Design Mentoring Tool

Abstract

In 2004 a design engineer on-line mentoring tool was developed and implemented. The purpose of the tool was to assist senior engineers mentoring new engineers to the Indiana Department of Transportation (INDOT) design process and improve their technical competency. This approach saves senior engineers time while developing a consistent mentoring approach and standardizing technical knowledge in road and bridge design. It is a self-guided tool that utilizes multi-media and web-based technologies, trains engineers in the design process and provides resources to use for developing plans and specifications. Available resources include INDOT design practices, design standards, design memos, specification and construction standards, procedures, and check lists. When this tool was developed the Design Manual was under development. Therefore, the tool could not link to the Design Manual but to excerpted sections extracted from the Manual. Now active linking to this Manual is possible. Additionally other resources used in the design process: design standards, design memos, design procedures and checklists should be accessible in the various topics. These current resources have also influenced the technical content for the current 12 topics. An upgrade was performed to deal with these needs and to make the tool a living one, that is where future revisions in resources can be incorporated without a major overhaul to the application.