I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
(OP)
Hello all
I have studied mechanical engineering and have now just over one years experience. My current job is shocking. I mean really shocking. I have wasted time not doing much and been used as a technician (!). I am fed up and am about to resign. Please note, this is not a spur of the moment/hot-head decision. I have been calculating this move for long.
So now I have been made a job offer in: Management Consulting.
I was told by the genteleman at the interview that I must think about what im doing and that once I enter MC there is no going back to engineering. What would you do, based on this brief description. Does management consulting have potential to grow?
I have studied mechanical engineering and have now just over one years experience. My current job is shocking. I mean really shocking. I have wasted time not doing much and been used as a technician (!). I am fed up and am about to resign. Please note, this is not a spur of the moment/hot-head decision. I have been calculating this move for long.
So now I have been made a job offer in: Management Consulting.
I was told by the genteleman at the interview that I must think about what im doing and that once I enter MC there is no going back to engineering. What would you do, based on this brief description. Does management consulting have potential to grow?





RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
I don't think the engineering profession will miss you.
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
I can not find engineers here who do engineering work
Hence my designation as engineer or future can be considered void.
Hence my decision to leave.
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
Using a new hire engineer as a technician is not only completely appropriate, but beneficial for learning the practical side of the business. Looking at your previous threads, it appears you've had at a least a few good engineering projects. That's not a bad first year in my book. Did you expect to get out of college and start designing the next space shuttle? That would be shocking.
Anyhow, you have a lack of experience and strong opinions on how things you don't understand should be done. You sound like perfect material for MC.
http://en.
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
Which thread was this? Mechanics behind fasteners? Was I not willing enough to learn the correct way?
And yes I am aware of MC criticisms, Ive been looking carefully into that. Thats why im trying to look into the "ROI" concept of building up a history of how usefull my MC advice is.
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
Thus I will continue to put on 100kg track sets and get blisters on my hands.
I am asking you all not to criticize me too easily. This may sound pretentious, but what I have endured I dont think many eng rookies would last a month. Understand my situation.
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
Just get a different job, one that doesn't require that you get your hands too dirty. Or get one that's even worse to give you some perspective, like crime scene technician. Not the guys that baggie up the samples. The guys that come in with biohazard suits and bag up all the brain splatter the crime lab doesn't need. I'm sure you can find something.
"Gorgeous hair is the best revenge." Ivana Trump
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
That is correct. When I tell this to my colleagues and University friends what I have done for the past over year, they go pale.
But it seems some poeple on this forum see it as normal. Thats kinda funny. Very easy to say that.
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
No need. I have known 2 people that died in my work place. On both occasions I was one shift away.
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
Now that ive given more details about my situation: Am I over-reacting?
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
If doing the real engineering is what you want, stick out your service underground, and treat every day as a learning experience (how could you make it easier for the poor guy who has to change tracks next?)
But if you just want to have a cush job, with no risk of ever doing anything real or meaningful, then by all means go be a consultant.
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
Mike McCann
MMC Engineering
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
Dan - Owner

http://www.Hi-TecDesigns.com
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
So, who does it then? Must be someone doing the work. You need to find out where those guys are and go work for them.
I don't know about "never" being able to get back to engineering, but if you do try, you'll certainly wind up in a newbie position, competing against others with your current experience. It's also a bit unclear what makes you qualified for a "management consulting" job; that raises some questions on its own.
At the very minimum, you ought to at least look at working for another company before completely ditching what you went to college for. While you obviously are frustrated and demoralized, spending only one year at a crappy job is hardly the basis for ditching the profession. If you read some of the postings about bad bosses and the like, you'll see than having a degree, or even having 10 or 15 years of experience does not immunize you from getting a bad boss or bad job.
TTFN
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RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
I tried looking for "these people" who do true engineering work, hehe, and its almost impossible to get in their sphere.
I will try squeeze myself in between what I want. This analyst position I speak of will still be in the engineering industry so its not as bad as being completely unrelated. Then maybe it might keep me within arms reach of what I studied.
I appreciate the advice, I AM listening.
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
- Steve
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
Management consulting will open the amazingly imaginative doors of Excel and (almost certainly) SAP. I'd rather dig graves.
- Steve
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
My God, that's just a notch up from cleaning the toilets!!
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
But what it comes down to is what engineering really is.
Off of wiki
"Engineering is the discipline, art, skill and profession of acquiring and applying scientific, mathematical, economic, social, and practical knowledge, in order to design and build structures, machines, devices, systems, materials and processes that safely realize improvements to the lives of people."
Here, IMO emphasis is placed on the scientific and mathematical skills. And I'm sure most good engineers would agree with me.
But there is still the added forte of "design and build"...and build. ie. we engineers must specify how to build these things we use science to design....sometimes it takes trying to build them to properly understand mistakes we may not otherwise see....or take longer to see.
Fe
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
The website used to have a lot more stories, but strangely enough fell over at about the same time the GFC struck.
As for doing dirty work, I spent the first 2 years of my career hanging off the back of drill rigs doing data acquisition for coal mines. Not exactly exciting, or a clean job, but it certainly puts things in perspective.
I certainly understood mining safety systems and lockouts better than my colleagues when I finally got an office job.
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
Fed up after only a year? IMO, do your job the best you can, then move on to another dept/position/etc.
Chris
SolidWorks 10 SP5.0
ctopher's home
SolidWorks Legion
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
You say that "in South Africa an engineer does not do engineering work". You also say that yor friends from uni "go pale" when you tell then what you do. What do they do? Do they do engineering work? What is "engineering work" in your opinion?
You have been working for a year which is a short time (at least in my opinion). If it was a trainee program it would probably be longer. Were you promised something they haven't delivered or did you just "go for it" and now you are frustrated because it wasn't what you expected.
If you are unhappy then try something else. But why did you study engineering in the first place? I don't think that Management Consulting includes a lot of "engineering work" either if that is what you are truly looking for.
Good Luck
/Thomas
RE: I am exiting engineering career. Life changing move. Please advise
On the other hand, since your current working conditions make you feel miserable then by all means get away from there.It will be a relief.
I am not sure that by entering MC " there is no going back to engineering".
But is this your only alternative? How about trying a bit more
on searching for eng. work possibilities.?
I thimk you should take your time trying on that....