Our thanks to Bernard McGrath for sharing his “Musings” with us. 

It has been a while since I participated in an organised sporting event. In the past I have undertaken a variety, but there are a couple I have deliberately avoided. The first is the marathon, having decided to limit myself to the half-marathon, which combines an enjoyable distance with sufficient challenge. Doubling the distance seemed, to me at least, not worth the pain nor the extra commitment in training time. The second is the obstacle race, which has become very popular in recent years. I have avoided the latter partly because of age: the races established themselves after I had lost the exuberance of youth and I can think of more attractive ways of testing my limits than being trodden in mud and electrocuted, whilst paying for the privilege.

This is just the way I see things. They do not apply to, nor colour my appreciation of the many thousands of people who think differently and participate. On the contrary, I am interested in peoples’ experience of all such events. This is why I sat down with my daughter’s obstacle course team to hear their tales of individual mishaps and personal achievements as they enjoyed the best part of all such events: the post-finish reminiscence, when the physical pain and mental anguish have relinquished their grip and faded to such an extent that individuals start to contemplate their next event.

If you are expecting me to disclose that I have signed up for a forthcoming organised event, then I am sorry to disappoint. As one of the group was an engineer, once the subject of traversing the obstacles had run its course, the conversation turned to engineering. I was waxing lyrical (to my daughter’s embarrassment, but that is what Dads are for) on the fact that people don’t go into engineering for the money but rather because of interest in the subject and the challenge it offers. This interest does not end just because you reach a certain age, which is why a lot of people continue working or contributing to the profession beyond the nominal retirement age. The young engineer agreed and gave a quotation, which he had modified and adopted: “I do engineering for free, I get paid for the bullshit.” He had come across this in the book Big Man by Clarence Clemens and Don Reo and substituted engineering for the original word, music. Evidently this phrase has been used a lot.

Not long afterwards, a newly published book by David Graeber, Bullshit Jobs: A Theory, was reviewed in the newspapers. It highlights the increasing prevalence of jobs with tasks that do not really need to be performed. These are likely to be good jobs with social status and good pay. Following the publication of an article in 2013, which was the precursor to the book, a YouGov poll found that 37% of British adults in work said their job didn’t contribute to the world and 33% didn’t find their jobs fulfilling (https://yougov.co.uk/news/2015/08/12/british-jobs-meaningless/). Of course NDT is a task that needs to be performed, probably more than it actually is! Just over a year ago I wrote that a key motivation for work is the feeling that you are doing something worthwhile, making a contribution beyond your immediate environment, to a service which was of benefit to society. I highlighted that the NDT profession has all these attributes. But it is important to avoid complacency. As implied by the quotation above, all jobs have meaningless tasks associated with them and it is important to ensure that they do not smother the engineering that is the main source of satisfaction.

Inspirations for these articles are a bit like buses: none for a time and then three turn up at once. Sure enough, on 3rd July 2018, Radio 4 broadcast Square Pegs in Round Holes, the first of a two-part series about why people end up in jobs which do not suit them and how they can avoid it. A startling statistic was quoted: In Britain, 75% of workers “feel they are in jobs which don’t suit them or which they simply hate”. This not only affects industry due to the impact on productivity but also the individuals themselves through stress and illness. There are many reasons why the majority of people end up in the wrong jobs and, what is more, stay in those jobs, just as they stay in what they consider to be meaningless jobs.

If you agree or disagree, please submit your views and comments to either myself or the editor. Next month I hope to provide evidence to support these ramblings.

Email: ndtnews@bindt.org or email Bernard McGrath direct at bernard.mcqrath@woodplc.com