The engineering management productivity challenge

A recent news story reported that engineering services were being moved from the U.S. to lower-cost Mexico and China. Students from those countries enroll in U.S. universities, then, after gaining U.S. industrial experience, move back to their native lands, and organize companies to provide global engineering services. This development follows the manufacturing lead. Global organizations will move all work to low-cost locations unless high-cost-areas can compete through higher productivity. The productivity challenge is not only global, but also regional within the United States. The Silicon Valley, for example, is one of the worlds' highest cost locations. Most manufacturing has already left. It is proposed that ASEM increase its concern with technical knowledge worker productivity, as its contribution to maintaining American competitiveness.