(46a) Navigating Professional Service When It's Personal

Presentation by the recipient of the 2021 Award for Service to Chemical Engineering Education

“For dedicated leadership and service in chemical engineering education, including contributions toward diversity and equity, particularly fostering an inclusive climate for LGBTQ+&Ally students and professionals.”

Building on the contributions of many who came before them, an engineer can see even their small improvements to a process lead to wide-reaching positive impacts. This potential of chemical engineering to be a potent helping profession not only attracts new engineers but also serves as an addictive source of purpose on the job. To build on the work of others and find those small improvements with large impact similarly motivates a great deal of professional service, particularly for those who have experienced problematic communities in the past.

For that motivation, many of us say ‘yes’ to every service opportunity that comes our way, reflexively. There is a lot to say ‘yes’ to: advising student groups, reviewing papers and proposals, chairing divisions, joining committees, giving workshops, chairing committees, community outreach, initiating initiatives, and much more. Additionally, there is a lot of community service one can not reasonably say ‘no’ to, particularly as an educator, from pushing back against bias to helping students in distress connect with the help they need. The emotional and social labors can eclipse the technical labors, and an engineer could work through each day on only service to their community, without ever using the technical skills of their formal education.

I have taken on a fair share of those professional service opportunities. I have done a fair percentage of it acceptably, but stumbled at an equally fair percentage. In this talk, I aim to share the professional service insights I wish I had encountered earlier in my career. Additional focus will be given to professional service around the LGBTQ+ engineering community, and I will discuss the complicating role that personal histories with bias in engineering can have in compelling and contextualizing service roles.