When Dan Wittliff, P.E., F.NSPE, D.E.E., received help early in his career, he never forgot it. In fact, one of the lessons he carried throughout his life was that none of us accomplishes anything entirely on our own.
The world lost Dan Wittliff on October 13, 2025. What we did not lose is his enduring legacy guided by his conviction that those who benefit from the guidance and support of others are obliged to “pay it forward” by helping those who follow.
Dan lived that philosophy throughout a remarkable engineering career. From his early years as an Air Force engineer to his leadership in the electric utility and environmental fields, and ultimately through decades of service to the National Society of Professional Engineers (NSPE) and the Texas Society of Professional Engineers (TSPE), Dan devoted himself not only to engineering, but to helping other engineers grow.
That commitment is one reason NSPE proudly announced during NSPEcon 2026 that Dan Wittliff will receive an honorary Systems Software Integrator (SSI) Certification—the first and only honorary SSI to be awarded.
A career built on leadership and service
Dan earned his mechanical engineering degree from Southern Methodist University in 1972 and began his professional career as an Air Force communications-electronics officer. During nine years of active duty, he managed test, acquisition, and installation programs, supervised a large maintenance complex, and commanded a remote communications unit in Turkey. He continued his military service in the Air Force Reserve, ultimately retiring as a colonel in 2002 after 30 years of active and reserve service.
His civilian engineering career included progressively responsible positions with West Texas Utilities, where he worked in power plant performance and environmental services. He later became the first Chief Engineer of the Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission, now the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. There, he led multidisciplinary initiatives involving environmental permitting, technical peer review, professional development, and engineering licensure.
But even as Dan's technical responsibilities grew, developing other professionals remained a consistent theme.
After obtaining his own professional engineering license, Dan was struck by how difficult and time-consuming the process had been. Rather than simply accepting that experience, he began helping other candidates navigate it. He advised applicants, pre-screened applications, served as a reference, and mentored dozens of aspiring professional engineers.
That effort grew considerably when he became TNRCC's Chief Engineer. Recognizing that many of the agency's engineers were not licensed and that no suitable environmental engineering exam preparation course existed in the Austin area, Dan worked with TSPE to establish one. Over the following six years, more than 300 engineers completed the program, and approximately 200 earned their professional engineering licenses.
Then Dan asked those graduates to become instructors themselves.
It was the essence of his philosophy: accept the help you receive, use it to grow, and then help someone else along the way.
A leader in NSPE and TSPE
Dan's commitment to professional societies began shortly after graduating from SMU. He became active in TSPE's Abilene Chapter, eventually serving as chapter president before moving into statewide leadership. In 1998, TSPE selected him as its Engineer of the Year from among approximately 6,000 members. He later served as TSPE president and was named a Distinguished Engineer of the Texas Engineering Foundation.
At the national level, Dan's service to NSPE was equally distinguished. He joined the Society in 1972 and ultimately served as NSPE president in 2012–13. Along the way, he led initiatives that addressed some of the profession's most important challenges.
Dan received the NSPE President's Award in 2010 for his leadership of the Software Engineering Licensing Consortium, which sought to establish a pathway toward professional licensure for software engineers. In 2016, he became the first two-time recipient of the President's Award for forming and leading the Committee on Policy and Advocacy. In 2018, he received the award for a third time for his leadership in advancing ten core umbrella policies adopted by the NSPE House of Delegates.
His leadership also helped NSPE examine its own future. Through the Race for Relevance initiative, Dan helped lead a broad examination of the Society's priorities and how it could better serve its members and the engineering profession.
NSPE subsequently recognized Dan with the NSPE Award, its highest honor, for his outstanding contributions to the engineering profession, public welfare, and humankind. He was also named an NSPE Fellow.
Preparing engineers for the future
Dan's professional service increasingly focused on an important question: How can the engineering profession remain relevant as technology and the nature of engineering work evolve?
His leadership in software engineering licensure and emerging technologies was an important part of that effort. He served on NSPE's Emerging Technologies Committee and Software Professional Certification Task Force and played an essential role in the development and launch of the NICET Systems Software Integrator Certification Program.
That work makes the honorary SSI particularly fitting.
SSI recognizes professionals working at the intersection of engineering and software—an area that represents the changing nature of engineering practice. Dan understood that professional organizations must not simply preserve the profession as it exists today. They must also help prepare engineers for what comes next.
And that brings us back to Dan's greatest legacy: people.
He taught that learning from others is only part of professional growth. The other part is passing those lessons along. Through mentoring, teaching, professional society leadership, licensure advocacy, and the development of new professional pathways, Dan spent his career creating opportunities for others to become better engineers and better leaders.
His influence can be measured in the organizations he strengthened, the policies he helped establish, the credentials he helped develop, and the hundreds of engineers who advanced their careers with help from programs he created.
But perhaps the best measure is what those engineers went on to do for others.
Dan understood that professional legacy isn't simply what we accomplish during our own careers. It is what continues because we helped someone else succeed.
The honorary SSI recognizes Dan Wittliff not only for his extraordinary contributions to engineering, but for the generations of engineers he helped prepare for the future.
And in honoring Dan, the engineering profession has an opportunity to do what he spent his career encouraging others to do:
Pay it forward.