Engineers? I’m about to start a geek fight.... Most IT requires little to nothing that would be classified as actual engineering.
If India had a million actual trained Civil, Mechanical, Electrical, Chemical and Software (and related disciplines) engineers they’d have a true national asset that they could tap and create value.
Instead they have a bunch of software installers and hardware rackers that they call “engineers”.
IT depends on somebody actually doing something real before it comes significantly into play. “google” is nothing without people who actually do something real that provides the content for them to index, sort, and distribute.
My father was a logistician in the nuclear weapons field, with a degree in Management (and 32 years in the Navy). His title at his last company was “Senior Engineer.”
They gave him a secretary because he refused to learn word-processing or even email!
Oh my! I think you’re right! Though I am not an IT professional I am an engineer of some 40 years. What one person said, if you are really an engineer you have the training in math, physics, chemistry, materials, thermodynamics, electricity, fluid flow, statics and dynamics and economics to eventually solve problems outside your field of expertise.
Engineering is the application of physical principles to economic means. Our study is often long on the physical principles part and short on the economic means.
My view after all these years is that engineers need more of two things added to the curriculum though it would make the program at least one or two semesters longer.... to which I say, tough. You can always ditch the humanities junk and save 6 to 9 hours. Frankly, the only thing I remember about my humanities classes is that there were girls in them! Add some business, finance and economics classes then require them to all enlist, preferably in the Marines, to develop leadership skills which first includes learning how to follow and take direction.
If I were to advise a youngster what discipline of engineering to study I believe it would be Mechanical with some electives in Civil and Electrical even if you only audit the course since so many have prerequisites. Study is costly but I believe we miss opportunities for study without credit. My undergraduate study even included things like agricultural economics... all about trading, commodities and futures. I believe engineers live in silos and need to look outward of the discipline for learning and understanding.
There are lots of engineering schools in the world that have the name only. Sadly, even janitors are sometimes referred to as engineers and like so many we see from some schools have the title without the credentials.
You won’t get an argument from me on that point. I go a little further and separate engineers into two camps - analytical and synthetical. Although we all do a little of both, you can be a better at analysis, or better at design. In my experience, the foreign-trained engineers are more adept on the analytical side, but are not often very creative.