At just 23, Colin Sheldon FIEAust CPEng found himself chairing a regional branch meeting of Engineers Australia. Surrounded by industry veterans, he learned the value of distilling complex ideas and speaking up when it mattered.
As told to Julia Abbondanza
I grew up in Brisbane listening to my father’s stories from his work as an electrical engineer. I enjoyed maths and science from an early age, and knew I wanted a career that involved problem-solving and practical thinking.
In 2008, I began a Bachelor of Engineering (Mechanical) at the University of Queensland. During my studies I received a scholarship from the mining company Anglo American.
After graduating, I went to central Queensland and regional NSW to work across several underground and open-cut mining sites. I spent about six to seven years in those environments and valued being close to the machinery and infrastructure. I liked the chance to get hands-on and be involved right at the coal face.
I also developed an interest in how assets and systems are managed over their full life cycle. That asset management theme for critical equipment and infrastructure shaped the second half of my career to my current role at Aurecon.
Accepting leadership opportunities
During my second year in the Anglo American graduate program, I attended a couple of Engineers Australia events in Emerald. At the local AGM the chair announced they would retire and asked who would take the role. Everyone looked at me, so I put my hand up. I was 23.
That decision began a long involvement with Engineers Australia. I moved from the regional branch to the Queensland Mechanical College Branch, then was elected to the National Mechanical College Board in 2019. I have served as chair of the board since 2023. Last year was my final year in that role.
My Engineers Australia involvement has helped me access opportunities to sit on university industry advisory boards and the editorial board of academic journals, act as a discipline expert for the Australian Engineering Accreditation Centre, judge and select winners of Engineers Australia’s Excellence Awards and also represent Engineers Australia on committees for the World Federation of Engineering Organizations.
It has truly opened many doors and chances to get involved.
Steeped in standards
My early involvement with Engineers Australia opened a broader view of the profession and its interface with society and industry. Through that exposure, I joined Standards Australia’s technical committee ME-018 Mining Equipment. I then took part in the Standards Australia Young Leaders Program in 2017-18, which is now called the NEXTgen program. It was an enjoyable introduction to how standards are developed, and how the national and international systems fit together.
My standards work has expanded from there. I joined committees in dependability through the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) and in asset management through the International Organization for Standardization (ISO).
I was selected for the IEC Young Professionals program and was later elected as a Young Professional Leader in 2021. I also joined one of Standards Australia’s board committees as a NEXTGen representative.
Standards work brought me into rooms with very experienced engineers. I was often one of the youngest people at the table. While I couldn’t contribute decades of technical experience, I could offer the ability to listen, synthesise detailed input and capture it in a way that moved the work forward.
That willingness to put my hand up and be curious made a difference to the way I learned and contributed.
Conformity assessment became an adjacent focus. I volunteered as a technical assessor with the National Association of Testing Authorities, Australia (NATA) from 2018. In 2022 I was selected to sit on its Inspection Accreditation Advisory Committee.
Embracing new tech
Mechanical engineering is changing as autonomous systems, AI, battery technologies and smart manufacturing become standard aspects of design and operations.
AI and machine learning are tools that allow more scenarios and more iterations to be explored quickly. That helps with design speed and helps lift productivity. For Australia, productivity matters if we want to be competitive. The ability to deliver outcomes faster and more efficiently affects how we compare internationally.
I have seen a strong capability that sits near the leading edge of the Australian mining sector. There is still room for innovation, learning from other industries such as manufacturing, which has adopted automation to improve productivity and safety.
Sustainability and decarbonisation goals have also shaped how I think about standards. When requirements are embedded upstream, compliance stops being a choice and becomes part of how a project is conceived. Embedding expectations early helps keep attention on long-term outcomes rather than treating them as an add-on.
Role of youth
Younger engineers can play a valuable part in this shift. Curiosity and initiative matter. You may not bring 30 years of history, but you can still add value by synthesising complex details, exploring new perspectives and testing ideas that have not been considered.
I encourage emerging professionals to be willing to express what they want to achieve in a project and suggest approaches that sit outside the usual pattern. I’ve been able to contribute to this shift more formally through mentoring in the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering Industry Mentoring Network in STEM program, supporting PhD students as they explore pathways beyond academia.
There is also a role for leaders to recognise how expectations are changing for young engineers. What mattered to leaders at an earlier stage of their career may not be what matters to today’s early-career engineers. Acknowledging that change and making space for it supports momentum. It can also help organisations find solutions sooner in a competitive environment where there is a race to solve problems and bring results to market.
Resilience in action
Although my work at Aurecon now looks at resilience of our ageing infrastructure, the concept of personal resilience has been present throughout my career, even if I did not label it that way at the time.
For me, it was putting my hand up before I felt fully ready, stepping into unfamiliar forums and learning by listening. It involved staying open to what other industries were doing, and asking how those ideas might transfer into mechanical systems and mining contexts.
It also involved taking part in programs such as the Standards Australia Young Leaders program and the IEC Young Professionals program, building capability piece by piece.
Looking ahead
Recently I was appointed to the Board of Professional Engineers Queensland for a term of three years. The board was established to maintain public confidence in the standard of services provided by registered professional engineers.
I remain interested in integration. New technologies work best when they are folded into mechanical systems in ways that respect how those systems already operate.
AI and machine learning help us run the numbers and test ideas quickly. Standards and accreditation help set clear expectations.
Contributing to both practice and the ecosystem around practice has been a rewarding path. It began at the coal face, continued through Engineers Australia and Standards Australia, and grew through IEC and ISO work and through NATA.
Each step added a tool or a perspective that helped with the next step.
Looking ahead, I see opportunities for Australian engineers who are prepared to be curious and deliberate. Integrating new tools such as AI will continue to open design pathways. Learning from other sectors will remain a useful habit.
Building requirements into projects early will keep attention on outcomes that last. I started by listening to more experienced voices and writing things down carefully, and I am still on a lifelong learning journey.
This approach continues to help me contribute to work that affects how systems are designed and maintained, and how teams learn from one another.
This article was originally published in the November 2025 edition of create with the headline “Professional curiosity”.
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