Ten Years of Engineering

The end of 2021 marked my first decade as an engineer. Ten years is simultaneously, a long time and the blink of an eye. I’ve gotten here quicker than I realized, and it also took forever. Anyone that’s marked their 10-, 20- or 30-year anniversary as an engineer must feel the same. However, this essay is not for someone marking off the decades but for the engineer who has just entered the industry and is marking off the years. Hopefully, I can provide you with some lessons in getting through your early career and towards your goals like a duck in water. Effortlessly.

Year 0
I graduated from college in 2011. The job market was weak and competition high. During that time, I sent out close to 100 resumes and applications. I received one call back for an interview. The HR person that called said I could come in on a Friday and don’t worry about dressing up too much. The interview would be informal with the department staff. But, I could not leave anything to chance. I made sure I had my suit ready and was studying from the book “150 Interview Questions”.

All of this paid off! I was offered a part time position with a non-negotiable salary. A small start and it was a job that I was very fortunate to have. It gave me a great start to my career.

Lesson: Prepare to the best of your ability and be willing to accept the outcome. Tough times make tough people.

Year 0 to 2
My first two years as an engineer were rocky. I was not like a duck through water. Luckily, I had a patient manager, willing to nudge me in the right direction. He gave me the right advice and with some other tips, I was able to get my feet swimming in the right direction. The most important piece of advice I received, was to study the tools of my profession. This meant getting familiar with criteria manuals and design standards. I would do this during lunch by reviewing the FDOT PPM or Standard Index.

You can do this too by devoting time every day to learning about your discipline. Being technically proficient as an engineer is the most important thing to get right early on because it takes the most focus. Everything else, project management, communication skills, can all be learned on the job. But no one pays attention to an engineer that isn’t good at engineering.

Lesson: Become technically proficient as qucikly as possible. Set a foundation for your career around your discipline. Learn the skills of engineering, production and delivery.

Year 2 to 4
These next two years were filled with stretch assignments. Because I developed a high level of technical knowledge early, I was trusted to work on larger projects. Around this time is when I got interested in energy management. One bad lunch could render me a lethargic mess for the remainder of the afternoon. Add enough of these days up and suddenly I was behind on work and disappointing people who depended on me. I had to learn what and when to eat. Also, around this time I started jiu-jitsu.

Being physically fit year-round makes the mental fitness for engineering easier. However you decide to approach your fitness is your choice but just know that it is important if you’re going to deliver high level engineering work.

Lesson: Build health management habits that help your career growth. Being high energy with deep focus means you can deliver consistently.

Year 5
In year five I made the decision to switch companies. This was obviously a difficult choice and I’ll give you the frameworks I used for making the decision here:

1. Modified Pro/Con List. Write down all the pros of Option 1 on Day 1. Then on Day 2, without looking at the previous pros list, write down all the cons of Option 1. Then do the same exercise for Option 2. On Day 5 you should have a pros/cons list for each Option. Sit and compare them for clarity. The same manager who helped me in Year 0-2 actually gave me this piece of advice when I reached out to him for help in making this choice.
2. In addition to the pros and cons list I wrote an essay. In this essay I tried to describe what my day would look like, 5 years in the future. Similar to the pro/con list I wrote one essay for Option 1 on the first day. Then on the second day the essay for Option 2. The essays are lost somewhere but the act of thinking through to the future was the helpful part.

Having a strategy for making tough decisions is paramount but what I’ve noticed is that your intuition usually knows the right choice. In the case of switching companies (and other tough decisions I’ve made) I knew what I should do internally. Getting my analytical engineering brain on board was the hard part.

Lesson: Develop personalized strategies for making tough decisions.

Year 5 to 8
These three years moved at a fast pace. I was part of a new team in a new job and was able to contribute to several key project wins for our office all while pursuing my MBA. The engineering knowledge built earlier in my career proved to be useful here in the chaotic environment of project pursuits and the supplemental knowledge from business school helped my total understanding of how engineering operations produce profit.

During this time, I started noticing the things I was good at, mainly by asking around and observing the things people relied on me for. One example of this was during a pursuit, an engineer asked, "Is there some sort of chaos management class you take for your MBA?!" He said this half-jokingly but he noticed that I was particularly cool under pressure and could help the team find a path through difficulty in a calm manner. Other things that I discovered I was good at was being diplomatic in tense situations and being logical about solving problems step by step.

Whatever your iniate strengths are, now is the time to find them. They'll ultimately guide the direction of your career. If you find that you're naturally outgoing and can effectively communicate complex engineering ideas, maybe you'll be great at pursuing projects. If you're naturally a tinkerer and love solving the hard problems that no one else can figure out them maybe a path to deeper technical expertise should be your goal. Either way, if you've followed my other steps and develop a strong base for your career in the first five years, then these 3 years should be ones of strength discovery.

Lesson: Find out where your natual strengths can be leveraged with your foundation of engineering knowledge.

Year 8 to 10
The past two years have been built on the skills of the previous eight. At this stage I've been able to lead projects and initiatives at an office level to help more people.

My career has naturally turned outward where I've been more concerned with helping others reach their goals with the little skills I've build. For instance where I've seen others struggling with financial managment of a project, either through work overload or inability, I've stepped in to assist. Where I've seen personnel issues I've tried to help through coaching or reaching up through the organization for assistance.

All this has helped others trust my abilities and continues to grow my career.

Lesson: Once you've establish your foundation of knowledge and found your initiate skills it's time to help others grow.

See you in another ten years.