Any advice for my first job as an EE? 1

[w1res]

Hello everyone,

I've just recently graduated from my university and finally received, and accepted, a job offer. This is my first time ever that I will be working a real job and I am just as nervous as I am excited.

I was wondering if anyone has some tips for a straight out of college electrical engineer. Maybe something that is good to do, some mistake you've made that you wish you hadn't... anything!

 

[JohnRBaker]

A mistake I've made, eh?

Remember; you have to actually touch a 220 line but 440 will reach out for you.

Which brings me to my second piece of advice; before you reach inside an electrical panel, make sure that one of the padlocks on the main-breaker handle is YOURS.

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Design Solutions
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Industry Sector
Cypress, CA

http://www.siemens.com/plm

http://www.plmworld.org/museum/

To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

 

[DesignerGuy16]

^^ What he said. Lock-out Tag-out. Learn it and love it. It doesn't matter what your job is, if you're physically working on equipment it's worth your life and limbs to follow it.

Most new employees aren't expected to be perfect out of the box, just learn from your mistakes and ask questions. Don't wait for someone to ask you for something.

Last but not least, make friends with the "little people". Assemblers, machinists, welders, journeymen electrician, etc. They will tell you what's REALLY wrong, and they're right more often than not.

James Spisich
Design Engineer, CSWP

 

[IRstuff]

Perhaps you should state what type of EE job you got, since advice is often situationally depedent. Congrats, BTW; there are many others who are not so fortunate.

> Don't assume that circuit ground is actually earth ground. Nearly took out my eye when I connected a scope ground to the circuit ground, and exploded a 741 op amp.

> Don't assume that any grounding circuit is actually working until continually proven with measurement. I go knocked flat on my back by residual 20kV charge when a grounding bar failed to make complete contact with the chassis.

> You are actually now beginning your real education, so pay attention, listen carefully, and take copious notes. College was merely a preparatory step for the real world. Nearly everything in school is close to the ideal case, which almost never happens in real life.

TTFN

FAQ731-376
Chinese prisoner wins Nobel Peace Prize

 

[w1res]

Thanks for the replies everyone! I will definitely be keeping these in mind.

To answer the question about the type of job, I will be dealing mostly with analog circuits built from discrete components. I also consider myself very lucky to be getting a job so fast. From the time I graduated till I accepted the offer has been less than 6 weeks. I know many of my friends have been not so fortunate.

 

[IRstuff]

OK, so the first of my comments definitely applies. ;-)

> Bone up SPICE; you probably be using it regularly
> Get access to a copy of Horowitz' Art of Electronics for reference designs; there are a bunch of other books that have
> Electronic Design magazine is free, and often has interesting circuit designs

TTFN

FAQ731-376
Chinese prisoner wins Nobel Peace Prize

 

[MadMango]

Try not to get into a clique your first week or month. You might ask who your mentor is going to be if it isn't obvious. I've seen many people right out of school make the mistake of gravitating to the "young and cool" and end up acquiring bad habits and work ethics. You can gravitate towards your "peer group" after your 90-day probation period is successfully over.

Related to the above, spread your lunches around, go with different people if asked. It's good to try to get to know everyone and lunch is a good start with that.

If you don't have an immediate task or project, ask others if they need assistance. You might get stuck with some menial jobs that no one else has wanted to do (like segregate a bin of loose SMT components), just know that completion of these types of tasks will create positive impressions with others in the office (and endless opportunity for some fun ribbing from co-workers).

"Art without engineering is dreaming; Engineering without art is calculating."

Have you read faq731-376 to make the best use of these Forums?

 

[rmw]

While you think you are educated, your education really taught you very little. You will come to realize that in time.

What it taught you was how to learn. Expect to start learning day one and relish it. Your learning curve will be very steep at first. Be a sponge. Soak it in.

Don't be afraid to say that you don't know. They don't really expect you to know that much at this stage and will see right through you if you claim to know what they know that you don't really know. Ask, they expect to teach you.

I think what James S said in his last paragraph above was golden. Heed it.

rmw

 

[berkshire]

w1res (Electrical)
In addition to the post from JohnRBaker (Mechanical)
Think zero energy state.
As an EE, you may not only be working on circuits, you may have capacators lurking in the background, or if working around electric motors, you have to think about what they may have been powering, before, you shut them off. Are there flywheels or hydraulics involved. All of these things can reach out and touch you in unpleasant ways, if you are not, aware of their potential. Don't let your first experience be " Guess how I found out about that."
B.E.

 

[racookpe1978]

You cannot "see" or "smell" or "feel" electricity .... until it has already either killed you or is burning up your equipment.

(Steam and high pressure water, and even most explosive fluids and gasses, at least leak out of the pipe or flange to warn you that "Something is badly wrong - or about to go wrong - Stop and investigate." Compared to electrical systems, piping and nuclear stuff is "easy" ... )

Electricity? Invisible. Deadly at high volts even if you aren't physically touching it.

Now, the nuclear side of me also wants me to remind you kindly that electricity - being invisible and all that - is also "Pure Freakin' Magic" and isn't really there. Unlike the real world of steam and water and oil and gas and other "real" things safely inside their pipes and pumps and tanks. Electrons are merely random small vibrating things zipping around the nucleus statistically of too little mass to even be weighed on the atomic scale of real matter.
8<)

 

[KENAT]

There have been a bunch of threads about first jobs etc, the search doesn't always work great but look back for the last few years worth of this forum. There was one about how to be a star or some such.

Many folks will say ask questions, and this is way better than sitting there doing nothing, however, often even better is spend a bit of time thinking about it or researching it, come up with what you think is the correct course of action and ask for confirmation. Obviously, for immediate safety and the like don't wait too long to ask the question!

Secondly, when you do ask a question or for confirmation of your idea etc. take note of this, preferably in a permanent log book or similar/equivalent. Don't ask the same question twice but refer to the answer from the first time. Even better, where possible apply the answer to other vaguely similar situations.

Congrats & good luck.

Posting guidelines faq731-376

http://eng-tips.com/market.cfm?

(probably not aimed specifically at you)
What is Engineering anyway: faq1088-1484​

 

[DerPumpeMeister]

Congrats, w1res! Lots of good advice here. I would recommend you take the opportunity to learn where your company stores reference information. That is, your department (if the company is ISO9001) should have written procedures on a variety of topics. There may be an engineering reference library (or just a file cabinet), technical white papers, articles, commonly used industry specs, etc. When you have some down time between tasks be proactive and peruse these materials. The goal is not only to learn the information, but more importantly where to find the information. Soon you'll be faced with something unknown and you'll make a great impression by being able to track down the answer yourself, or at least show your boss you are self-reliant and motivated. Good luck!

http://www.EngineeringGuideBook.com

 

[kontiki99]

Where you are not 100% tasked with project work and deadlines yet, maybe they will let you work a few weeks with the technical crews in what ever field you're in.

Always good to see things from the bottom up.

 

[plasgears]

GE jet engines used to have a lessons learned publ. Good for those wanting to learn from mistakes of others. Your quality dept may have initiated a work instructions collection. The purpose of WI is educating newbies, among others.

 

[Ron]

Stay well grounded.