CPD Auditor, Finola Howe.

Q.1 You work with Engineers Ireland as an Expert CPD Auditor as part of the CPD Accredited Employer standard. Can you tell us a little bit about your background and how you became a CPD auditor?

I started my career as an Engineer in a US multinational after completing a BEng in Mechanical Engineering. I progressed through various levels of management and executive leadership positions both in Ireland and internationally and was fortunate to have excellent CPD opportunities to support my development in transitions from an engineer to people manager and then to leading large organisations where I was developing strategy and leading transformational change on behalf of the company.

I pursued additional academic qualifications (Executive MBA and MSc in Work and Organisational Behaviour) and founded my own consultancy company Danu Consulting, working with organisations to bring a blend of technical expertise, business and leadership development. More recently I’ve worked with the Higher Education sector to create stronger collaborative linkages between Academia and Industry so that academic programmes and research are informed by industry and enable CPD needs within industry.

Through my own experience I’ve realised how critical CPD has been in terms of my career progression. Transitioning into different roles with increasing levels of responsibility and shifting from managing a small team into leading a large organisation can be daunting. It is critical that companies develop processes and systems to support and enable the growth of individuals to take on new challenges, equally it is very motivating to know that CPD is a core part of a company culture.

I have worked with Engineers Ireland as an expert CPD auditor since 2013 and one of the things I particularly enjoy is learning about the many approaches companies take in imbedding CPD in their DNA and seeing how that has enabled adaptability, flexibility and resilience particularly in the past few years where companies have been faced with many challenges.

Q2. What would say are the biggest changes you have seen in the organisations you have audited over the past 10 years?

In general, there has been a big shift in Industry 4.0 technology adoption, the generation and use of data and crossovers between disciplines (e.g Science, Medical and Engineering).  Some of the smallest companies may be far more technically advanced than larger organisations that may be slower to adopt technologies. Many companies have started or are beginning their digitalisation journey, shifting from data collection into data analysis and utilisation in order to proactively manage their business.

We also see a lot more product development that requires the merging of skill disciplines – this requires a different model of education that blends disciplines which were previously very disparate, and it is critical that Industry and Higher Education work very closely together to ensure that these emerging skills needs can be met.

With respect to CPD I’ve seen a huge change in how CPD is integrated at a company strategy level, as an enabler of growth. CPD has shifted from being about training courses to being about developing people to deliver a company vision. I believe the importance of CPD is becoming more widely recognised as a foundation for a company to enable their strategic aims. Additionally, CPD is more and more seen as a retention tool, employees want and expect professional development, they want to know they have a career path and support system if they choose to work somewhere.

Q3. What is the area that you believe Engineers excel at, and why? 

I think engineers are typically logical thinkers and can visualise how something complex fits together, this can be at a deep technical level but also at a process, system, and strategy level. I think we can break down something complex into smaller manageable steps and figure out the interactions between things. As a CPD Auditor, sometimes we see companies that have parallel technical and managerial/leadership career paths and I think engineers can excel at both because of this ability to see through and break down complexity into smaller components. 

Q4. Where is the area that you believe there is still room for improvement, and why?

I mentioned that I believe engineers can excel at both a technical and managerial/leadership career path. I would caveat this with the need for support in developing leadership skills, especially for senior technical and managerial roles where you are a team leader, coaching and motivating your team to perform. That was a big learning for me in my career transition from engineer to my first team management role. The role was far more about understanding people and what makes them tick, rather than having deep technical knowledge of every aspect of something.

As engineers we can fall into the trap of feeling we need to know all the technical details in order to display credibility, this can actually be debilitating while leading a technical team as they now have a manager who is still operating as an engineer and is not providing what they need in terms of strategic direction and support. I learned that understanding the basics of human psychology and behaviour are more critical as you move into leadership roles.

Q5. When you are not working to enable engineering-led organisations achieve their strategic objectives how do you like to spend your time?

I really enjoy spending time with my family, we have 2 girls aged 11 and 13 and 2 big energetic dogs. The girls are into GAA and anything to do with water, so we trek around to a lot of football matches, swimming competitions and surf spots. We love tent camping and exploring. I practice Tang Soo Do, a Korean form of Martial Arts and am halfway to my black belt, I also have taken up running since Covid, I never really ran before so this is new and surprisingly enjoyable!