I realize that even though I’m in the civil engineering field, my personality is actually completely opposite of the stereotypical engineer. I’m not a big fan of desk jobs (I’m okay with it but just not 24/7), I’m cool with working with numbers but I would hate a job involving pure number crunching, I do however love to work and meet with people. One of the reasons I became an engineer was so that I can impact people’s lives but truthfully I also want to be able to do it directly by working with people, not just behind the scenes.
I’ve heard that as an entry-level structural design engineer you will mostly be sitting in a cubicle and not interacting with too many. Is there a recommendation for a good job you would recommend for someone my personality? any to avoid? I’d even be nice if anyone can describe the jobs that people generally get out of college and what they’re like, thanks.
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I’ve heard that as an entry-level structural design engineer you will mostly be sitting in a cubicle and not interacting with too many.
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At my company, you interact with your team and your mentor(s). But yes, you’re generally a glorified technician for a bit, learning how to CAD, how to learn LARSA and RISA (sp?), learning QAQC procedures, and creating excel spreadsheets calculations. Your supervisors will evaluate how much you can be trusted to do things on your own for a while.
However, all of the project managers spend probably 50-80%+ of their day working with people and in meetings and collaborating, and much less time on technical design (though they all do have 10+ years of design experience under their belt and they are fantastic engineers). You need to slug through the boring parts to get to the super awesome stuff.
I’m only an intern, but I’ve worked on projects that will affect a large population of Chicago. So that’s pretty cool. 2 of them are being built right now.
Get enough experience to hang out your own shingle. That way you can pick and choose the jobs you want…mostly small, but if you get bored you can go for a bigger contract. You can be a major part of the smaller jobs and actually make a difference.
Would you say if engineering is generally a less social field, is there some sort of career track or side field that engineers can divert into if they feel they need that social interaction to be fulfilling? I say this mainly because I currently volunteer at community center sites and love the fact I can meet new people everyday and feel that if I was stuck only working with minimal people or simply around other socially quiet engineers I wouldn’t get that full job satisfaction and be sad from it. I need to make a living obviously but I’m willing to accept less pay if necessary as long as its reasonable.
how about industrial engineering. Mostly business related and you have to talk and deal with people.
I recommend rehab engineering or biomedical engineering if you like to work with people.