What about sustainability? Adding the “S” to leadership and management competency development in the engineering curriculum

Abstract

To provide a framework for engineering educators to map leadership and management skills development in the curriculum, the authors previously created a Leadership-Management Development Model (LMDM). In this paper we look to extend the model to include sustainability by using an “environmental limits approach”, creating a  Leadership-Management -Sustainability Development Model (LMSDM). Adding the sustainability dimension provides a contextual purpose for leadership and management development as it relates to creating and stewarding sustainable socio-technical engineering solutions. This can set a common language and a harmonized framework in the context of skills development and application in engineering practice to complex socio-technical problems. Ultimately the model will allow programs and instructors to map and situate the development of leadership, management and sustainability concepts in their programs in an integrated manner., and to examine learning outcomes relevant to the Canadian Engineering Accreditation Board (CEAB) graduate attributes (GA). Curricular examples are provided to give insight into application of the LMSDM in engineering courses and programs. Future work will include mapping the developed LMSDM to engineering curriculum at multiple institutions.