"Engineers tasked to do more with less," says IHS

9th March 2015

IHS

Nat Bowers

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Which issues cause the biggest headaches for today’s engineers around the world? According to a study from IHS, the pressure to work faster, the threat caused by institutional knowledge drain and challenges posed by environmental regulations are among the chief concerns. More than 2,100 engineers and technical professionals responded to a recent survey, the results of which appear in a report called 'The Pulse of Engineering: The Changing Work Environment for Engineers Today'.

The report details the demands that engineers from around the world face from increasingly complex designs, shorter design cycles and mounting environmental regulations. It also offers recommendations for industrial marketers to better understand their target audience, align their products more closely with buyers’ needs and industry trends and strengthen relationships with customers and prospects.

Key findings include:

Slightly more than half of engineers (52%) said the pace of engineering is accelerating, and 57% said they are asked to do more with less;
Respondents agreed that designs are becoming more complex at the same time that design cycles are shrinking and time-to-market pressures are increasing;
About 70% of respondents noted that constraints on resources, specialised knowledge, budgets and time were jeopardising productivity, product quality and innovation; and
Designing and developing environmentally sustainable products was cited by more than 90% of respondents as an important part of their work.