Engineering in a pandemic: the impact of remote working and learning on quality of work produced

ABSTRACT

CONTEXT COVID-19 has shocked the globe since December 2019, with unprecedented international and domestic travel restrictions and self-isolation policies enacted by governments around the world. With lockdown policies in place in hopes of preventing further spread of this disease, there has been a widespread transition into learning and working from home - causing a paradigm shift in traditional working and learning cultures. PURPOSE OR GOAL This study aims to investigate the effects of transitioning into remote learning and working on the quality of work produced, specifically by electrical and electronic engineers in Australia. The objective is to identify factors relating to an individual's ability to produce self-defined quality work and identify any emerging themes due to the change in learning and working environments. APPROACH OR METHODOLOGY/METHODS A total of six participants, consisting of five students and one senior engineer, was recruited and interviewed. Each brought their own unique perspective on the matter via semi-structured interviews where they were asked questions regarding their learning/working experience before and during remote learning/working. Defining quality working through the epistemology of practice, cooperative work and self-efficacy, and connectivity, the researchers investigated how the ability to produce quality work has been affected due to the change in learning/working environment. OUTCOMES The representative data indicated that feedback, open collaboration, and team rapport were the three key contributing factors to quality work during this transition to learning/working remotely. Feedback and collaboration contributed positively to quality work and a strong team rapport further augmented the individual's ability to produce quality work. CONCLUSIONS/RECOMMENDATIONS/SUMMARY This study provides an initial impression on the topic and invites further study to establish a deeper understanding behind the contributing factors towards quality work. Further studies into different engineering disciplines or a larger sample size to establish a larger data set is recommended to extract richer conclusions. Copyright © Tan, Marinelli, Male & Hassan, 2021.