Signal Processing - September 2017 - 5

PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE
Rabab Ward | SPS President | rababw@ece.ubc.ca

Careers in Signal Processing:
A Diverse Field Impacting the Future

hen the IEEE Signal Processing
Society (SPS) was founded in 1948
as the Professional Group on Audio of the Institute of Radio Engineers
(IRE), the discipline of signal processing
didn't exist as the robust field we know
today nor was it an established career
path. Fast-forward to today, and we're
living in a world surrounded and enabled
by signal processing and its applications,
with endless possibilities in where they
will take us.
For the last 70 years, the Society's
mission has been to disseminate knowledge and heighten awareness about signal processing-the science behind our
digital lives-and to act as resources
to our members for the future of their
careers. We have started to gain some
mainstream visibility and recognition; for example, our new and inspiring video, "Under the Radar" (http://
snip.ly/w9jr7), is available for viewing
on Air Canada flights. But we've only
scratched the surface: the future of signal processing, and the future of our
world, is in the hands of the next generation of engineers.
The good news is that waves of fresh
talent are entering the workforce every
day. According to data from the U.S.
Bureau of Labor Statistics, engineering
jobs are expanding, and so are salaries.
But the challenge is educating students
and young professionals on all the opDigital Object Identifier 10.1109/MSP.2017.2728738
Date of publication: 6 September 2017

portunities available to them. Many
engineering students enter college unaware of signal processing as a field of
study and, thus, often pursue a traditional electrical engineering route-missing a significant opportunity to impact
the daily lives of millions of people
around the world.
So what can one do with a concentration in signal processing? The beauty
of this diverse and pervasive field is that
I don't have enough room in this "President's Message" to capture all of the
possibilities-they're endless. In short,
you can develop technology for the next
autonomous car; enhance music capabilities; improve hearing aids, medical and electronic instruments; predict
financial markets; work for the government; and help speech recognition systems (like Siri and Alexa) get better at
interacting with humans.
Data is the root of all signal processing, enabling our digital lives in both
obvious and obscure ways. From the
tangible applications in your smartphone, to the data collected to predict
future financial markets, the power of
signal processing is unparalleled. Signal
processing engineers are even figuring out how to use data to better design
power grids and smart cities.
Today's young professionals have
different career expectations than prior
generations. Deloitte's 2017 Millennial Survey found that more millennials
want to change lives and make the world
a better place. A career in signal proIEEE SIGNAL PROCESSING MAGAZINE

September 2017

cessing enables this. In fact, signal processing engineers around the world are
exploring ways to use data and applications to make cities safer, promote sustainability and clean technology, tackle
climate change, improve health care,
develop technologies to assist aging
populations, and more. As Aleksandra
Mojsilovic explains in our newest "Careers in Signal Processing" video series
(http://snip.ly/g9vwo), which emphasizes
the limitless opportunities in our field,
"there are a wealth of application areas
around doing good-and doing good
with data is something that I think is a
real enormous future opportunity for
signal processing."
The mission of the SPS has long been
supporting the future of the profession,
and that means targeting and attracting
young professionals through our visibility efforts. Our new "Careers in Signal Processing" video series not only
delves into the impact signal processing
has on the world and our interactions
with it but explores the countless benefits of mentorship, joining a Society
and much more.
The seven-video video series feat u res exper ts f rom diverse indust r ies a nd backg rou nds, i nclud i ng
David Frakes (technical project lead,
Google), Aleksandra Mojsilovic (IBM
fellow and codirector of IBM's Science for Social Good Initiative), Jeremy Webb (principal engineer, J. Webb
(continued on page 11)
5

http://www.snip.ly/g9vwo http://http:// http://www.snip.ly/w9jr7

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Signal Processing - September 2017