Industrial Engineers are trained to be non-resistant to change. We expect change. We welcome change. At some point, we are the reason for the change. As an IE, we need to have a healthy balance between being a management person and operations person. We should act as the arbiter between the management and its people so we need to be fair and just.
The common characteristics of an IE are the following:
1. We are hardworking. Yes, there are times when we feel like being lazy the whole day but those days are rare as compared to the number of times that we need to render long working hours just to get the job done. Since the organization relies to our data or our study for their decision-making, we tend to walk an extra mile just to submit a comprehensive report.
2. We promote a healthy culture at work. Since we are the catalyst for change in an organization, we are aware that a harmonious work environment is more receptive to change than one that is chaotic. We are the ones who promote change but do not appear to be intimidating. We are the ones who justify the change but do not act as a know-it-all because we prefer to be low-key.
3. We don’t stop asking questions until we find the acceptable answer. We are trained to ask, to investigate, to be thorough so some people might find us annoying but they end up appreciating our insistence because they know that we have the best intentions for them.
4. We are competitive without really trying hard. Competitiveness is in our culture from the moment we step into junior college. But our kind of competitiveness is a friendly one because we want continual improvement on the existing systems or processes. Seldom does an IE compete with another group in an organization because it contradicts with our culture of being the internal consultant of the organization.
5. We are well-groomed, or at least, the majority of us. We know that personality matters if we want people to listen to us. While working, an IE may look messy because we are too busy but when presenting, an IE makes herself presentable.
6. We value teamwork very much. Even the loner types of IE are forced to embrace the concept of teamwork simply because the nature of our job requires us to mingle with people from the other departments or section.
The World of Second Chances 