A few weeks back I wrote a series on engineering leadership in which I discussed the importance of overcoming failure in order to develop and progress. Failure is a natural part of the iterative process and is required in order to define and understand your objectives and goals. EDSI needs to be lean, to succeed EDSI needs to have well defined goals and a problem statement limited to just a few words. This has to be core to the project and everything EDSI sets out to achieve must be centred around this core objective. Defining this has taken years of purposeful iteration; digging deeper and constantly asking why.
The ideas behind EDSI started, a few years back, with an interest in regeneration and sustainability, and the question of how to consider the different stakeholders throughout a regeneration project. This has led me to study and research different ideas and from an initial interest I discovered a passion for different themes. To dig deeper I had to constantly move outside my comfort zone in order to understand different perspectives; trying and testing different ideas to understand how they relate back to engineering. A couple of months back I started the DSIL (Design for Social Innovation and Leadership) course, which is ran in partnership with UPEACE, the course brought together different subjects I am passionate about. This provided me with the opportunity to start EDSI with the tagline of connecting the dots between people and engineering.
When starting EDSI I didn’t have a plan, mission statement or core objective. My main aim was to share my journey to South East Asia and my passion for civil engineering. As EDSI has developed, so have I, and during the trip to South East Asia I was finally able to define my core goal for EDSI. This goal connects what I am passionate about and enabled me to have a strong focus moving EDSI from a conceptual idea towards real world impact. Focusing on the why has taken me on the journey of a lifetime, in doing this I have built up a project with a purpose.