A systems-based approach to assessing leadership styles in engineers.

摘要

There is a widely recognized gap in the skill set of newly graduated engineers and the needs and expectations of industry. The Accreditation Board of Engineering and Technology (ABET) has taken steps to address this gap by adjusting its criteria for accrediting engineering programs.;In particular, ABET has specified program outcomes that address technical skills in relation to the ability to function on teams, the ability to communicate effectively and an understanding of professional and ethical responsibility. However, there are still gaps not directly addressed by ABET, gaps involving leadership skills, which are defined as a combination of leadership terms. These leadership terms are communication, motivation, team-building, visionary, coaching & mentoring, time management, listening and innovation. This research explores the key components of leadership to engineering academia and industry using system techniques that classifies the different definitions of leadership.;Through the use of text mining, data was collected from industry trade journals then fuzzy similarity was used to classify different terms employed in the definition of leadership. Finally, the results suggest that the more terms used by journals were classified by engineering academia as having more leadership terms in defining leadership when compared to industry.