Ten Essential Skills for Electrical Engineers by Barry L. Dorr, Chapter 10 Part 1 Summary

Ten Essential Skills for Electrical Engineers is a wonderful book and at the writing of this post I am summarizing the fifth chapter. However, I couldn’t resist skipping over to read the tenth chapter, GETTING A JOB – KEEPING A JOB – ENJOYING YOUR WORK. In this chapter, Dave a 74 year old friend of the author and successful engineer, joins in writing this chapter. Together with Dorr, they provide suggestions on getting and enjoying an engineering career in the following ways:

• Positively distinguishing yourself from other job applicants
• Distinguishing yourself in the workplace

The chapter is divided into three parts:

1. How to effectively market yourself to ccompanies as a candidate with strong technical and interpersonal skills
2. How to quickly develop skills that will make you a valuable part of any engineering department
3. How to ensure the nearly 100,000 hours of your working life be satisfying, rewarding and meaningful

This chapter advises one to select the information that is right for you at the moment. For myself, I will focus on the first part.

Part 1. Getting a Job

First of all, familiarize yourself with the corporate hiring process. This is usually done in 4 steps: Step 1, Computer screening. Step 2, Review by Human Resource personnel. Step 3, Telephone screening. Step 4, Interviews at company.

Tips for bypassing the above corporate hiring process:

1. Avoid the computer screening process by taking advantage of all the job placement assistance available at your school
2. Target companies carefully and send resumes to individuals within the company

Getting an Interview

1. Take and pass required engineering exams and certifications by these companies
2. Get some experience, in form of internships or projects
3. Attend job fairs
4. Send resumes to a carefully chosen set of companies
5. Send your resume to the right person
6. Always accompany a resume with a cover letter
7. Contact companies even if they are not hiring

Preparing for an Interview

1. Get your suit cleaned and pressed
2. Prepare to discuss anything on your resume
3. Mentally prepare to be interviewed by a team
4. Be prepared for the interviewer to ask you to discuss a subject of your choice

The Interview

There might be an initial telephone screen. If you do well, you will be invited for an on site interview. At this stage, follow the following:

1. Treat the telephone screen as you would a normal. serious interview
2. Be prepared to work problems
3. Be confident and enthusiastic
4. Don’t worry about being nervous
5. When asked something you don’t know, do not give up or panic
6. If the interviewer is inexperienced (like in your particular expertise) help him/her out in understanding
7. When doing problems, check your work
8. When asked about team projects, make sire to credit your team members
9. Be prepared to ask the interviewer questions
10. Send a follow-up email immediately after the interview

Selecting the Right Offer

After going through the above stages and hopefully succeeding in getting an offer for a job, it might still be important to ask yourself these questions:

1. Does the company offer job security?
2. Did the company offer a high starting salary?
3. Did you meet mentors you could learn from?
4. Did you see women in engineering and management positions? (Relevant benefit to female candidates)
5. Is the laboratory well equipped?

 

The above is only a shallow summary. The complete book further elaborates each point stated. I will continuously internalize on these concepts as I continue with my studies and career search. The next two parts will become relevant to me as soon as I start working and I’ll be sure to capture that too!