Chemical Engineering May 2023 - 42

You and Your Job
Owning Your Career: Transitioning From a
Technical Role
Making the decision to change career paths from a technical role to a more
managerial one can be difficult. Here are some considerations to take into account
Garrett Forsythe
JGF Performance Consulting
A
s a technically trained chemical
engineer, career opportunities
are very broad with respect
to the type of work, size
of company and location. While there
is certainly no " typical " career, there is
often a general career path that starts
you off in a primarily technical role. As
a reader of this publication, you take
your technical professional development
seriously. In addition, in those
first years, you are measured as an individual
contributor, or part of a team,
where your contributions are evaluated.
Sometime in the first 2-6 years
of employment, there can be a point
where an opportunity to move to a
management, leadership or businessrelated
opportunity arises (Figure 1).
How does one determine if this career
opportunity is worth pursuing? What if
success in the new role is much more
focused on managing others and a
more complex scope of work? What
if you would like to stay on a technical
career path? Is your temperament and
personality suited to the new opportunity?
These are challenging questions.
Should I pursue a new role?
Your definition of success is something
only
you
can
determine.
Choose to pursue a career that fits
your goals, work-life balance and
preferences. Some of the most content
engineers I have known have
stayed in a technical role for most or
all of their careers. I also know engineers
who now are chief executive
officers or chief operating officers.
Some, like me, have led chemical
businesses, sales and marketing
teams, and global supply chains.
Others pursued careers outside of
the chemical process industries (CPI)
in medical, sales, legal, financial and
business roles. How do you determine
what path is right for you? What
is your right balance of individual con42
tribution,
team contribution, or
leading and managing others?
In a previous article [1], I reviewed
the importance of having
a personal development strategy
that helps set up success,
regardless of your industry and
specific job role. An important
consideration is the " soft skills "
needed to succeed - including
things like understanding personalities,
communication effectiveness,
leadership skills, understanding and
practicing emotional intelligence and
more. Working effectively with others
is critical if you are an individual
contributor and if you are leading a
complex operation as a site manager.
While I presume that your technical
competence is strong, and that you
are doing well in your current assignment,
you still will want to expand
your capabilities and skills to prepare
yourself for roles of greater breadth
and responsibility, regardless of
whether it is along a mostly technical
career path or not.
Why consider a change?
Assuming you are successful in your
current role, and that it has primarily
been a technical one, you could
be asking the question " Why would
I want to make a change from what
I am currently doing? " There could
be multiple reasons under consideration,
including the following:
* Am I unhappy or discontent in
my current job and ready for
a change? Or am I happy and
content but still ready for something
different?
* Am I looking for a new challenge
with more responsibility and
broader scope?
* Do I want to move into an expanded
role where I will then
have people reporting to me?
* Am I being offered a new opportunity
by my leadership team
that looks interesting?
Shutterstock
FIGURE 1. An engineer's career path can lead to technical,
management, business and other leadership roles
* Is it time to consider a new working
group, company or location?
Typically, each job scope has a
ratio of how much success is based
on your individual technical contribution
and how much is based on your
group contribution and your leadership
and management capabilities.
Fortunately, as an engineer, there are
many options for individual contributions
and for team contributions.
Moving into a new role where you
have people reporting to you brings
a whole new set of dynamics to the
picture. In engineering curricula,
management and leadership competencies
are rarely discussed. Soft
skills are often left out of any formal
training, and you need to develop
them somewhat on your own.
Managing versus leading
Making the shift to your first management
role is a big decision. There are
many references that talk about the
differences and similarities between
managing and leading individuals
and teams. Through my experiences,
I often have found that there is much
overlap and that even in technically
focused roles, there are needed skills
related to both. If you are moving
from an " individual contributor " role
to a " supervisory role " (where you
have responsibility and accountability
for direct reports), it is even more important
to understand the differences
between managing and leading. Both
are crucial to be successful. Typically,
when moving from a technical role
into your first managing or leading
role, you will need to improve your
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