Young engineers are the future custodians of South Africa\u2019s infrastructure, and should be supported in their personal and professional development. This is the view of Michael Mhlanga, the Chairperson of the Young Members Panel of the South African Institution of Civil Engineering (SAICE).<\/p>\n
Mhlanga reports that continuous education, mentorship, and networking are key building blocks for young engineers starting out in the profession. \u201cWe must support our young people to ensure that they have the necessary skills and experience to overcome the challenges of our future,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
This commentary comes during South Africa\u2019s official Youth Month, with 16 June commemorating Youth Day. \u201cWith a deep-rooted historical context, today our government continues to promote \u00a0this month as a time to focus on youth empowerment, acknowledging the important role that our youth play in socio-economic development,\u201d adds SAICE CEO, Vishaal Lutchman. \u201cThis is even more relevant when considering young engineers, who have the added opportunity to positively impact South Africa\u2019s infrastructure development too.\u201d<\/p>\n
However, it is important for young engineers to remember that learning does not end at graduation. \u201cContinued professional development is vital after graduation to enable engineers to remain educated on new technologies, construction methods, materials and to continue to enhance their training and skills. Joining a voluntary association, such as SAICE, provides the youth with access to a wide variety of learning opportunities,\u201d says Lutchman.<\/p>\n
Mhlanga adds: \u201cToday\u2019s young people have access to resources and technology which have the power to revolutionise the way infrastructure is conceptualised, designed, built and operated. They should be encouraged to use what is available to them, to create sustainable infrastructure projects for the future – which today\u2019s engineers are yet to imagine. Our tech-savvy youth carry with them a wealth of opportunity.\u201d He adds that these skills can also be applied to maintaining and upgrading existing infrastructure to meet the needs of an increasingly urbanising country.<\/p>\n
SAICE proudly supports young engineers through a variety of membership options, which provide access to the wider benefits enjoyed by SAICE members. Student membership is offered to civil engineering students, who can then remain members after graduation for a reduced fee. \u201cOur graduate membership was designed with the understanding that not every student is able to find employment immediately after graduating. At the same time, we know that being part of the SAICE community is helpful for finding job opportunities, learning, and networking. We wanted to ensure that young engineers have access to these benefits without feeling financially constrained, and hence the graduate membership option was formed,\u201d explains Mhlanga, who joined SAICE as a student member in 2015.<\/p>\n
The SAICE Young Members Panel acts as a support function for young members of the institution and facilitates exposure to networking opportunities and technical talks from a variety of disciplines within the civil engineering \u00a0industry. Added to that, young members gain access to social media groups which are used to share information on job opportunities, as well as provide a \u2018troubleshooting\u2019 function for engineers needing help at work. \u201cWe have found that when stuck on a problem at work, our young members interact on one of these groups to \u2018crowdsource\u2019 a solution. This is the kind of youthful thinking that will see a wide and positive contribution to infrastructure development. To have a focus group in the palm of your hand is surely helpful for decision-making, and to gain wider perspectives from other professionals,\u201d says Mhlanga.<\/p>\n
Lutchman says: \u201cMany senior engineers realise that mentorship is vital at the early stage of one\u2019s career. As a young engineer, the opportunity to talk to someone who has already walked the path is invaluable. SAICE recently launched SAICE Connect \u2013 a member benefit which aims to facilitate this very function. The online platform helps connect junior and senior engineers to encourage mentorship in the industry.\u201d Mhlanga also reports that young members have access to \u201cSpeed Mentoring\u201d, which plays on the concept of speed dating. Young engineers spend time working their way around a room, spending five minutes with each older engineer. \u201cThis has proven to be a fun way to facilitate networking and knowledge sharing,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs South Africa continues to urbanise and existing infrastructure continues to age, the role of young civil engineers in building a strong future should not be underplayed. Every company, professional body and senior engineer can play a role in developing our young people by facilitating knowledge sharing, skills development, and networking,\u201d concludes Lutchman.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Young engineers are the future custodians of South Africa\u2019s infrastructure, and should be supported in their personal and professional development. This is the view of Michael Mhlanga, the Chairperson of the Young Members Panel of the South African Institution of Civil Engineering (SAICE).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":16407,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[60,76],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16406","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-press-releases","category-saice"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/swmcommunications.co.za\/press-office\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16406","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/swmcommunications.co.za\/press-office\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/swmcommunications.co.za\/press-office\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/swmcommunications.co.za\/press-office\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/swmcommunications.co.za\/press-office\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16406"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/swmcommunications.co.za\/press-office\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16406\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/swmcommunications.co.za\/press-office\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/swmcommunications.co.za\/press-office\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16406"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/swmcommunications.co.za\/press-office\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16406"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/swmcommunications.co.za\/press-office\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16406"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}