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Asked by saieem to Alex, Claire, Kate, Marcus, Neil on 17 Jun 2014.
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Claire Brockett answered on 17 Jun 2014:
Hi saieem
Great question.
Yes I have been in several situations where I didn’t know what to do. Fortunately as an engineer I often work in a team, so there’s usually someone to ask for help if I’m not sure or to get ideas from. Some engineering problems can be pretty tricky and it’s difficult to know where to start! Team work usually saves the day on these occassions 🙂
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Alex Lyness answered on 17 Jun 2014:
Hey saleem,
The truth, just like Claire hinted at, is all the time! If you always new everything already where would the fun be in working all your life?
I am constantly learning and getting better everyday. That shouldn’t stop after school or Uni or even a PhD!
When things get tricky there are always people on stand by to be able to help and brain storm solutions with. That’s why research groups at Loughborough (where I am) or Leeds (where Claire is) are made up of all different types of researchers all pooling there collective knowledge to over come problems together.
Also… Google helps a lot too! 😀
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Marcus Johns answered on 17 Jun 2014:
As with Claire and Alex, this happens all the time to me. I generally have 3 ways to find an answer.
1. Ask a colleague or someone that you think might have an answer. This is generally the quickest method, assuming that someone knows the answer!
2. Read around the subject or situation. Chances are that someone else has been in the same situation or is thinking about a similar problem. For researchers this includes papers and review articles, but the internet usually can give you an answer.
3. Sleep on it. If all else fails, don’t panic. Do something else for a while and then come back to it later. There’s been many a time when I’ve woken up or 2 in the morning with a brilliant idea to resolve all my problems, or at least 1 of them.
There is, of course, a 4th option. This is to just go with whatever your instinct tells you to do and hope that it turns out for the best. It doesn’t always work, but that’s life! Either way, if I do get into a situation where I don’t know what to do, I try to come up with a decision within a day or two at most. Otherwise you end up spending your life sitting on the fence and not really going anywhere.
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Kate Niehaus answered on 18 Jun 2014:
Nearly every day!
I think the others have answered this pretty well already – my usually way to approach these situations sounds similar to what Marcus does.
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