<p>I like your posts, keep posting.</p>
<p>Pyrotechnics was always something I wanted to do. Never really got into it though, at least not professionally. There's a firework company around here, I should look them up.</p>
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Until there are high-reward positions for high-achieving engineers, there is really no incentive for me to go into engineering.
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<p>The truth is, engineering is a 'high pay average, low pay variance' career, which means that while the average salary of engineers is relatively high, the variance of engineering pay is not high. Even a star engineer with stellar experience will probably only make 2x or, if very lucky, 3-4x that of the average engineer. However, in other career fields, i.e. finance, there really are people who make 10x or even 100x+ that of the average employee. To be sure, the odds are low. But the chance does exist. I have never heard of any engineer ever making even 10x that of the average engineer, except perhaps for the very special case of stock options in a startup firm. </p>
<p>Hence, presuming that the top salaries are somewhat correlated with talent, it is entirely rational for those with the most talent to prefer to work in those industries that have high pay variance, because they then have the chance to earn one of those extreme packages. It is also equally rational for those with below-average talent to choose those industries that have low variance because they receive what is effectively a subsidy from those in the same industry who have high talent. </p>
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For the most ambitious engineers with 3.9+ GPAs from top 10 schools, what opportunities are there in the job market that correlate with their abilities and offer potential to revolutionize industries and make a real impact with continual salary growth? Do these positions only lie with the best funded biotech/nanotech startups? Unfortunately, most of these startups look for people who are already leaders in their fields and not college grads.
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<p>First off, there are indeed numerous (non-CS) engineering positions are startups or small companies available to people fresh out of school. You usually do have to spend time searching for them, because they are small and therefore by definition hard to find. They often times don't actively recruit on campus because they don't have the resources. People generally tend to find them through networking. Places like Silicon Valley and the Boston area are chock full of startup and small semiconductor, polymer, ceramics, and biotech firms, and some of them will hire people right out of school.</p>
<p>But it is true that many of these companies are looking for leaders in their field, and so one strategy is to become such a leader. Graduate school, especially a PhD program, is a common method of establishing yourself as a leader. Getting a PhD at a top engineering school ought to mean that you are actually a world leader in your specific research focus. {The reality is rather less glamorous, but that's the intent.} Nevertheless, there are quite a few PhD students at the top engineering schools who intend their launch their own company based on their research. For example, many MIT PhD students team participate in the $100k entrepreneurship business plan competition where they compete for VC funding and exposure. The 2007 co-winners were Robopsy, a medical devices company of which 2 of the co-founders are MIT mechanical engineering grad students, and Bagozo, an alternative fuel company that was also co-founded by an MIT mechanical engineering grad student.</p>
<p>MIT</a> $100K Entrepreneurship Competition - Home
<a href="http://www.mit100k.org/news/files/07winners.pdf%5B/url%5D">http://www.mit100k.org/news/files/07winners.pdf</a>
New</a> device offers assist in needle biopsies - MIT News Office
Bagazo:</a> Team</p>
<p>Even if you aren't one of the winners, the experience of writing a business plan and interacting with VC's is valuable in and of itself and will surely help you to fund your company later. {I know several $100k teams who did not win the competition yet were still eventually able to find VC funding anyway.} </p>
<p>You can also of course become a leader by simply working as an engineer and aggressively maneuvering to be assigned to the most dynamic projects you can get. R&D and product development jobs tend to give you the most freedom to find such projects and develop your capabilities to the utmost. </p>
<p>In general, I tend to agree that smaller companies, especially startups, tend to provide the most opportunity for advancement and development and hence are probably the best place for the best engineers who want to quickly advance their career. They are risky, they don't provide much (if any) training, and they require a forward-leaning personality. But if you're one of the best guys, you should not be afraid of the uncertainty of a startup.</p>
<p>Sakky, I never said I didn't like you. I was just stating how much of a monster you are at posting. Everyone knows you, your are worshipped as a posting god, and rightfully so.</p>
<p>lol @ high school kids</p>