Career in the defense industry 2

[ziggi]

Hey all,
I'm a relatively fresh mechanical engineer (about 3 years out of univ). Ever since I was a kid I was interested in defense technology, I went into engineering primarily b/c of it, why am I not in it now? Long story.

Anyway I was wondering if anyone knew how to get into the defense industry as a young pup.

 

[Twoballcane]

ziggi,

Just some news that might be helpfull!

http://www.boston.com/business/tech.../colleges_craft_studies_to_fit_defense_firms/

Tobalcane
"If you avoid failure, you also avoid success."

 

[KENAT]

So straight out of University (1999) in the UK I did the following.

Wrote off with a CV to all the larger aerospace/defense companies I could think of in the UK. (I’d actually applied to some while still at uni)

I then looked at a copy of the “Society of British Aerospace Companies” member directory at the local library. I went thru it sending CV & cover letter to every company that looked remotely interesting.

Eventually got 2 companies interested in me. At the time one of them was probably the second or third biggest in UK while the other was fairly small. The small firm was quicker at giving me an interview & offer so I took it.

I was a Design engineer. I spent a relatively small proportion of my time at my desk working on CAD. The range of activities I spent the rest of my time on was fairly long but a bunch of it was customer liaison & trials (including abroad). We emphasized trying to get input from users and employing former users to get their input at the design stage. I wouldn’t go so far as to say (former) users always make the best designers but their input was invaluable.

It was a great job, wish I was still there many days.

I’m now in the US and have pretty much given up on getting into the aerospace/defense industry until I have citizenship.

From my research (and responses from companies that were interested) it is officially not possible to get a full US clearance as a non US citizen. If you’re really something special you may be able to get clearance on a by program basis but it seems you need to be Von Braun or someone for this to actually happen these days. Bear this in mind if you’re looking at coming to the US and aren’t a citizen.

 

[IRstuff]

That's pretty accurate, I think. We just nixed interviewing someone who turned out to be a non-citizen. Much of the issue is that even non-secret stuff cannot be exported to "foreign persons" per ITAR, so in aerospace, and defense in particular, a non-citizen can't even work on some of the unclassified stuff.

When I worked at MDC, they used to use red stripes across a non-citizen's badge to denote "Agent of a Foreign Power." Was definitely a conversation stopper.

The big problem right now is that there is a huge backlog for getting clearances, so any item that raises a flag is just going to make everything that much worse.

TTFN

 

[IRstuff]

Note also, that if you have immediate relatives in annoying countries, that can stimie your clearance as well.

TTFN

 

[KENAT]

The ITAR is definitely an issue.

For a while after moving to the states I still did free-lance work for my previous UK employer. However, with changes and stricter enforcement of ITAR regs this was starting to become an issue.

Also Just being in a building or part of a building where remotely sensitive stuff is going on can be a problem without clearance, like the red stripe on the badge issue. Having to be escorted every time you want to use the restroom or photocopier gets old.

 

[Heckler]

TTFN - I just went through an interview for a friends clearance. I asked about that.....I was told that it adds a lot of time to the entire background investigation. I got my clearance in three months due to being ex-military.

 

[FORD150HD]

i have a uncle who works at rathyeon and he said it's very cool job you might want to check it out.

p.s. he works on defense projects