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The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers
3

The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

(OP)

I graduated with a BSEE in 2007 and am having a hard time finding an entry level engineering job.

Whether it's on job sites or a company's careers page, there's practically no entry level jobs available.

I've read that outsourcing and automation are the main problem (due to cheaper labor) and will unlikely go away.

Will the future of U.S. engineers be comprised of mainly h1b workers?

If there are no entry level jobs for U.S. graduates then how can they even begin a career?

If India and China were 1st world countries, would finding an entry level job still be as difficult?

 

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

What do you know that could make your potential employer money?  If the list is short or small, then consider graduate school or self study for the most common assignments. (Grounding grid design, lighting protection, conductor specifications and motor control center design).

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

I imagine that engineers who don't know how to use a search function will always find it hard to find a job.

Do you really think my job can be replaced by a machine?


 

Cheers

Greg Locock

SIG:Please see FAQ731-376: Eng-Tips.com Forum Policies for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips.

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

If I'm not mistaken, the annual output of engineers from the U.S. is about 80,000 compared to close to 400,000 for both India and China.  Although these numbers are daunting, most American companies complain of extreme shortages of U.S. engineers forcing them to look overseas for more talent.  

I would advise that you look into your University's job placement services, which tend to be good at matching companies with entry level engineers.

Also, I think if you're willing to move anywhere in the country with no distinctive geographic area, you should be able to land a job.  No doubt the economy is getting tough, but thinking outside the box, getting more education under your belt or simply trying different career paths are all viable solutions to job market problems.

Best of luck!

Kyle

 

Kyle Chandler
www.chiefengineering.net

"To the Pessimist, the glass is half-empty.  To the Optimist, the glass is half-full.  To the Engineer, the glass is twice as large as it needs to be!"
 

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

Major aerospace companies are looking for interns and entry level. Keep looking at their sites, they will pop up.

Chris
SolidWorks/PDMWorks 08 3.1
AutoCAD 08
ctopher's home (updated Aug 5, 2008)
ctopher's blog
SolidWorks Legion

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

"h1b workers"

The chip on your shoulder is dripping.

I have been an H1B worker.  I was paid the same as any native American (can I use that word?) engineer, no cost-cutting there.  What is your problem?

- Steve

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

On careerbuilder.com I find 410 engineering jobs from the last 30 days using the search string "entry level electrical".  Took me about 1 minute.  I don't think H1B's and automation are your problem.    

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

I'm not trying to sound harsh, but I'm not going to go out of my way to sound nice.

How many resumes have you sent out?  Were they all the same?  Did you tailor any of them to the specific positions you applied for?  Have you let anyone (especially someone with experience) proofread your resume?

Do you even know what you want, or are you just trolling for any entry level gig?  Blind wanderers never do well in job searches.

If all you are doing is clicking the "Submit Resume" button on job sites, you will find that you will have plenty of time to continue doing that without being interrupted by gainful employment.  Makes some calls, hit the bricks, every day all day.

 

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

sharp21:  don't blame the H1B system- at least it exists, and requires the employers to do some dancing about to prove that they can't find the people they need in the local marketplace.

In Canada there is no H1B system.  We use the so-called "human capital model" of immigration- bring 'em in and let the economy sort 'em out.  Many entry level positions get snapped up by "experienced" recent immigrants whose alternative is driving a taxi.  This was hard enough on both the fresh grads and the recent immigrants in good economic times- imagine what it has the potential to become in the coming recession, when the Alberta tarsands boom finally busts and all the ex-pat Ontarians come home looking for work...

It's not all doom and gloom.  Unemployment is still pretty low in the US in historical terms.  Not to "blame the victim" here, but it sounds like you either need to widen your search area or take some job readiness/job search training.  I don't know you or your particular circumstances so I could be completely wrong, but most of the people I meet that are completely unable to find engineering work as fresh grads are really saying that they're unwilling to relocate.   

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

I disagree and think that entry level engineering positions are abundant and not to hard to find. I am will be graduating here in december as a mechanical engineer and already have a job lined up.

I have had it for 6 months and never worked for the company before.

I think as a student you have to put yourself out there. I am by no means even close a 4.0 (try 3.0). I did two interships and a Co-op and still graduated in 4.5 years..

Anyways sorry for the self ranting. I think if you search and start calling companies you will find one. DON'T settle with submitting your resume online. Call them and talk with someone.


I think TheTick said it the best.."Makes some calls, hit the bricks, every day all day."

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

In case you didn't get Gregs subtle point...

This type of question comes up regularly, do a search of this site rather than trying to get a bunch of new responses.

In fact I'm pretty sure I answered a similar question just a few days ago.

Sure the search functionality of the site search isn't great but the google search of this site works OK and should get you headed in the right direction.

To get the most out of this site I suggest you take a look at the 2 links in my signature line.

KENAT,

Have you reminded yourself of FAQ731-376: Eng-Tips.com Forum Policies recently, or taken a look at posting policies: http://eng-tips.com/market.cfm?

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

I have a one word answer for you: networking.

In this day and age, "pounding the pavement" looking for a job is an inefficient waste of time.  In my experience it is also utterly useless in finding a job.  In 15 years I have rarely ever been contacted by a company that I cold submitted a resume to, and out of those few that called me, none of them ever offered me a job.

Every professional position I have ever held I got through some sort of "connection".  I put almost no effort into job searching because I network effectively and use the tools available to me.

My first job out of school was for a major defense company.   They had just won a huge contract and were conducting on-campus interviews.   I also had three other job interviews before I graduated.  All of these interviews were through the school office of career development.   Even after graduation, I used the office of career development to land a couple of other jobs.   I have also held two positions that I got working through a recruiter.

So here is my advice:

If you haven't done so already, get your resume on file with the career development office at the school you went to.

Talk to professors that you had a good relationship with.   Tell them that you are looking for a job.   They may have leads.

Do you keep in touch with any former classmates?   Are they employed?   Tell them that you are looking for a job and maybe they can pass along your resume.   This could be a win-win situation, as many companies offer referral bonuses to their employees.

Do you belong to any professional societies?   They can also be a valuable network for your job search.

Post your resume on various job sites.   HR managers and recruiters are out there every day reviewing resumes.

Contact a recruiter or two.

Are you a member of any engineering networking sites?
 

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

I certainly do feel for the recent engineering grads.  It's bad enough that the economy is slow right now, but recent graduates are facing a new challenge: global competition.  I don't know how H1B entered into this topic, since by my understanding they get paid the same as an American doing the job.  The real threat to US engineers is foreign engineers working for US companies overseas.   In countries such as China and India the engineers are willing to work for a fraction of what engineers here make.   

Entry level engineers are usually assigned to do rote and menial work.  Sending this work to India or China looks very appealing to the corporate bean counters.   My former employer moved its entire sustaining engineering department to India.   You certainly don't need any special skills to process ECNs,  and it is cheaper to have an engineer making 7K a year do it than one making 50K.   
 

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

"In this day and age, "pounding the pavement" looking for a job is an inefficient waste of time. "

I beg to differ.  So far the jobs that I go thru out the years have been at job fairs.  However, networking has benefited me be way of promotions.  But for a young kid just coming out, hitting the bricks and networking is your best way of finding that first job.  My first job I went to Delaware for a job fair and landed a job in Massachusetts and I'm from New York.  That's another thing; you have to be ok with relocation.  You have to go where the work is or stagnate.
 

Tobalcane
"If you avoid failure, you also avoid success."  

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

For the figuratively impaired: "Pound the pavement" means more than hitting the road and knocking on doors.  It also definitely means more than hitting "Submit Resume" button on your favorite job website.  It means looking for ways to reveal more opportunities.

Everyone looks in the easy places.  Thats why the treasure is already gone from them.

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

I will second the advice of being willing to relocate for your first job.   At my first job I worked with entry level engineers from all over the country.   After a year or two of experience, many of them left for jobs back where they came from.

You don't need to look at relocation as a permanamet thing.  Do whatever it takes to get your foot in the door somewhere and then you will be more free to be choosy once you have built up your resume.

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

For the record, by pounding the pavement I meant pouring over the want ads or cold calling compaines, or the modern equivalent of hitting the submit button over and over again on your favorite job site.   

The way I look at it, if your resume gets to HR through the usual channels, you are often finished before you even get started.   Having a connection, even it is as simple as having your resume passed along by a recruiter or your University will give you a leg up.

I also figure that by working with a recruiter or posting my resume online to be viewed I won't waste time and only be dealing with compaines who have an interest in what I have to offer.

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

sharp21, Electrical engineering ...especially the embedded systems and electronics /communications/ fpga development field sis a tough one to find a job in and has been like that since 2001. My best advice for you is to look very hard and move to other cities e.t.c. Also try to focus more on jobs that cannot be outsourced i.e. jobs in factories and/or heavy industries......

If you're still having trouble finding work....do not go to grad school....look for a new career instead....grad school for those that do not want to pursue an academic career is a waste if time and money....

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

You can create a profile on the attached link. It's a networking site and you can connect with past co-workers or people you went to school with (if they are on the site). What I have noticed is there are tons of HR recruiters for companies with profiles on the site, just for the purpose of looking for potential hirees. It costs nothing to set up a profile and will provide another avenue for job postings / networking. The more avenues you have to search and the more contacts you make during your job hunt, the better.

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

I agree.  I joined linked in about 3 weeks ago and found some folks I worked with 20 years ago.  An Ohio EI is hooking up with a former boss of mine in NC.  

There is a lot of truth to the phrase "it is not what you know but who you know."

 

Don Phillips
http://worthingtonengineering.com

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

"grad school for those that do not want to pursue an academic career is a waste if time and money"

I could not disagree more in the case of a Masters Degree.   You can get an MS degree full time in under two years and it will mean higher pay and better quality jobs.   As far as a PHD goes, the problem is that you will make boat loads of money in industry, but your education will shut the door on 90% of the jobs in industry.  No one wants to pay a PHD salary for a job that really only requires a BS.

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

(OP)
I started this thread in order to gain information about the future of the engineering profession by asking professional engineers their opinion, not so much about what recent graduates need to do in order to land an entry-level job (since that topic has been covered many a times), but instead:

since companies are continually trying to reduce costs by outsourcing jobs (entry-level), which in turn creates experienced workers giving companies a reason to opt for more H1B visa workers, U.S. engineers, both experienced and unexperienced will eventually be replaced (yes, no, maybe).

I can't blame companies for trying to reduce costs, nor am I angry at H1B workers, but it leaves me wondering if engineering will continue to be a rewarding career or just an expensive hobby.

There was also a thread in this forum, back in 2004, related to the outsourcing of jobs (a little less than 5 years from now), I didn't see a problem of starting a new thread in order to talk about the next 5 years.

I've done searches on job websites (monster.com, indeed.com, careerbuilder.com...etc) for entry level engineering jobs and most searches return less than 500 matches. If the U.S. produces ~80,000 engineers annually (from kchan711's numbers) then the chances of an individual getting an entry level job is less than 1%(0.625%). Of course that's assuming all entry level jobs are posted through these sites to begin with.  

I've considered moving, but I would think living in the silicon valley would give you better opportunities.

I was also considering going back to school, not for a Masters Degree, but some sort of vocational school where you can get hands on training working on projects.

 

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

Like any industry, the best place I would think that would be fertile ground for entry level would be hot new jobs of today that would continue into the future versus jobs that are becoming obsolete to our society and has been around for decades.  For an electrical, I would focus on information technology jobs (http://www.boston.com/jobs/galleries/industry_information_technology/).  If I was 20 something again I would probably go into this.  As a Mechanical, I am focusing on electronic packaging the technology that this field is producing but from an Analysis and Test perspective.  To answer to your question I guess is that yes there are many opportunities for entry level jobs, however, once you get hired, you are some what a professional and your next job (even a year later) you will be applying as a professional.  So in a way your question is a fleeting one, it is only the time between coming out of college and then finding your first job in your field.  Everybody will find that entry level job sooner or later.  If not ever, it is not the industry's fault but the person for not trying hard enough which I think everybody in this thread is echoing.   

Tobalcane
"If you avoid failure, you also avoid success."  

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

Sharp21,

I completely see where you're coming from.  However, I don't think nearly the amount of available jobs are even posted on sites such as Monster and Careerbuilder.  I say this for a variety of reasons.

I went to a Big Ten university to get my ME degree.  Our engineering Expo, having over 400 companies, was hiring interns, seniors and recent graduates.  Each year this University puts out near a 1000 engineers of some sort with a job placement over 95% in the first 6 months out of school.  Now those are pretty uplifting numbers.  That doesn't mean they're great jobs but just jobs within their field.

Some of the companies I work with now claim that for every job you find on sites like Monster, there's another 5-10 available.  Usually these jobs are kept in house, on their website or simply "You gotta know someone".

Just to let you know, there are almost 1.5 million engineers employed in the U.S. according the Dept. of Labor with a pretty decent growth rate.  Check it out.

http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos027.htm

There is always one thing an engineer can rely on to keep his job or, better yet, grow in a company.  Make the company money (innovation, lean manufacturing, you name it).

Kyle

Kyle Chandler
www.chiefengineering.net

"To the Pessimist, the glass is half-empty.  To the Optimist, the glass is half-full.  To the Engineer, the glass is twice as large as it needs to be!"
 

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

My thoughts on engineering are from a new, young engineer who is going to soon sit for my PE exam.

I think most people get into engineering for the right reasons: the right reasons involve that they really are curious about how the physical world works, not because they want to make boatloads of money.  In the past few years I've noticed a distaste and distrust for those who aren't participating in the 'real' economy.  Engineers ARE the real economy.  Everything in this world that is of value was designed and created by an engineer (of sorts).  The BS in engineering is a stamp that says you want to create, design, and be part of the real economy.

Finance, academia, and a number of other 'supporting fields' have their share of clout and respect that go along with them, but thankfully the clout of those intelligent financiers who produce nothing for the 'real' economy is going away.

If you have a BS in any engineering field, you have made the first step.  Entry level jobs are out there – and engineers will always be the 'backbone' of our greatest companies (and no, that doesn't include the kind of companies that package and sell insurance/financial instruments).

So, keep your head up and enjoy the ride as much as you can.
 

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

I keep tabs on a number of finance / Wall Street message boards and it seems a building sentiment among the young Wall Street types is "Crap, I wish I would have studied/entered a field like engineering where I'd actually have some tangible skills.

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

Heh.  I got some major crap from my family when the son of friends, 10 years younger than I was, got some $100k job right out of school while I was working my state engineering job for under $40k.  Where was the kid working?  Lehman Brothers.  Hah!

Hg

Eng-Tips policies:  FAQ731-376: Eng-Tips.com Forum Policies

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

In high school we did these interesting assignments where you had to select a group of X number of humans to be with you to 're-inhabit' the earth in some apopcalyptic scenario.

When it really comes right down to it, you end up selecting the engineers and the young fertile women.

That gets society back to where it needs to be ASAP!

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

Check your local colleges for Career Fairs.  At my college we had an Engineering specific career fair twice a year and a general fair three times a year.  It's how I found my current job, and now they pay me to go back and stand on the other side of the booth!

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

"but it leaves me wondering if engineering will continue to be a rewarding career or just an expensive hobby."

Sharp21, if  you really really really love engineering and you adamantly want to work in this field and you're willing to live with the risk that it poses in terms of job instability due to offshoring and automation, then by all means go for it...look harder and harder for jobs. Who knows, you may even become one of the lucky few that manage to avoid periodic layoffs and find a good long term and highly rewarding job.

If you however have tried looking for a highly rewarding jobs in your engineering field for long enough...moved to a couple of different cities in search of your goal and exhausted every possible alternative....then look for another job/career. But remember that in the current economic environment finding work in most careers isn't necessarily going to be easy regardless of whether they're engineering related or not     

Best of Luck!

halherta

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

Sharp21,

Your 2 major misconceptions need to be cleared up.

1. In order to get an H1B visa for a person a company needs to prove that the salary of the visa applicant will not be lower than that of a local american worker.
2. Most companies will not advertise entry level jobs purely because there are 80000 of them and they dont have the time to sift through resumes. You need to look deeper than the nearest employment website.

 

RE: The future of entry level jobs and U.S. engineers

I haven't read all the posts, but the points made above make it clear that you need to expand yourself a bit.  It could be you are in a hard hit area and simply won't find a job locally where you want.  Not all of the US is in deep.  To start, you may have to go to another part of the country to get experience until things stabilize and start going forward.  

If nothing else, check for companies in ND.  They currently have an unemployment rate of about 2 percent.  With the oil going bonkers, pipelines going through, wind turbines and new power plants going up, there is work.  I would imagine there is work for EE's as well.

Good luck.

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