<p>Hey,</p>
<p>So I really like the idea of engineering but I dont think it is exactly what I want to do. I was wondering if anyone has heard of engineering management or technology management or something similar and would be willing to tell me information about it. It mixes engineering up a little bit and I like that. Anything is appreciated! Thanks!</p>
<p>There are such programs. They’re a combination of technical knowledge and project management/human resources/economics/business studies. They prepare for management/consultation/company or group leadership work, but in the real world you may have to work your way up there, because there are also technical people, who have learned on the job what their team’s or company’s business and management is or should be about. It may really be a company/people preference whether they like business (even if partly technical) majors in the management or long-term engineering employees, but anyways, there’s a lot of learning to be done in the real world and no (straightforward) job ticket.</p>
<p>The companies I’m familiar with would never hire someone to manage engineers or technical people unless that person had a lot of engineering or technical experience.</p>
<p>Twenty years ago they might have, but not now.</p>
<p>“The companies I’m familiar with would never hire someone to manage engineers or technical people unless that person had a lot of engineering or technical experience.”</p>
<p>What it really boils down is whether there are technical people that want to and have the aptitude to move into management. Business majors are usually already oriented for those positions, so their initial motivation may be better and their previous work experience may be more specific to handling those roles. E.g. it’s not necessarily efficient to move senior engineers into paper and people work, if they’re more useful and happy as senior engineers. And maybe business majors can’t be put to technical work either. So there may be a division of labor of some sort.</p>
<p>But there are also companies where management barely exists, people/engineers manage themselves (or there are senior engineering personnel for doing the coordinating), so what is left is just the paperwork and perhaps “strategy” relevant to running the company.</p>
<p>You could certainly put business majors into administrative or marketing positions. You wouldn’t want them directly managing technical or engineering workers. When the inevitable technical problems occur, managers without technical or engineering backgrounds won’t have a clue as to what’s going on, and will TRY TO impose solutions that only make things worse.</p>
<p>I capitalized TRY TO because I’ve often seen teams of engineers tune-out managers who are viewed as technically incompetent.</p>
<p>I have a Masters in IE. If I would have managed projects the way I learned in the Masters program, I would have destroyed every project I was on. That’s because in school you learn clean, idealized cases. The real world is not like that. In order to learn how the real world of engineering works, you have to have hands-on, real world engineering experience.</p>
<p>^^^ These “engineering/technology management” BS degree’s are not meant to be used to manage engineers.</p>
<p>Engineering management is different from technology management in that you take some engineering courses in the first, but none in the second. Both degree’s can be viewed as “business management” degrees.</p>
<p>The engineering management degree “is designed to provide students with the skills for effective management and leadership of engineering-driven enterprises.” Below is a link to ASU’s degree. It’s focused on new students that want to go into business (that have an engineering focus) and it has a link to the MBA program at ASU. It also targets “professionals currently employed in technology jobs that would like to finish or pursue their undergraduate engineering degree online.”</p>
<p>[Engineering</a> Management BS Degree | ASU Online | Arizona State University](<a href=“Page Not Found 404 | ASU online”>Page Not Found 404 | ASU online)</p>
<p>The “Technology Management” degree has even less engineering. Grads go after jobs in IT (or standard business major type jobs) and not engineering.</p>
<p>Here is an example of a BS in Technology Management.</p>
<p>[Technology</a> Management Bachelor of Science Degree (B.S.) - Pennsylvania College of Technology](<a href=“404”>404)</p>
<p>“The Technology Management major prepares students with the skills necessary to meet the business demands of today and the future. The curriculum provides a solid business core that includes an extensive background in the functional areas of marketing, finance, accounting, human resources, and management.”</p>
<p>If you want to go into engineering (as an entry level engineer) neither of these two degree’s do the trick. If you like engineering and business, and may want to go into an MBA program(or consulting, sales, …anything other than an entry engineering position), then engineering management would be fine. If you’re not interest in engineering, but want to go into IT, or are already in IT, but want a degree to help your marketability, then the IT degree’s fits the bill.</p>
<p>I have been through several companies and every supervisor and upwards at the engineering side has at least an engineering degree. So I dont know how useful these degrees are. I doubt that you could manage anyone just with this degree though</p>
<p>The IT degree has nothing to do with “engineering” as we’re using that term here (EE, ME, Civil, etc), it has to do with the IT field, so wouldn’t be a degree used by a “working” engineer. The exception being a master’s degree, which would be used by an engineer that’s working in “IT”.</p>
<p>The engineering management degree could get you an entry level engineering position (it has enough core engineering classes), but of course not a position managing engineers, which takes work experience.</p>