Yeah, I've worked in structural engineering with real chartered professional engineers. Most of that work was relying on rules of thumb and bodging in hacks to fit around too small customer budgets, changing requirements, contractors trying to exploit loopholes, or bad designs from architects. No job ever had the budget to do anything "properly".

Software development usually seems far more controlled than that was.

If you don't know what engineering means, why not check out Wikipedia?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Engineering