What I appreciate from being an Environmental Engineering major
There is something from my background that people learn and often find counterintuitive and wonder how I ended up where I am now, working with data and technology for nearly two decades already. I have graduated with a B.Sc. with a major in Environmental Engineering - with the never-ending internal joke which still stands amidst my university colleagues being the "profession of the future".
The thing for me was that even during the university course I already started getting myself distant from what I was in principle studying towards being, as a professional. I got myself involved in an Applied Lab which was specialized in developing information systems with a bias towards geospatial intelligence, and got passionate about it and that is what ended up setting my professional journey much more strongly. I did consider for a while changing majors, but it wasn't that practical, so I figured an engineering diploma was still worth it in and of itself and I could always further specialize where I wanted to go with an M.Sc. for instance - which is precisely what I ended up doing.
With my M.Sc., which I did in the Netherlands, I took the step into moving towards geospatial data processing as a science and technology, not just an application of the tools and processes in context of the projects I was involved on (which is how I got started). And since then I steadily moved into technology, although keeping my tight connection with data - now in a more general level as well, not necessarily geospatial.
It's not a career track you would typically see out there, and it is something I am not only OK and fine with, but something I have learned to appreciate over time, through reflection. And I must confess that having done the Environmental Engineering major was probably the part that at some point I mostly struggled with, but I eventually realized some key traits in my thinking and ways to approach the world and challenges in technology, which I could connect to my training as an environmental engineer.
So now I appreciate that. And here are a few of, as far as I can tell, the key reasons for that:
A deep regard for complexity. That a system like an organization is not fully closed, and thus not fully controllable. It should be seen from an "ecological" standpoint, rather than the industrial revolution engineering metaphor of a "machine". That is likely more prominent in a software technology context, where the outcome is not tangible, which also means the possibilities are less constrained (when compared to the hardware and physical product world).
An understanding of the power of feedback loops. As a double-edged sort of sword - even the smallest of the nudge can unleash unpredicted outcomes (so-called butterfly effect). Good if it is for the better; risky if it is not. The main practical implication for that is to create an overarching skepticism for too big of endeavors, and to work more incrementally, learn and adapt.
Systems are bigger than the sum of their parts, and the product of their interactions. Those are not own words, but from Russell Ackoff's, who would also complement with:
The performance of a system doesn’t depend on how the parts perform taken separately, it depends on how they perform together – how they interact, not on how they act, taken separately. Therefore, when you improve the performance of a part of a system taken separately, you can destroy the system.
That has led me to always have the overarching picture in mind, and aiming at making decisions for the best of the global performance of the system (or organization), not just the part I happen to be responsible for.
I don't know from which background you may have come from, perhaps at some point (or maybe even still the case) you were critical of yourself about it. This hopefully can serve as a little inspiration for further reflection. I could go with the cliché now and say that…
Whatever doesn't kill you, makes you stronger!
But that is just a superficial part of it. The real deal is to realize how your experiences have shaped you in certain ways. Perhaps there are clear reasons to appreciate that as well. There is typically something to learn, I would say, and expect in fact.
Gratitude is a beautiful thing.