underway.
The most important piece of information that I learned from this interview was that if I wanted to gain the same education on engineering then I know which classes to take like calculus and trigonometry, and where I should go to finish my education like the Naval Academy.
This interview has influenced my feelings about my future career by giving me an idea of what I might do with the engineering skills that I learned in courses and classes, and it gave me a great example of one part of the jobs that you can do that require skills in engineering.
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
The Deep Dive
Wow, what a design.
I am impressed that a group of people were able to recreate an item like the shopping cart into a futuristic item. I would want to go shopping with one of those carts myself. It is amazing that we can remake anything we want, except for nature.
Here are my blog questions/answers
1. “From the buildings in which we live and work, to the cars we drive, or the knives and forks with which we eat, everything we use was designed to create some sort of marriage between ____form_____ and _____function_____.”
2. The folks at IDEO state that they are not experts in any given area. But, they do claim to be experts on the _____design process_____, which they apply to the innovation of consumer products.
3. After the team of designers is brought together, told the problem, and informed they have five days to “pull it off,” what phase of the design process do they immediately engage in?
The phase of the design process that they immediately engage in is the Brainstorming Phase when they were brought together, told the problem, and are told that they had a five day deadline.
4. Give two examples of what the team members did during this phase.
a. They went to the supermarket and observed the shopping carts in action.
b. The group generated a list of ideas that they posted on the wall, and voted for the best design to build.
5. List five rules-of-thumb that IDEO employees follow when they share ideas during the brainstorming phase:
a. One conversation at a time.
b. Stay focused on the topic.
c. Encourage wild ideas.
d. Defer judgement.
e. Build on the ideas of others.
6. Why should wild (and sometimes crazy) ideas be entertained during the brainstorming phase?
Wild and crazy ideas should be entertained during the brainstorming phase because it allows the design group to branch out and build on the idea, while plain and simple ideas are hard to branch and build upon.
7. After the brainstorming phase was over, the team narrowed down the hundreds of ideas by ___voting___ for those ideas that were not only “cool” but also _______buildable__________ in a short period of time. What phase of the design process is this called?
This part of the design phase is the Select an Approach Phase because the group was selecting one design out of hundreds of ideas.
8. IDEO believes that the ideas and efforts of a ___group___ will always be more successful than the planning of a lone genius.
9. Once the ideas were narrowed down and divided into categories, the group was split into four smaller teams. What phase(s) of the design process was each of these groups responsible for?
The phases of the design process that each group was responsible for using were Identify Criteria and Specify Constraints, Explore Possibilities, and Make a Model or Prototype.
10. The leaders at IDEO believe that __chaotic__ behavior and a __creative__ environment are two important reasons why their employees are able to think quickly and creatively to produce innovative results.
11. Sometimes, people come up with great solutions that work by trying their ideas first, and asking for ________permission_________ later.
12. Design is often a process of going too far and having to take a few steps back. What phase of the design process would the critique of the four mock-ups come under?
The phase of the design process that would critique the four mock-ups is to Test and Evaluate the Design using Specifications.
13. Upon critique of the four teams’ models, it was obvious that none of the teams had developed an optimum solution. However, the people at IDEO believe that it is important to ___fail___ often in order to ___succeed___ sooner.
14. What percentage of the entire week’s time did it take to fabricate the final prototype?
It took about 40% of the time needed during the week to complete the final prototype.
15. Instead of showering his design team with a tremendous amount of praise, what did the boss require his employees to do with their new design?
The boss required that the employees take the finished design to the supermarket to test the design out.
16. Of all the things that we are surrounded by every day, what has not been placed through the design process?
The only thing that has not been placed through the design process out of all the things that we are surrounded by everyday is nature.
Conclusion
1. What did you find to be the most impressive part of the team’s effort?
What I found to be the most impressive part of the team's effort was that they would work day and night to complete their product, and I also find it impressive that they are able to work better under chaotic behavior and a creative enviroement.
2. What advantages are there to having a design team with members that have non-engineering backgrounds?
The advantages of having a design team with members that have non-enginerring backgrounds is that it allows for more wild ideas to be created and built upon, and they could use their own background to contribute a new approach to the general project.
3. There was a point in the process where a self-appointed group of adults stepped up, stopped the ideas, and redirected the group to break up into teams. Why was this done?
The group of self-appointed adults stepped up, stopped the ideas, and redirected the goup to break into teams becasue they feared that under a time constraint that they wouldn't get the job done in time with the group voting on designs, and that by spliting into teams the group has a better chance of getting the job done under the five-day time constraint.
4. At the end of the video, Dave Kelly states, “Look around. The only things that are not designed are the things we find in nature.” Can you think of anything that would contradict this statement?
I think that there are more items that can't undergo the design process in outer space. For example, we can't recreate the sun in a different way, we can't recreate gravity in another way, and we can't recreate black holes or supernovas whenever we want to.
I am impressed that a group of people were able to recreate an item like the shopping cart into a futuristic item. I would want to go shopping with one of those carts myself. It is amazing that we can remake anything we want, except for nature.
Here are my blog questions/answers
1. “From the buildings in which we live and work, to the cars we drive, or the knives and forks with which we eat, everything we use was designed to create some sort of marriage between ____form_____ and _____function_____.”
2. The folks at IDEO state that they are not experts in any given area. But, they do claim to be experts on the _____design process_____, which they apply to the innovation of consumer products.
3. After the team of designers is brought together, told the problem, and informed they have five days to “pull it off,” what phase of the design process do they immediately engage in?
The phase of the design process that they immediately engage in is the Brainstorming Phase when they were brought together, told the problem, and are told that they had a five day deadline.
4. Give two examples of what the team members did during this phase.
a. They went to the supermarket and observed the shopping carts in action.
b. The group generated a list of ideas that they posted on the wall, and voted for the best design to build.
5. List five rules-of-thumb that IDEO employees follow when they share ideas during the brainstorming phase:
a. One conversation at a time.
b. Stay focused on the topic.
c. Encourage wild ideas.
d. Defer judgement.
e. Build on the ideas of others.
6. Why should wild (and sometimes crazy) ideas be entertained during the brainstorming phase?
Wild and crazy ideas should be entertained during the brainstorming phase because it allows the design group to branch out and build on the idea, while plain and simple ideas are hard to branch and build upon.
7. After the brainstorming phase was over, the team narrowed down the hundreds of ideas by ___voting___ for those ideas that were not only “cool” but also _______buildable__________ in a short period of time. What phase of the design process is this called?
This part of the design phase is the Select an Approach Phase because the group was selecting one design out of hundreds of ideas.
8. IDEO believes that the ideas and efforts of a ___group___ will always be more successful than the planning of a lone genius.
9. Once the ideas were narrowed down and divided into categories, the group was split into four smaller teams. What phase(s) of the design process was each of these groups responsible for?
The phases of the design process that each group was responsible for using were Identify Criteria and Specify Constraints, Explore Possibilities, and Make a Model or Prototype.
10. The leaders at IDEO believe that __chaotic__ behavior and a __creative__ environment are two important reasons why their employees are able to think quickly and creatively to produce innovative results.
11. Sometimes, people come up with great solutions that work by trying their ideas first, and asking for ________permission_________ later.
12. Design is often a process of going too far and having to take a few steps back. What phase of the design process would the critique of the four mock-ups come under?
The phase of the design process that would critique the four mock-ups is to Test and Evaluate the Design using Specifications.
13. Upon critique of the four teams’ models, it was obvious that none of the teams had developed an optimum solution. However, the people at IDEO believe that it is important to ___fail___ often in order to ___succeed___ sooner.
14. What percentage of the entire week’s time did it take to fabricate the final prototype?
It took about 40% of the time needed during the week to complete the final prototype.
15. Instead of showering his design team with a tremendous amount of praise, what did the boss require his employees to do with their new design?
The boss required that the employees take the finished design to the supermarket to test the design out.
16. Of all the things that we are surrounded by every day, what has not been placed through the design process?
The only thing that has not been placed through the design process out of all the things that we are surrounded by everyday is nature.
Conclusion
1. What did you find to be the most impressive part of the team’s effort?
What I found to be the most impressive part of the team's effort was that they would work day and night to complete their product, and I also find it impressive that they are able to work better under chaotic behavior and a creative enviroement.
2. What advantages are there to having a design team with members that have non-engineering backgrounds?
The advantages of having a design team with members that have non-enginerring backgrounds is that it allows for more wild ideas to be created and built upon, and they could use their own background to contribute a new approach to the general project.
3. There was a point in the process where a self-appointed group of adults stepped up, stopped the ideas, and redirected the group to break up into teams. Why was this done?
The group of self-appointed adults stepped up, stopped the ideas, and redirected the goup to break into teams becasue they feared that under a time constraint that they wouldn't get the job done in time with the group voting on designs, and that by spliting into teams the group has a better chance of getting the job done under the five-day time constraint.
4. At the end of the video, Dave Kelly states, “Look around. The only things that are not designed are the things we find in nature.” Can you think of anything that would contradict this statement?
I think that there are more items that can't undergo the design process in outer space. For example, we can't recreate the sun in a different way, we can't recreate gravity in another way, and we can't recreate black holes or supernovas whenever we want to.
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