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  • Author Author: rscasny
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Op Ed: A Good Engineer Can Find a Job in an Hour But Building a Career May Take Years

rscasny

One of the luxuries that engineers have in most regional job markets is that they are in high demand and can find a new gig sometimes in an hour. That happened to me twice. One time, I sent a guy a resume and he called me and I was hired over a 10 minute phone call. If you employ professional networking, it could be quicker.

 

But just because an engineer can get hired in a short time does not mean:

 

  • A. It's a fantastic job. (You might want to ask about the turnover in the job before you accept it. Extremely high turnover jobs have a back story to them IMO.)
  • B. It will lead to a career. That is, a position where you have an opportunity to grow professionally.

 

Careers often take years to develop. Of course, it depends on the person. Some people are quite happy with staying in one job for years. But most people change and evolve over the course of a decade and want to do new things.

 

Building a career requires more than just sending our a resume/CV and waiting for a phone call. (Or waiting for a recruiter to contact you via LinkedIn, for instance.) Careers are developed through relationships, but also through listening and learning to people who work at companies that you want to be part of.

 

I think that's why element14 is offering a Career Series of webinars focusing on companies that provide products and/or services for IoT solutions. On October 10th, we will be having a panel discussion with representatives from Microchip Corporation and The Things Network.

 

I encourage you to sign up for the webinar: How To Start and Grow Your IoT Career Featuring Microchip Technology Inc and The Things Network 

 

I really believe these people will provides some insights to starting an IoT career, if you are right out of college, or growing your IoT career if you are more experienced.

 

 

Randall Scasny

Webinar Host

Parents

  • The internet did not exist when I graduated and IoT wasn't even a concept - today it is huge.

    On the other hand, there are a lot of technologies from that era that are no longer relevant. Does anybody remember core memory? CRTs lasted a little longer - they were everywhere. I bet you have to think a bit just to remember what VCR stands for.

    It is useful to understand whether you want or need a job that allows you to grow and adapt and stay current with the evolution of technology, which is exponential.

    How long will your current skill set be in demand?

  • in reply to dougw

    Based on my time in the industry, I would argue that most anyone that has the following in their skill set will always be in demand:

     

    1. A troubleshooting mindset,
    2. A solid understanding of the fundamentals, (really knowing what V=IR means can take you a long way)
    3. An ability to learn.  Especially an ability to learn how (2) and (1) apply to new technologies.

     

    I started in the CRT era, heck in the vacuum tube era, but I can readily understand new technologies as they come (and go) because the physics of electronics hasn't changed much and the principles of troubleshooting are pretty universal.

  • in reply to rscasny

    Very true,

     

    In my final year project using RF reception technology the application of RF technology is only a part of the overall picture. I find that it is important to understand many aspects of other electronic stream especially coding. I have good experience C programming but the project involved Python which I had never touched until now. It is good to have a background in C though as it helped with developing the new skill on Python programming even the necessity of adapting to PEP8 standards as well.

     

    It goes to show that single areas of understanding are not much a prerequisite for jobs now and am glad that I have a >30 year technology experience to help me on the way. Although I am still learning even after 30 years, and that statement is on top of my resume and cover letters for any applications. Seems to go down well.

     

    Here in Australia many agency get involved with vetting, and now they are using algorithms to vet people which is concerning as I learnt one method of overcoming this, so do many other people I feel, that fail at the interview stage leaving out potential better suited people that are honest about their skills.

     

    Malcolm

  • in reply to rscasny

    ,

     

    The process of landing a job is easily broken down into two unique phases:  'Getting the interview' and 'Getting the job'.

     

    Getting the interview - The resume and cover letter are very important tools for getting a perspective employer to notice you.  Many times, when a job posting is advertised, there will be a flood of resumes and cover letters that will need to be culled down to a reasonable number of candidates to be advanced to next round.  If your resume and cover letter can sell you as a good candidate, you are out.  There are countless theories on how to write that winning combination of resume and cover letters.

     

    Getting the job - The phone screening and interview process require a certain degree of salesmanship skills.  You have to do a fair amount of self promoting (not lying) and you have to be quick to address any concerns that an interviewer might have in matching your experience to the job at hand.  Just keep in mind that you can over do the salesmanship and come off as argumentative or arrogant. I have known great people who could not 'close the deal' because they just could not convince the interviewer that they were the right person for the job.

     

    As you move further in your career, building you skills and experience, the process gets a bit easier.  But building your career does require time and energy.  Getting the job is important, but keeping the job is even more important.  When opportunities come you way, you need to grab onto them.  Don't get too comfortable in your current role, be willing to take on assignments that require a stretch of your skills and comfort zone, ask your supervisor what you need to do in order to advance and assume greater responsibilities.

     

    Gene

  • in reply to genebren

    Gene,

     

    Great points.

     

    Thanks.

     

    Randall

  • in reply to rscasny

    So-called "soft" skills are vastly underrated in technical disciplines. Way too many engineers and scientists seem to think that merely knowing the material better than the rest of the talent pool is good enough, and it's just not true, because your job is never purely technical. At some point you have to communicate with other people, and if you want to be noticed and advance your career, you have to be able to sell yourself and your ideas to other people. For reasons that escape me, this essential truth is often overlooked during technical training/education. It's good to see someone making an effort to teach these soft skills.


  • in reply to rusgray

    So-called "soft" skills are vastly underrated in technical disciplines

    You are correct that this seems to be the modern version of how we work.

     

    I've seen plenty of people who can talk the talk, but they have limited ability when it comes to fixing the actual problem.

    The nature of what makes someone a good Engineer, tends to offset some of the other skills that say a salesperson might have.

     

    Most of the vetting tends to be done by the HR people and while they look at the CV to see if it matches their list, they may have no idea of what those skills are or if this equates to that.

    So as some have pointed out, many others might have been overlooked by the vetting process.

     

    Lessons on job interviews would be extremely helpful to many people trying to get into the workforce, or those trying to re-enter.

    It might also highlight those that need some help on the 'soft skills'.

     

    Mark

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  • in reply to rusgray

    So-called "soft" skills are vastly underrated in technical disciplines

    You are correct that this seems to be the modern version of how we work.

     

    I've seen plenty of people who can talk the talk, but they have limited ability when it comes to fixing the actual problem.

    The nature of what makes someone a good Engineer, tends to offset some of the other skills that say a salesperson might have.

     

    Most of the vetting tends to be done by the HR people and while they look at the CV to see if it matches their list, they may have no idea of what those skills are or if this equates to that.

    So as some have pointed out, many others might have been overlooked by the vetting process.

     

    Lessons on job interviews would be extremely helpful to many people trying to get into the workforce, or those trying to re-enter.

    It might also highlight those that need some help on the 'soft skills'.

     

    Mark

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  • in reply to mcb1

      wrote:

     

    The nature of what makes someone a good Engineer, tends to offset some of the other skills that say a salesperson might have.

     

    Respectfully, this is the sort of mentality I was talking about earlier. There is no part of being a good engineer that requires one to be gruff, difficult, or burdened with other social handicaps. It is possible to be curious, thoughtful, skeptical, and outspoken without being rude or unpleasant. It is possible to learn public speaking, socializing, and conflict management/resolution skills without losing one's scientific knowledge and engineering training.


    Engineering skills are difficult enough to acquire and master that many employers are willing to put up with engineering staff who are lacking in social graces. This does not mean that one cannot posses both engineering skills AND social graces. Speaking from my own (severely limited) experience, the combo of technical and people skills is extremely attractive to employers.

      wrote:

     

    Most of the vetting tends to be done by the HR people and while they look at the CV to see if it matches their list, they may have no idea of what those skills are or if this equates to that.

     

    I've interviewed with two of the four gigantic companies that dominate the sector amorphously described as "tech companies" in the past two months. In the course of the two in-person interviews, I spoke with two HR types, three managers, and nine engineers/programmers.

  • in reply to rusgray

    Agreed you're quite right.

     

    Obviously getting to the interview stage means your CV passed the various checks, so well done.

     

    Mark