EBU • UER - Technical Review

No. 297 (January 2004)

Good engineers are good communicators ...

Feedback from our readers indicates that the articles selected for publication in the EBU Technical Review are highly appreciated – mainly because they offer clear explanations of complicated subjects. As a significant proportion of those reading the Technical Review are non-engineers, many of our authors deserve particular praise.

How often have you heard people say "I am sure that he's very good at his job, but I can never follow what he is talking about"? Of course, it would be unfair to suggest that such communications problems are unique to engineers in the world of broadcasting. It is a sad fact that engineers, scientists, lawyers or other specialists have problems in communicating with people from outside their disciplines.

In the early days of broadcasting, the new technology of broadcasting was commonly judged to be almost "magical" – even by those working in broadcasting. In those circumstances, engineers were revered, partly because they had made broadcasting possible and partly because the equipment was so unreliable. The fact that non-engineers could not understand the engineers merely added to their mystique!

It is interesting to reflect that the first Director General of the BBC, John Reith, was an engineer. How many EBU Members are today run by an engineer? I think that the answer is currently only one – Mr Kiril Gotsev, the Director General of Bulgarian National Television.

For many years, a large proportion of the annual expenditure of most broadcasters was devoted to building studios, developing outside broadcast facilities and extending transmitter networks. This meant that the Director of Engineering became a key figure – especially as only he and his colleagues could really judge whether this expenditure was necessary. In essence, senior managers trusted the engineers to make the correct decisions about new technologies, mainly because the non-engineers were not interested in such matters.

In the late 1980s, I recall hearing a complaint from a senior non-technical person in the BBC that "the Queen is more likely to award an honour to the BBC's Director of Engineering than to the Director General". In some ways, this was understandable because the Director General is responsible for editorial policy and, thus, can easily offend the Government (and the Queen) – whereas the Director of Engineering is simply expected to do his "complicated" job well.

As the world of broadcasting became more complex, many broadcasters realized that technological choices can dramatically affect their competitive position, and even "make" or "break" their organization. The future of each EBU Member is intricately linked with technology. Despite the current period of unprecedented technological developments, it is important to recognize that "technology is now too important to be left to the engineers".

At the same time, technology has become all-pervasive. TV cameras are no longer used only by broadcasters: digital camcorders are widely used by holidaymakers – some of whom have sophisticated video editing software on their home computers. When the world is full of such "experts", it is not surprising that traditional engineers in broadcasting are no longer revered.

We must overcome some serious obstacles. Recently, I gave two lectures to a group of engineers. During the lunch break, I asked the hosts to give me an honest opinion of my first lecture. Although they were very polite, I sensed that there was some problem. Eventually, I was told that the problem was "we understood everything you said." My hosts felt that I should demonstrate my "superior" knowledge by including some elements in my second lecture that nobody would understand!

Such behaviour is common in the academic community, but it is surely not appropriate in an environment where we need to share our knowledge and experience.

I must admit that, recently, I found a technical paper that I had written in the early 1970s. Looking through it, I was disturbed to realize that I could understand the introduction and the conclusions – but I was baffled by the rest of the paper. Had my brain power diminished to the point where I could not understand what I had written 30 years ago? Had I really written it? After a few minutes of study, I solved the problem. In those days, it was almost respectable to write papers that nobody understood: it might even help your promotion prospects if your boss said "I cannot understand his work myself – but he's obviously very clever". I am sure that such devious behaviour is a thing of the past – or is it?

The introduction of computer-based production systems in broadcasting has highlighted another communications gap. Many broadcast engineers have difficulties in communicating with IT professionals (and vice versa). To some extent, this is due to differences in philosophy: most computer networks function on a "best effort" basis, whereas broadcast engineers know that production staff demand 100% reliability. It does not matter much if you have to wait 5 seconds for a word-processing document to be opened from a network server, but a sports producer rightly expects an instant response when cutting between cameras!

I have heard it said that less than 10% of broadcast engineers can be trained to be experts in IT – and that less than 10% of IT engineers can be trained to become experts in broadcasting. Fortunately, there are some individuals who can function well in both environments. If you are one of them, you are guaranteed life-time employment – as long as you can also talk to non-engineers!

Few engineers are able to explain technical concepts to non-engineers. Of course, there is the problem of technical jargon which causes despair amongst many non-engineers. But this is not the only problem: the non-engineers probably want to understand the "big picture", whilst many engineers are entranced by technical details. It is crucial that somebody (usually an engineer) understands the details so that faults can be rectified. However, many engineers expect other people to share their enthusiasm and interest – and become discouraged when people cannot understand their explanations.

Senior managers really do need high-quality advice on technology. They need to recognize that their engineers can help them to understand the complexities of the digital world. Christian Nissen (Director-General of DR, Denmark) acknowledges that engineers need to try harder to communicate with non-engineers, but he also believes that the senior managers must try to understand technical concepts: he has even suggested that every Director-General should be familiar with terms such as "single-frequency network".

It is no longer sufficient for engineers to be simply "experts" on technical matters. We must provide practical advice, emphasize the strategic implications of new technologies and, most importantly, work closely with non-technical experts on an inter-disciplinary basis.
Engineers must make determined efforts to make sure that they are understood. If they do not do so, their advice will be ignored.

Philip Laven
Director
EBU Technical Department

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