Engineering Culture

Engineering Culture PDF Author: Gideon Kunda
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Control (Psychology)
Languages : en
Pages : 348

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Book Description
"Engineering Culture" is an award-winning ethnography of the engineering division of a large American high-tech corporation. Now, this influential book - which has been translated into Japanese, Italian and Hebrew - has been revised to bring it up to date. In "Engineering Culture", Gideon Kunda offers a critical analysis of an American company's well-known and widely emulated "corporate culture." Kunda uses detailed descriptions of everyday interactions and rituals in which the culture is brought to life, excerpts from in-depth interviews and a wide variety of corporate texts to vividly portray managerial attempts to design and impose the culture and the ways in which it is experienced by members of the organization. The company's management, Kunda reveals, uses a variety of methods to promulgate what it claims is a non-authoritarian, informal, and flexible work environment that enhances and rewards individual commitment, initiative, and creativity while promoting personal growth. The author demonstrates, however, that these pervasive efforts mask an elaborate and subtle form of normative control in which the members' minds and hearts become the target of corporate influence. Kunda carefully dissects the impact this form of control has on employees' work behavior and on their sense of self. In the conclusion written especially for this edition, Kunda reviews the company's fortunes in the years that followed publication of the first edition, reevaluates the arguments in the book, and explores the relevance of corporate culture and its management today

Engineering Culture

Engineering Culture PDF Author: Gideon Kunda
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Control (Psychology)
Languages : en
Pages : 348

Get Book

Book Description
"Engineering Culture" is an award-winning ethnography of the engineering division of a large American high-tech corporation. Now, this influential book - which has been translated into Japanese, Italian and Hebrew - has been revised to bring it up to date. In "Engineering Culture", Gideon Kunda offers a critical analysis of an American company's well-known and widely emulated "corporate culture." Kunda uses detailed descriptions of everyday interactions and rituals in which the culture is brought to life, excerpts from in-depth interviews and a wide variety of corporate texts to vividly portray managerial attempts to design and impose the culture and the ways in which it is experienced by members of the organization. The company's management, Kunda reveals, uses a variety of methods to promulgate what it claims is a non-authoritarian, informal, and flexible work environment that enhances and rewards individual commitment, initiative, and creativity while promoting personal growth. The author demonstrates, however, that these pervasive efforts mask an elaborate and subtle form of normative control in which the members' minds and hearts become the target of corporate influence. Kunda carefully dissects the impact this form of control has on employees' work behavior and on their sense of self. In the conclusion written especially for this edition, Kunda reviews the company's fortunes in the years that followed publication of the first edition, reevaluates the arguments in the book, and explores the relevance of corporate culture and its management today

Creating a Software Engineering Culture

Creating a Software Engineering Culture PDF Author: Karl E. Wiegers
Publisher: Addison-Wesley
ISBN: 0133489299
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 579

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Book Description
This is the digital version of the printed book (Copyright © 1996). Written in a remarkably clear style, Creating a Software Engineering Culture presents a comprehensive approach to improving the quality and effectiveness of the software development process. In twenty chapters spread over six parts, Wiegers promotes the tactical changes required to support process improvement and high-quality software development. Throughout the text, Wiegers identifies scores of culture builders and culture killers, and he offers a wealth of references to resources for the software engineer, including seminars, conferences, publications, videos, and on-line information. With case studies on process improvement and software metrics programs and an entire part on action planning (called “What to Do on Monday”), this practical book guides the reader in applying the concepts to real life. Topics include software culture concepts, team behaviors, the five dimensions of a software project, recognizing achievements, optimizing customer involvement, the project champion model, tools for sharing the vision, requirements traceability matrices, the capability maturity model, action planning, testing, inspections, metrics-based project estimation, the cost of quality, and much more! Principles from Part 1 Never let your boss or your customer talk you into doing a bad job. People need to feel the work they do is appreciated. Ongoing education is every team member’s responsibility. Customer involvement is the most critical factor in software quality. Your greatest challenge is sharing the vision of the final product with the customer. Continual improvement of your software development process is both possible and essential. Written software development procedures can help build a shared culture of best practices. Quality is the top priority; long-term productivity is a natural consequence of high quality. Strive to have a peer, rather than a customer, find a defect. A key to software quality is to iterate many times on all development steps except coding: Do this once. Managing bug reports and change requests is essential to controlling quality and maintenance. If you measure what you do, you can learn to do it better. You can’t change everything at once. Identify those changes that will yield the greatest benefits, and begin to implement them next Monday. Do what makes sense; don’t resort to dogma.

Engineering Culture

Engineering Culture PDF Author: Gideon Kunda
Publisher: Temple University Press
ISBN: 1592135471
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 320

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Book Description
A revised edition of the classic text on the sociology of management and organization.

Engineering Culture

Engineering Culture PDF Author: Geoff Cox
Publisher: Autonomedia
ISBN: 1570271704
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 241

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Book Description
Social change does not simply result from resistance to the existing set of conditions but from adapting and transforming the technical apparatus itself. Walter Benjamin in his essay "The Author as Producer" (written in 1934) recommends that the 'cultural producer' intervene in the production process, in order to transform the apparatus in the manner of an engineer.This collection of essays and examples of contemporary cultural practices (the second in the DATA browser series) asks if this general line of thinking retains relevance for cultural production at this point in time -- when activities of production, consumption and circulation operate through complex global networks served by information technologies. In the 1930s, under particular conditions and against the backdrop of fascism, a certain political optimism made social change seem more possible. Can this optimism be maintained when technology operates in the service of capital in ever more insidious ways?

How Culture Shapes the Climate Change Debate

How Culture Shapes the Climate Change Debate PDF Author: Andrew J. Hoffman
Publisher: Stanford University Press
ISBN: 0804795053
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 120

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Book Description
Though the scientific community largely agrees that climate change is underway, debates about this issue remain fiercely polarized. These conversations have become a rhetorical contest, one where opposing sides try to achieve victory through playing on fear, distrust, and intolerance. At its heart, this split no longer concerns carbon dioxide, greenhouse gases, or climate modeling; rather, it is the product of contrasting, deeply entrenched worldviews. This brief examines what causes people to reject or accept the scientific consensus on climate change. Synthesizing evidence from sociology, psychology, and political science, Andrew J. Hoffman lays bare the opposing cultural lenses through which science is interpreted. He then extracts lessons from major cultural shifts in the past to engender a better understanding of the problem and motivate the public to take action. How Culture Shapes the Climate Change Debate makes a powerful case for a more scientifically literate public, a more socially engaged scientific community, and a more thoughtful mode of public discourse.

An Elegant Puzzle

An Elegant Puzzle PDF Author: Will Larson
Publisher: Stripe Press
ISBN: 1953953336
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 281

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Book Description
A human-centric guide to solving complex problems in engineering management, from sizing teams to handling technical debt. There’s a saying that people don’t leave companies, they leave managers. Management is a key part of any organization, yet the discipline is often self-taught and unstructured. Getting to the good solutions for complex management challenges can make the difference between fulfillment and frustration for teams—and, ultimately, between the success and failure of companies. Will Larson’s An Elegant Puzzle focuses on the particular challenges of engineering management—from sizing teams to handling technical debt to performing succession planning—and provides a path to the good solutions. Drawing from his experience at Digg, Uber, and Stripe, Larson has developed a thoughtful approach to engineering management for leaders of all levels at companies of all sizes. An Elegant Puzzle balances structured principles and human-centric thinking to help any leader create more effective and rewarding organizations for engineers to thrive in.

Culture of Cells for Tissue Engineering

Culture of Cells for Tissue Engineering PDF Author: Gordana Vunjak-Novakovic
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0471741809
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 528

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Book Description
Step-by-step, practical guidance for the acquisition, manipulation,and use of cell sources for tissue engineering Tissue engineering is a multidisciplinary field incorporatingthe principles of biology, chemistry, engineering, and medicine tocreate biological substitutes of native tissues for scientificresearch or clinical use. Specific applications of this technologyinclude studies of tissue development and function, investigatingdrug response, and tissue repair and replacement. This area israpidly becoming one of the most promising treatment options forpatients suffering from tissue failure. Written by leading experts in the field, Culture of Cellsfor Tissue Engineering offers step-by-step, practicalguidance for the acquisition, manipulation, and use of cell sourcesfor tissue engineering. It offers a unique focus on tissueengineering methods for cell sourcing and utilization, combiningtheoretical overviews and detailed procedures. Features of the text include: Easy-to-use format with a two-part organization Logically organized—part one discusses cell sourcing,preparation, and characterization and the second part examinesspecific engineered tissues Each chapter covers: structural and functional properties oftissues, methodological principles, culture, cellselection/expansion, cell modifications, cell seeding, tissueculture, analytical assays, and a detailed description ofrepresentative studies End-of-chapter features include useful listings of sources forreagents, materials, and supplies, with the contact details of thesuppliers listed at the end of the book A section of elegant color plates to back up the figures in thechapters Culture of Cells for Tissue Engineering givesnovice and seasoned researchers in tissue engineering an invaluableresource. In addition, the text is suitable for professionals inrelated research, particularly in those areas where cell and tissueculture is a new or emerging tool.

Essential Practices for Creating, Strengthening, and Sustaining Process Safety Culture

Essential Practices for Creating, Strengthening, and Sustaining Process Safety Culture PDF Author: CCPS (Center for Chemical Process Safety)
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 1119515173
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 416

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Book Description
An essential guide that offers an understanding of and the practices needed to assess and strengthen process safety culture Essential Practices for Developing, Strengthening and Implementing Process Safety Culture presents a much-needed guide for understanding an organization's working culture and contains information on why a good culture is essential for safe, cost-effective, and high-quality operations. The text defines process safety culture and offers information on a safety culture’s history, organizational impact and benefits, and the role that leadership plays at all levels of an organization. In addition, the book outlines the core principles needed to assess and strengthen process safety culture such as: maintain a sense of vulnerability; combat normalization of deviance; establish an imperative for safety; perform valid, timely, hazard and risk assessments; ensure open and frank communications; learn and advance the culture. This important guide also reviews leadership standards within the organizational structure, warning signs of cultural degradation and remedies, as well as the importance of using diverse methods over time to assess culture. This vital resource: Provides an overview for understanding an organization's working culture Offers guidance on why a good culture is essential for safe, cost-effective, and high quality operations Includes down-to-earth advice for recognizing, assessing, strengthening and sustaining a good process safety culture Contains illustrative examples and cases studies, and references to literature, codes, and standards Written for corporate, business and line managers, engineers, and process safety professionals interested in excellent performance for their organization, Essential Practices for Developing, Strengthening and Implementing Process Safety Culture is the go-to reference for implementing and keeping in place a culture of safety.

The Effective Engineer

The Effective Engineer PDF Author: Edmond Lau
Publisher: Effective Bookshelf
ISBN: 9780996128100
Category : Computer programmers
Languages : en
Pages : 260

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Book Description
Introducing The Effective Engineer--the only book designed specifically for today's software engineers, based on extensive interviews with engineering leaders at top tech companies, and packed with hundreds of techniques to accelerate your career.

On Line and On Paper

On Line and On Paper PDF Author: Kathryn Henderson
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 9780262262996
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 258

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Book Description
The role of representation in the production of technoscientific knowledge has become a subject of great interest in recent years. In this book, sociologist and art critic Kathryn Henderson offers a new perspective on this topic by exploring the impact of computer graphic systems on the visual culture of engineering design. Henderson shows how designers use drawings both to organize work and knowledge and to recruit and organize resources, political support, and power. Henderson's analysis of the collective nature of knowledge in technical design work is based on her participant observation of practices in two industrial settings. In one she follows the evolution of a turbine engine package from design to production, and in the other she examines the development of an innovative surgical tool. In both cases she describes the messy realities of design practice, including the mixed use of the worlds of paper and computer graphics. One of the goals of the book is to lay a practice-informed groundwork for the creation of more usable computer tools. Henderson also explores the relationship between the historical development of engineering as a profession and the standardization of engineering knowledge, and then addresses the question: Just what is high technology, and how does its affect the extent to which people will allow their working habits to be disrupted and restructured? Finally, to help explain why visual representations are so powerful, Henderson develops the concept of "metaindexicality"—the ability of a visual representation, used interactively, to combine many diverse levels of knowledge and thus to serve as a meeting ground (and sometimes battleground) for many types of workers.