How can you tell an engineer has social skills? When he’s talking to you, he’s looking at your shoes. Actually, he’s probably messaging you on his smartphone, even if he’s sitting beside you.
The electronically-social engineer has many non-face-to-face options for communications. Following Twitter experts. Reading blogs. Reading newsletters. Watching YouTube videos. Visiting forums and LinkedIn groups. And maybe Facebook. Here are some suggested sites for the electronically-social engineer.
Twitter: @AllThingsPROFI and @PIChairman for news related to PROFINET and PROFIBUS, Industrial Ethernet and fieldbus, IIoT and Industrie 4.0, and all things network and industrial automation.
Blogs: www.PROFIblog.com includes news and opinion plus the occasional “secret” like Picking PROFINET Cities
Newsletters: www.profinews.com for monthly updates on PROFI topics. Visit the website monthly or subscribe to the emailed condensed version. Is that how you got here?
YouTube videos: your control vendor probably has a YouTube channel, but for vendor-neutral, educational videos, visit MinutePROFINET for quick looks at PROFINET benefits and PROFItelevision for more educational videos. Try this playlist to watch all the MinutePROFINET videos in order. This playlist includes four videos on the “PROFINET of Things.” For PROFIBUS, this playlist presents five videos on PROFIBUS benefits.
Forums: There are three forums you may want to try individually or all at once:
- International PI website
- PI North America website, PROFIBUS and PROFINET
- LinkedIn groups, PROFIBUS & PROFINET and PROFINET
Facebook: PI International and PI North America
The (electronically-)social engineer is welcome at all the above virtual places.