Engineering to inspire

Sell Your Idea!

You’ve got your idea. You’ve submitted it.

More importantly, you’re a Create2011 finalist!

So what next?

Apart from garnering votes (very, very important if you want to win that 4-day trip to Nokia Singapore and Beijing!), Create2011 finalists must create prototypes and present them to our judges!

That’s actually three different posts: one on garnering votes; another on prototypes (which our CoTs will be mentoring); and finally on presentation.

Last week, our guest writer Ong Yizhen wrote a rousing post on how to do up and present your idea to kick ass (like our favourite non super-powered hero).

Kick Ass movie trailer

But what would rock the Creators of Tomorrows’ boat? We’ve polled them for their responses and found that it’s a mixed bag of acting and tips.

Got a problem? Tell us at creators.of.tomorrow@gmail.com and we’ll help you out!

Create 2011 Help Files: On teamwork

You’ve got a bright idea for Create2011. So does your teammate.

Here’s the problem: you both think that your own idea’s better than the other… So how do you resolve it?

Or what if your teammate isn’t doing any work?

Or what if you just don’t have the time to work together?

They are problems that every team will face. In fact, you might just be having a teamwork crisis right now! But working in teams is a big part of doing engineering. In fact, engineering projects are just too large-scale for anyone to do on their own.

While we realise there might problems, just talking about it doesn’t solve it. That’s why we got the Creators of Tomorrow to weigh in on how to work better as a team.

Got a problem? Tell us at creators.of.tomorrow@gmail.com and we’ll help you out!

Create 2011 Help Files: How do I know if my ideas are good?

It’s easy to know if we made it in school. Our report cards have A’s, B’s, C’s on them. Problem is: it gets thorny outside of school where standards (e.g. 90 marks = A) become somewhat fuzzy and arbitrary.

That includes the Create2011 Engineering Challenge.

We’re looking for “a brilliant idea related to the theme of Future Mobility, one which can improve the way we play, think, live and connect.”

But how do we know if our ideas are “brilliant”?

The judges will tell us…if we make it to the finals. But we’ll need some way of deciding before then; to see if we’re “on track” or not.

So for this instalment of the Create2011 Help Files, the Creators of Tomorrow tell us what they think makes a brilliant idea.

Note: These are some ways to help you judge if your ideas are good. Tell us what you think about them in the comments…

Just who is: Andrew McGlinchey of Google

“Hey, what’s an ornithopter?”

“I don’t know. Just google it.”

Now look up “ornithopter” without using a search engine. Hard isn’t it? That’s why we’re thankful for search engines like Google, and Google’s thankful to its engineers.

Engineers like Andrew McGlinchey, product manager at Google, who:

“Causes Googley things to happen in Southeast Asia. I am the bridge between the software engineering teams and the users, as well as the other parts of Google (like marketing, business development, and marketing). I figure out what the products should be and work with the engineering team to make that happen.”

This is Andrew’s second appearance on our blog (read his five things to know about engineering). This time it’s all about him and his views on engineering.

Before we let him loose, if you’re “right now in a university dorm room, or a garage or somewhere, creating the next amazing innovation that we’ll all be using five years from now” drop Andrew a line ‘cause he would love to be in your shoes.

5 things to know about engineering

*Creator of Tomorrow, Andrew McGlinchey, guest blogs*

In case you didn’t catch it, I was on 938Live Passion People. It was crazy cool talking about UCreateChange, innovation and engineering, as well as whether locals are creative (they are, you just don’t know it yet).

It’s a great first step at dispelling old-fashioned notions about engineering (and engineering folk).

And that’s what the Creators of Tomorrow are here -- to let people know that it’s a lot more fun, exciting and creative then the usual engineering myths. For this blog post, I’d like to expand on five engineering characteristics that I’ve mentioned in the interview* and give examples on what’s cool about them.

* FYI, my interview with 938Live is posted at the bottom. :)