IEEE-USA and the Globalization Challenge

by Russell Lefevre

Whether it’s characterized as globalization, offshoring, trade in services, competitiveness or Thomas Friedman’s "world flattening," U.S. engineers are facing unsettling new challenges and asking what needs to be done not only to preserve their own career vitality, but also to maintain a strong U.S. engineering workforce and keep engineering an attractive career path for future generations. At the November 2004 IEEE-USA Board meeting, Region 5 Director John Meredith challenged IEEE-USA to address globalization's adverse effects on U.S. IEEE members. This article summarizes our response to date, and identifies related issues. Future articles will highlight our progress and pertinent developments.

Globalization poses three fundamental questions: What do the IEEE’s U.S. members need to do to remain employable in an increasingly competitive global labor market? What can be done to ensure that engineering remains a viable and rewarding career path in the United States? What should be done to ensure that the United States maintains its leadership in technology in the global marketplace and in the technologies needed for our national and homeland security?

Each question involves a different set of issues that require attention. Under the leadership of IEEE-USA President Gerard Alphonse, we are deploying our volunteer and staff resources to tackle each of these areas in turn:

• IEEE-USA’s Technology Policy Council is proactively advocating innovation policies, such as increased federal investments in the physical sciences and permanent extension of the R&D tax credit, to help keep America in a technology leadership position.

• IEEE-USA’s Career and Workforce Policy Committee is working to raise Congressional awareness of offshoring trends and their impacts on the engineering workforce, as well as promote policies that can help displaced engineers make career transitions and protect their retirement savings.

• IEEE-USA’s Employment and Career Services Committee is expanding IEEE-USA’s portfolio of career-related tools and resources to help our members maintain career vitality in this new competitive environment, including such new offerings as the IEEE-USA Salary Service and the IEEE-USA Employment Navigator. IEEE-USA’s 2006 President Ralph Wyndrum has pledged to make continuing education enhancements a priority of his administration.

• IEEE-USA is employing its communications outlets to increase member awareness of the trends, policy implications, and IEEE-USA's related services and advocacy efforts on behalf of U.S. members.

Understanding the S&T Workforce Challenge

Do we have too many engineers or too few? What will future demand look like, especially in light of offshoring and immigration trends? Why are some engineering enrollments declining? Clouding these questions is the lack of adequate workforce data to enable informed policy decisions. To address the  problem, the Minority Staff of the House Science Committee has organized a series of roundtable briefings to explore the current state of, and prospects for, the U.S. science and technology (S&T) workforce. The roundtables are designed to determine:

• whether our current education system is preparing sufficient numbers of students to pursue training in science, engineering and technology and whether undergraduate and graduate education is providing scientists and engineers with the skills industry needs

• whether immigration policy changes are needed to attract more foreign technology workers or whether too many are coming here, thereby driving down U.S. workers' salaries and discouraging U.S. students from entering these career fields

• whether offshoring of S&T jobs is a problem, and whether it is occurring because too few U.S. workers are available or because international companies are simply meeting their needs with cheaper, but equally well-trained, foreign workers

The Science Committee's first roundtable, “Science & Technology Workforce: Where Are All the Jobs Going?” looked at what we currently know about offshoring and whether the current state of the S&T workforce represents a shortage or a surplus. Invited speakers included Dr. Ron Hira, IEEE-USA’s vice president for Career Activities and author of Outsourcing America; Dave McCurdy, president and CEO, Electronic Industries Alliance; Dr. George Langford, former vice chair of the National Science Board’s Task Force on National Workforce Policies for Science and Engineering; and Dr. Michael S. Teitelbaum, program director of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

Two more sessions are in the planning stages. The second roundtable will look at education and training needs for the S&T workforce, including changes flowing from the pressures of greater foreign competition in skilled workers and changes in the productivity of scientists and engineers due to the widespread applications of information technology. The final roundtable will attempt to sort out possible policy options, based on the findings of the previous events.

Responding to The Innovation Challenge

As IEEE-USA’s vice president for Technology Policy, I am responsible for leading IEEE-USA’s efforts on innovation and competitiveness, which is the focus of the balance of this article. Clearly, “competitiveness” is emerging again as a buzzword in Washington, driven in part by a number of cautionary reports issued by organizations such as TechNet and AeA (see additional reading below). Although the reports have similar messages, the most influential report to date is Innovate America, issued by the Council on Competitiveness, calling for creating a National Innovation Initiative (NII). The report has already motivated several efforts to improve the long-term competitive posture of the United States, especially in the high-tech sector.

IEEE-USA is an affiliate member of the Council on Competitiveness and is participating on the President's Council for the National Innovation Initiative, a coalition of non-governmental organizations who are translating the report’s policy recommendations into a workable legislative agenda. We are also working with Senator John Ensign (R-Ariz.), chair of the Senate Commerce Subcommittee on Technology, Innovation and Competitiveness, Senator Joe Lieberman (D-Conn.) and others to help draft an innovation bill that would capture key recommendations from the NII report.

In the House of Representatives, the House Science Committee, under the leadership of Representatives Vernon Ehlers (R-Mich.) and Sherwood Boehlert (R-N.Y.), will sponsor a Global Competitiveness Summit in December 2005. The summit will bring together a cross section of the nation's business leaders to promote workforce development and increasing government support for R&D. IEEE-USA staff and volunteers are working closely with Science Committee staff to ensure that our concerns and policy recommendations are considered.

A bipartisan effort is in the works, spearheaded by Senator John Warner (R-Va.) and Virginia Governor Mark Warner, who are organizing a Regional Innovation Workshop to be held on 29-30 October in Washington, D.C. The workshop's goal is to promote an innovation agenda and collaborative efforts in the Mid-Atlantic region. IEEE-USA has met with the workshop's organizers to explore creative ways to involve local IEEE Sections and Chapters.

Concluding Notes

The challenges facing U.S. engineers and our nation will require a thoughtful and sustained response. Much work must be done to build the political consensus needed to support constructive legislative action. And we must recognize that there are practical limits to what our government is willing and/or able to do. Ultimately, we must each take responsibility for our own careers. Part of owning our careers is standing up for our profession and speaking out on issues that affect our collective well-being as a nation. IEEE-USA provides an organization and opportunities for us to do that and tools that can leverage and amplify our efforts.

This article is the first of a series to keep the membership aware of activities that IEEE-USA staff and volunteers are carrying out on its behalf. More information is available by email from Vin O’Neill (v.oneill@ieee.org), Debbie Rudolph (d.rudolph@ieee.org), and Russell Lefevre (r.lefevre@ieee.org). Future articles will report on these activities and others that are of interest to the members. We welcome your input, which can be sent to feedback@ieeeusa.org.

Additional Reading

”Innovate America”, Council on Competitiveness, December 2004
(www.compete.org/pdf/NII_Final_Report.pdf)

“Losing the Competitive Advantage: The Challenge for Science and Technology in the United States”, AeA, February 2005
(www.aeanet.org/Publications/idjj_CompetitivenessMain0205.asp?bhcp=1)

“The TechNet Innovation Initiative and 2005 Innovation Policy Agenda”, TechNet,
March 2005 (www.technet.org/resources/TechNetInnovationInitiative.pdf)

“The Knowledge Economy: Is the United States Losing Its Competitive Edge?”, The Task Force on the Future of American Innovation, February 2005
(www.futureofinnovation.org/PDF/Benchmarks.pdf)

Russell Lefevre is IEEE-USA's Vice President for Technology Policy Activities.  Comments may be submitted to todaysengineer@ieee.org.