Engineering leadership: Grounding leadership theory in engineers’ professional identities

In recent years the US-based National Academy of Engineering and Engineers Canada have urged engineering educators to supplement technical coursework with multiple domains of professional skills development. One such domain is that of engineering leadership. While leadership education is beginning to be infused into some undergraduate engineering programs, it has not yet gained traction as a legitimate field of study. The legitimacy of the field depends on engineers recognizing themselves as members of a leadership profession. Our paper facilitates this process of recognition by grounding leadership theory in the professional experiences of engineers employed by four Canadian engineering-intensive firms. Our constant comparative analysis of qualitative data collected through nine focus groups and seven interviews suggests that engineers are largely resistant to dominant leadership paradigms drawn from other disciplines, but that they do, in fact lead in ways that blend key aspects of their identities with professionally recognized forms of influence. Our compound model of engineering leadership has practical and theoretical implications for engineers, leadership theorists and engineering educators.