There is no 'single right answer' for engineers. How to find the 'right answer' that you should learn while you are young [Developing talent in your late 30s/early 40s]

Is 'careful guidance' hindering development?

There is a slightly concerning trend I see in engineers in their late 20s who have reached a position where they mentor junior staff. It is teaching newcomers step-by-step procedures, and doing so with the nuance that 'this is the right answer'.

I understand the sentiment. You want to properly pass on the correct methods you learned yourself. You don't want them to take unnecessary detours. I don't think that kind of guidance comes from malice. However, I would like you to hold on for a moment.

For example, in school education, I think 'teaching the right answer' is the correct approach. This is because studying is a place where there are right answers, and you train the ability to figure out how to derive them.

But what about work?

The procedures you are teaching may indeed be the right answer at this moment, representing the collective wisdom of many people. But that is only true at the time those procedures were created. No one knows if it is the right answer for this very moment.

The right answer stops being the right answer depending on the prerequisites

Why do right answers change so often? The reason is simple: the prerequisites surrounding work are constantly changing.

Using a 'manual for using a certain system' as an example, I would like to list a few prerequisites.

Prerequisite 1: People change
There is no way a manual for knowledgeable people and a manual for absolute beginners should have the same content, right?
If the level of the user changes, the optimal form and granularity of information provision also change.

Prerequisite 2: Tools change
What if the tool used in the manual undergoes a major update, and the operation feel and appearance change significantly?
The previous manual might not be wrong, but it cannot be called the right answer.

Prerequisite 3: Time changes
For example, if you provide contact information in a manual, and the support desk differs between weekday daytime and nights/holidays, the right answer changes depending on 'when you use it'.

There is no end to the examples, but with so many prerequisites changing rapidly, how much meaning is there in conveying a 'single right answer'?

In the first place, there is no single right answer in engineering work

You might feel anxious when you hear that 'there is no right answer', but in engineering work, there is almost no such thing as a single right answer.

Moreover, unfortunately, there are wrong answers. A wrong answer is when a result clearly deviates from the objective.

However, conversely, if it does not deviate from the objective, it can be said to be one right answer.

It is necessary to value the perspective of not deviating from this objective, and there is no need to pursue a single right answer.

Engineers are required to have an attitude of exploring diverse approaches to achieve their goals.

It is true that there are examples of correct answers and theories in work.

However, there is often no single correct answer that anyone knows, and it varies from person to person. This is because many people are involved in work, and diverse perspectives intervene in decision-making.

That is precisely why the process of how you reached this conclusion is important.

If there is consistency between the process and the conclusion from an objective point of view, it becomes one valid 'answer,' regardless of whether it is the optimal solution.

Being able to build your own logic and explain it is far more valuable than tracing a correct answer decided by someone else.

To young engineers: I don't want you to try to find the correct answer.

I understand the desire of young engineers to seek a 'correct answer'.

But I don't think that is caused by your laziness, but rather by the excessive efficiency brought about by the information society, the so-called trend of prioritizing time performance.

With an environment where anyone can access a decent answer at any time becoming the norm, hasn't searching only for 'results' become a habit before we knew it?

But speaking clearly from the position of a boss or senior, I don't have such result-oriented expectations for young people. I almost never make young people take responsibility for results, and I place more importance on the process of how they arrived at the answer.

That is why I want you to make it a habit to provide answers as a set with the process while you are young. Once you receive feedback, try to do it a little more efficiently next time by utilizing it—that kind of stance is enough.

Trial and error with a process is far more valuable than a correct answer without a process.

To veteran engineers: I don't want you to teach as if there is a correct answer.

Teaching even the detailed procedures and having them executed exactly as instructed may indeed be an effective means of completing tasks efficiently.

But what will happen when the young people raised in that way become the ones in a position to instruct others in a few years?

People who have only been taught procedures can only pass on those procedures to the next generation of young people. Procedures are passed on while the 'why' is left out. Such transmission work will be replaced by generative AI in the future.

What is important is the purpose, and conveying the background of 'why it is that way'.

Instead of mass-producing people who are driven by manuals, we should cultivate people who can create manuals themselves.

To that end, I believe the true role of a veteran is not to force a correct answer upon them, but to teach them that no such correct answer exists while showing them how to arrive at one.