My plan to "jumpstart" my career
My plan to "jumpstart" my career
(OP)
Hi all,
Its been an age since I last posted on here - long story short I took an entry level job as a Field Engineer with Halliburton in late 2008, lost that job after 2 months when the sector collapsed in Colorado, and haven't been working in Engineering since then.
Like many others here, I've been on the job hunt, although my problem is that I graduated in 2006, so I can't qualify as a "new grad" anymore, and only have a year and a half's experience, which was mainly in project management, so I can't qualify as an "experienced professional".
The good news, is that I have managed to maintain full time employment, albeit in a totally different job sector (hospital security). I've also been fortunate enough to be promoted twice by my company into supervisor jobs.
I have managed to continue applying to jobs, mainly trying to get onto a graduate training program, although it doesn't help that I have one of the lesser-known disciplines (Materials Engineering), so there are a lot less opportunities out there.
Anyhow, now that my background essay is over with, my plan to "jump start" my career again, is that I am planning to enlist into the National Guard, and return to College to take some classes in Electrical/Mechanical Engineering with the aim of a second undergraduate major, before moving onto a Masters.
I've had plenty of discussions with current and former Guard members about the military side of this plan, but I'd like to hear from Engineers about the value of going back to College to take more classes - my hope is that then I will be eligible for more of the "new grad" programs, and will be able to add my previous work and internship experiences to boost my resume above the rest. There's also the local contacts I would make through the Guard, a number of whom work for local companies such as Lockheed Martin, which may help too.
Thanks in advance for any advice or suggestions - and apologies for the long read!
Its been an age since I last posted on here - long story short I took an entry level job as a Field Engineer with Halliburton in late 2008, lost that job after 2 months when the sector collapsed in Colorado, and haven't been working in Engineering since then.
Like many others here, I've been on the job hunt, although my problem is that I graduated in 2006, so I can't qualify as a "new grad" anymore, and only have a year and a half's experience, which was mainly in project management, so I can't qualify as an "experienced professional".
The good news, is that I have managed to maintain full time employment, albeit in a totally different job sector (hospital security). I've also been fortunate enough to be promoted twice by my company into supervisor jobs.
I have managed to continue applying to jobs, mainly trying to get onto a graduate training program, although it doesn't help that I have one of the lesser-known disciplines (Materials Engineering), so there are a lot less opportunities out there.
Anyhow, now that my background essay is over with, my plan to "jump start" my career again, is that I am planning to enlist into the National Guard, and return to College to take some classes in Electrical/Mechanical Engineering with the aim of a second undergraduate major, before moving onto a Masters.
I've had plenty of discussions with current and former Guard members about the military side of this plan, but I'd like to hear from Engineers about the value of going back to College to take more classes - my hope is that then I will be eligible for more of the "new grad" programs, and will be able to add my previous work and internship experiences to boost my resume above the rest. There's also the local contacts I would make through the Guard, a number of whom work for local companies such as Lockheed Martin, which may help too.
Thanks in advance for any advice or suggestions - and apologies for the long read!





RE: My plan to "jumpstart" my career
RE: My plan to "jumpstart" my career
David
RE: My plan to "jumpstart" my career
RE: My plan to "jumpstart" my career
RE: My plan to "jumpstart" my career
Cedar Bluff Engineering
http://cedarbluffengineering.webs.com
RE: My plan to "jumpstart" my career
RE: My plan to "jumpstart" my career
RE: My plan to "jumpstart" my career
Someone who qualifies for OCS and Nuc School could do a ton worse. Not every Engineer is going to qualify for both (about half my section had degrees and about half of them were Engineers who didn't qualify for OCS).
David
RE: My plan to "jumpstart" my career
Sounds like a great course of action to me. Military experience opens up several employment possibilities, it gives you preference for public jobs, there's the hire a vet program, it opens doors in project management or buisness development, and it's just plain good life experience.
I would agree that maybe the materials discipline is maybe a little too narrow for an unexperienced person. An MS in ME would broaden your applicability.
RE: My plan to "jumpstart" my career
Firstly just to clarify something, I graduated College in 2006, then worked for a small Engineering company doing Project Management work for a year and a half. I then moved to the US at the end of 2007, did a couple of short term jobs at the start of 2008, and did my 2 months with Halliburton at the end of 2008.
I have managed to get a whole new skillset from my Hospital Security work (talking down aggressive pysch patients, restraining violent drunks, helping calm grieving families etc), but it's not something I could have a future in long term as the only way to move up is to get into management, which would take away the part of the job I enjoy, which is dealing with the aforementioned incidents.
While the Navy Nuke program is tempting, I'm pretty settled on the Army National Guard as my choice of branch. I'm not yet a US Citizen, so my plan is to enlist for now, and then go OCS once my Citizenship comes through. The Colorado ARNG has some pretty interesting lines of work, from Artillery to Space Command, all of which I'd be fine with doing.
I did enjoy my studies in Materials, but truth be told my main interest is in Space Engineering. They have this interesting program at UCCS, which is one of the schools the ARNG would cover my tuition for:
http://www.eas.uccs.edu/meso.shtml
That being said, I wasn't exposed to some of the programming/mechanics which are pre-requisites for this course, so my plan is to initially do a few undergrad classes to prepare myself before I jump into this program.
All of the things which go part and parcel with the military (time away from home for training, deployments etc) are all things I've chatted about with my wife and we feel it's the best option. I do know a few people who have gone Active Duty after starting in the National Guard, so I may wind up taking that path if the military life appeals enough to me to make it my full time job.
RE: My plan to "jumpstart" my career
RE: My plan to "jumpstart" my career
RE: My plan to "jumpstart" my career
RE: My plan to "jumpstart" my career
htt
My experience w/ military recruiters is that they are far more ethical than people give them credit for. Most trouble with recruiters stem from lies or omissions on the recruit's part.
RE: My plan to "jumpstart" my career
The recruiter I'm working with came highly recommended to me by a co-worker who's in the NG at the moment - and he's been very good to me in terms of honesty (e.g.he could offer job x, but it would be at a unit 3 hours drive away, or job y, which would be 20 mins drive away), and willing to do the legwork for a couple of waivers I need (one of them is already approved, just waiting on the second one).