Guru Madhavan

A journey inside the minds that build our world.

How Engineers Think

Applied Minds

Dubai’s Burj Khalifa – the world’s tallest building – looks nothing like Microsoft’s Office Suite, and digital surround sound doesn’t work like a citywide telecommunication grid. Yet these engineering feats have much in common: they are the result of a unique thinking process combining abstract and structured thinking, common sense and great imagination. They are born of the engineering mindset. In this groundbreaking and lively work, Guru Madhavan reveals the extraordinary influence of engineering on society, not just today but throughout history. Drawing on a cast of star engineers like Steve Jobs, the Wright brothers and Thomas Edison, Madhavan explores aspects of this mindset and shows its usefulness to life and business – in areas as varied as traffic congestion to health care to filmmaking. Full of case studies and practical insights spanning the brilliant history of engineering, Think Like an Engineer is in equal parts personal, practical, and profound. It reveals how key engineering concepts can help you make better decisions and create innovative solutions in a complex world.

Inside the Minds that are Changing our Lives

Think Like An Engineer

Charles E. Phelps

Systems engineering offers a set of capabilities and competencies to design and manage complex systems as they evolve. Drawing from social choice research and systems engineering practice, Making Better Choices examines how we make decisions together and the tools we use to arrive at those decisions. It takes a critical look at the rules and methods we apply to important decisions--from how we run meetings to how we elect presidents--with an interest in how we can improve these mechanisms. By reviewing different voting systems, their original intents, and their deficits, the authors outline a systems engineering approach to making collective choices in society. Written by an economist and an engineer, this groundbreaking work draws from insights in sociology, linguistics, law, political science, philosophy, psychology, economics, and systems design. In an era of relentless rating, this book offers a fresh vision for engineering better democracies by enabling diverse and inclusive choices

Design, Decisions, and Democracy

Making Better Choices

"Our collective decisions usually revolve around three basic factors. First, how many people are affected by the decision. Second, how many people make the decision. Third, how important is the decision both to the makers and recipients of the decisions"--

Barbara Oakley

Penny Low

David Green

David Koon

Sustainability applies to everybody. But everybody applies it differently, by defining and shaping it differently—much as water is edged and shaped by its container. It is conceived in absolute terms but underpinned by a great diversity of relatively “green”—and sometimes contradictory—practices that can each make society only more or less sustainable. In Practicing Sustainability, chefs, poets, music directors, evangelical pastors, skyscraper architects, artists, filmmakers, as well as scientific leaders, entrepreneurs, educators, business executives, policy makers, and the contrarians, shed light on our understanding of sustainability and the role that each of us can play. Each contributor addresses what sustainability means, what is most appealing about the concept, and what they would like to change to improve the perception and practice of sustainability. What emerges from their essays is a wide spectrum of views that confirm an important insight: Sustainability is pursued in different ways not only due to different interpretations, but also because of varying incentives, trade-offs, and altruistic motives. Practicing and achieving sustainability starts with a willingness to look critically at the concept. It also means enabling rich and vigorous discussion based on pragmatism and common sense to determine a framework for best ideas and practices. With time and the much needed critical thinking, sustainable development will become a more integral part of our culture. By sharing experiences and crisp insights from today’s savants, Practicing Sustainability serves as a stepping stone to the future.

Guru Madhavan

Books

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