Has your career followed your subject of study?

[sadoksevoli]

War Studies => .NET Developer/IT Consultant

[spikeyhead]

Electronic Engineering, still at it 22 years after graduating.

Pay can be reasonable in teh UK if you're contracting, otherwise it's working abroad if you want good money.

[richyb]

BA in Business Studies - now Arboriculture and Hydrology.

[BeefMaster9000]

NoelWatson said:

All my friends that studied Engineering now do something unrelated

Never really understood this phenomenon - fair few people I went to uni with didn't stick with engineering for a career. Seems to have quite a poor conversion rate.

[NoelWatson]

BeefMaster9000 said:

NoelWatson said:

All my friends that studied Engineering now do something unrelated

Never really understood this phenomenon - fair few people I went to uni with didn't stick with engineering for a career. Seems to have quite a poor conversion rate.

Think it mostly comes down to money.

[jdbecks]

and getting your hands dirty puts alot of people off

[Dan_1981]

Nope.

Economics with Business Degree - now work in logistics.

[NoelWatson]

jdbecks said:

and getting your hands dirty puts alot of people off

Don't think that tends to happen too much in the grad jobs my friends joined but left.

[BeefMaster9000]

NoelWatson said:

BeefMaster9000 said:

NoelWatson said:

All my friends that studied Engineering now do something unrelated

Never really understood this phenomenon - fair few people I went to uni with didn't stick with engineering for a career. Seems to have quite a poor conversion rate.

Think it mostly comes down to money.

But what alternative careers are there that pay so well you'd genuinely want to do them instead of say, spending your days testing pre production prototype sports cars in extreme climates, or developing championship winning F1 cars etc?

fk giving up that to be a tax accountant for a few extra grand a year..

[Fatman2]

NoelWatson said:

BeefMaster9000 said:

NoelWatson said:

All my friends that studied Engineering now do something unrelated

Never really understood this phenomenon - fair few people I went to uni with didn't stick with engineering for a career. Seems to have quite a poor conversion rate.

Think it mostly comes down to money.

+1 about the money.

It's also one of the toughest degrees there are (other than something medical or architechtural) and whilst the world is happy to benefit from all that engineering has to offer, does not recognise how difficult it is or how poorly paid it is for the education you need.

Add to that the fact that sucessive governments have st all over engineering and it's not hard to understand why people want out.

[shirt]

money is a major factor yes, but also when you think about being an engineer in your teens you think you'll end up designing cars or aircraft one day. you graduate and end up designing machine components which you don't give a fk about which are used to make products that you give even less of a fk about.

also, when you do find yourself giving a fk, you can't build what you want to because some in accounts wants it to cost half your realistic budget, yet the from marketing has promised it will be better than the last model and wants to sell it for twice the price. you also just know] that production will fk the whole thing up anyway.

not that i'm unhappy with my current lot, clearly.

[rhinochopig]

BeefMaster9000 said:

NoelWatson said:

All my friends that studied Engineering now do something unrelated

Never really understood this phenomenon - fair few people I went to uni with didn't stick with engineering for a career. Seems to have quite a poor conversion rate.

Because engineering in the UK is a st career choice if you want to be well paid and do some interesting stuff. Take [a large engineering company that has many finger in many pies - sorry just realised I probably shouldn't name them] for example. When I was there, If you followed the engineering / specialist leg of the career ladder, you would generally end up being paid much less than someone who moved into management / projects. You also used to hit a glass ceiling much sooner.

I was a principal engineer when I left and one of the youngest in the company, mainly because I was a bit of a jack of all trades and was good an managing novel stuff rather being a good engineer. I had guys who were the best in the world at what they did working for me, and yet I earned considerably more than they did because I had management experience. I was also far more replaceable than they were. Madness.

It's the same at most big engineering companies.

[otolith]

Degree in aquatic biology. PhD in fish ecophysiology. Work in IT.

Why don't schoolteachers tell pupils interested in a career in science that - certain specific sectors apart - the money is awful and the only way to make a decent living is to get promoted to management and not actually do any science.

[NoelWatson]

BeefMaster9000 said:

NoelWatson said:

BeefMaster9000 said:

NoelWatson said:

All my friends that studied Engineering now do something unrelated

Never really understood this phenomenon - fair few people I went to uni with didn't stick with engineering for a career. Seems to have quite a poor conversion rate.

Think it mostly comes down to money.

But what alternative careers are there that pay so well you'd genuinely want to do them instead of say, spending your days testing pre production prototype sports cars in extreme climates, or developing championship winning F1 cars etc?

fk giving up that to be a tax accountant for a few extra grand a year..

I don't think all Engineering jobs are that exciting

[otolith]

NoelWatson said:

I don't think all Engineering jobs are that exciting

You mean someone has to spend their days in front of a CAD screen designing locking mechanisms for Kias or rotors for sewage pumps or drainage for pedestrian underpasses? You mean it's not all handling evaluation on frozen lakes, hooning around Death Valley or field testing fast jets?

[AyBee]

otolith said:

NoelWatson said:

I don't think all Engineering jobs are that exciting

You mean someone has to spend their days in front of a CAD screen designing locking mechanisms for Kias or rotors for sewage pumps or drainage for pedestrian underpasses? You mean it's not all handling evaluation on frozen lakes, hooning around Death Valley or field testing fast jets?

Nail and head! There are very few engineers that manage to get into the specific field they want to, and even then, they sacrifice a lot of money because the companies know people will do it for the love of the job. If you don't love it, why do it? I did an engineering placement at a big british/german prestige car company and decided it wasn't for me, nice company to work for but the role didn't excite me although the product did, but it's not like I'd get to drive the product whenever I wanted to...hence starting in the city on monday

[GSP]

Well, I got a degree in Safety, Health and Environmental Management...

Most would assume completely boring and mundane, and maybe alot of the safety jobs are. I worked in construction safety for 5 years, it was pretty boring. However, I now work offshore, still doing safety and frankly some of the stuff I do and get involved in is immense, exciting and I bloody love it... when people don't die that is

[hyperblue]

Iddingtons said:

hyperblue said:

NoelWatson said:

All my friends that studied Engineering now do something unrelated

Same, just me bucking the trend by being an engineer. Financially, a bad decision! It has other benefits though

Other benefits? I've stuck with engineering thus far and I am yet to see any!

I often see friends earn more and work no harder though. I get more and more tempted to switch to something else every year.

Id.

Sorry to hear that. I suppose I've been lucky with my experience of engineering. I enjoy my job, get loads of international travel, decent hours (37/week), flexi-time and a relaxed work atmosphere. As it's in a small company I get a wide range of experience and more responsibility than I would get elsewhere. Seems to have a good balance of site and office work at the moment too.

Of course, I could've become an accountant like my friends, earn more, but work longer hours and hate it

Edit: This reminded me of a friend who did engineering and now works for a well known car parts manufacturer. Whenever I hear from him he's hooning cars around the high speed bowl at Milbrook, bd!

Edited by hyperblue on Friday 29th October 17:58

[Fatman2]

^^ that's pretty sad, but very common and I've spoken to a fair few that feel like this (mostly grads and inexperienced though).

I might get cheesed off about money etc but am an engineer through and through and love designing/number crunching and seeing a finished product. Hence I stick with it as I get a lot of job satisfaction. Fortunately I've spent the last 10+ years of my career working on stuff that is very interesting to me so don't have any real plans to change providing the industry I work in doesn't suddenly go down the pan.

I have in the past thought about changing career (due to money) and whilst many of my friends earn well over six figures have absolutely zero life as they're working ridiculous hours and when out of the office are glued to the Blackberry. That's not for me I'm afraid as I like to go home at 4:30pm and spend time with the wife/kids or in the gym!

[littlegreenfairy]

Engineering, accountancy....


Now.


I bake cake.