| By employing a field research method, the researcher studied engineers' activities in natural, unaltered settings and in a non-restrictive, non-judgmental way. Ten engineers in six organizations were studied closely and comprehensively. The description of the nature of engineering work is developed in three dimensions: the engineer's working roles, the characteristics of engineer's activities, and the engineer's knowledge.; The categorization of the purpose of engineer's activity leads to the development of six working roles. Engineering activities and engineer's roles may be grouped into three categories: those that deal primarily with data---the collector role and the consultant/mentor role; those relating to organizing and facilitating work---the administrator role and the overseer role; and those that involve finding solutions, creating ideas, and making significant judgment-the historian role and the adapter/inventor role. These six roles describe the essential contents of engineers' activities. They form the theory of what engineers do in their daily work.; Through an analysis of how engineers spent their time, detailed descriptions about characteristics of engineers' activities are presented in the thesis, including phone calls, conversations, meetings, desk work, computer work, tours, and travel. The most important two findings are: (1)engineers' activities are characterized by fragmentation, brevity, and interruption; (2)engineers spend a surprisingly large part of time (over 40% in this study) in communicating with others.; Based on the analysis of engineer's working roles, it is reasoned that engineer's knowledge can be categorized into five groups: theoretic tools, stock solutions, symbolmaterial linkages, operational considerations, and access to distributed knowledge. |
