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engineering salaries 20

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ballist

ballist

Automotive
Feb 28, 2016
9
hi!

I work as a trainee in a large automaker in UK. The pay is decent, comparing to other sectors, but not considerably. Graduates start with 30k, reaching 38k in 4 years. Then, it is a bit hard to become senior, in order to earn 50-60k. Some people after 7-10 years haven't become seniors. After that, it's harder to become supervisor (I guess you need 10+ years) and supervisors earn 60-80k. To become chief engineer or director, it's even harder and comes after 20 years of service at least.

Is there any department I could try to get in to earn a bit more or have better career progression? Maybe legal or finance or IT? Any advice please?
 
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Poor wording perhaps, even when there are lots of engineers there are likely to be niches (by sector, experience level, location...) that still have shortages. For instances, having lots of engineering grads does not directly translate to having a surfeit of 'good structural designers' in a specific location assuming by good you in part mean suitably experienced with a demonstrated track record.

Posting guidelines faq731-376 (probably not aimed specifically at you)
What is Engineering anyway: faq1088-1484​
 
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No to me good means:

[ul]
[li]eager to learn[/li]
[li]pays attention to everything someone with more experience says[/li]
[li]asks questions[/li]
[li]spends too much of their private time cruising eng-tips[/li]
[li]has a good sense of proportion[/li]
[/ul]
 
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jayrod12: offer pay 20% higher than the local "going rate" and see what kind of candidates you attract. Can't afford that? Then you, like the pointy haired boss in the Dilbert comics, want the very best technical professionals- but only the ones who are dim enough to accept industry average compensation. You can want it all you like, but those "bright, but clueless" people are very tough to find.

Every industry is short the people with ten years' experience that the same industry failed to hire as fresh grads 10 years ago. And in a buyer's labour market, fresh grads are left on the scrapheap. They find other things to do. Businesses get addicted to having piles of candidates with cardboard signs hanging around their necks, responding to every job ad, and figure that the days when professionals needed to be built from good raw materials rather than purchased "just in time" are over. Half the problem we have right now in our profession is the broken transition from graduation to employment. But with at least half of each graduating class currently failing to gain access to jobs in their chosen profession, there is only one solution worth contemplating, and it's a dramatic reduction in supply.

 
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I don't even know you and you compare me to Dilbert's boss? That's a good way to end what could have been a good discussion. I can see why you have such a negative outlook.
 
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jayrod12: that was NOT intended as a personal attack- I used my comparison to my favourite Dilbert comic as a tactic of argument. I'm sorry if I offended you. For all I know, you're the best boss around and your hair isn't even nearly pointy!

I've got to say though that I get very tired of people complaining about being unable to find candidates that they find suitable, when the labour market for engineers is so obviously- and measurably- in oversupply.

We hire co-op students, pick the best ones and hire them, train them, pay them well and give them interesting work. We never experience shortages.

 
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Just as another talking point... just because there's an "over-supply" of engineers in the marketplace doesn't mean they're experienced engineers. Every semester a class graduates, the out-of-work engineer number surges... because there are suddenly more "engineers" in the marketplace. Doesn't mean they're useful, but they hold the title, so they must be counted.

Dan - Owner
URL]
 
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Part of me wonders if this oversupply is a mindset that lingers from the cold war and is thought to be linked with national security. During and after an all out conflict, I think there would be an incredible need for engineers.
 
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The Cold War thing pretty burned out in the 90s. Even then, the market share for defense-related jobs was tiny compared to commercial; we were lamenting in the late 80s that defense electronics was less than 5% of the total electronics sector, which meant that no one was particularly interested in jumping through the hoops needed to be a qualified military electronics supplier.

TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert! faq731-376 forum1529
 
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I talking more about if the infrastructure was damaged. I don't think think it would take much of a conflict to stretch available engineering and delay recovery.
 
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Actually, that would not be true. In an all-out conflict, as in WWII, the work force needed factory workers, not engineers. And infrastructure requires primarily SE and CE, so a generalized demand for "engineers" is silly and counter-productive. Moreover, those engineers that are not working as engineers are likely to have completely forgotten their relevant education, and would hardly be a "reserve force" that's immediately ready to do engineering.

TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert! faq731-376 forum1529
 
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Sure doesn't seem to be a lot of job postings for structural engineers in the prairies from where I sit. Basically stuck at my current firm until I get laid off and then faced with the prospect of leaving east.
 
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Any large country is going to have inhomogeneities in workforce. Alabama and California have different wants and needs. Even in Baton Rouge, where lots of infrastructure is damaged, engineers are essentially only needed for the damage assessment, for now. It'll be years for money to be allocated, contracts drawn up, etc.

TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert! faq731-376 forum1529
 
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As I said, the oversupply can and certainly does coexist with localized shortages of experienced people. Every industry is short the people with 10 yrs of experience that it failed to hire 10 years ago. The same is true of boom/bust industries like oil and gas: they're desperately short people in boom times, they flush out during bust times, then when they try to rebuild during the next boom cycle, the people they had as 2nd tier last time have all moved on. They may have once been considered qualified, but now they're considered 10 yrs out of date.

Look: when a profession can only capture 30% of its graduates on average in a whole nation, it's a freaking disaster. Even teaching exceeds 50% capture here. Engineering is oversupplied to an extent that no other regulated profession is. Why is that? I suggest it's because our governments and our educators feel that there can never be too many of us- and we're too arrogant to disagree. We've allowed a once-proud profession to become "the new liberal arts education".
 
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"I suggest it's because our governments and our educators feel that there can never be too many of us"

The reason would be two-fold. The educators, because turning away paying students would require letting go some of the educators, and the government, because they have a vested interest in driving down wages.

TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert! faq731-376 forum1529
 
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Do Canadians not check to see that their degree is in demand before they pursue it? I know one could ask the same of Art, History, and English majors in the States, but I'd expect those thinking of pursuing engineering to have slightly more forethought than the "next guy".
 
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I feel that there are people who take engineering who never really plan to be an engineer. The engineering degree on it's own opens a lot of doors. It also shows employers that you are capable of teaching yourself new skills, and capable of being dedicated enough to finish an extremely tough degree.
 
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Many engineers in Canada refuse to believe what the data is saying. Why should prospective students be any different?

The days when all you needed was a university degree and it was your ticket to a nice cushy white collar job for the rest of your life are long gone. Engineering is just the regulated profession which is worst affected- so far.

The educators don't care- they have long ago divorced an engineering education from training to work as an engineer. They view it as the new liberal arts education, which makes me cringe on so many levels...

And the anecdotal shortage reports of people like jayrod12 don't help. Lots of people in government and in the regulatory bodies feel that engineering must be in short supply because they hear anecdotes like that, again and again. I've explained how that can happen despite an oversupplied labour market.

For those of you who want to review the stats, I'll post the link to the OSPE study again:


p. 8 of that report tells the story, but the rest is worth the read.
 
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I don't think that being an engineering major means that your frontal cortex is any more developed than the next person's.

I think a more likely reason for getting an engineering degree is to placate familial pressure; I know someone who got an engineering degree from Berkeley with straight A's, and they even got an engineering job. It was clear that they had very little interest in engineering, and being Asian, it was more likely that their parents (probably father) badgered them into that degree. They stuck it out for almost 4 years, and then quit to work in their father's restaurant. Another engineer worked for a while at McDonnell Douglas as a engineer, but their passion was apparently cooking, and they went off and started Panda Express, after succeeding at their original, standalone, restaurant, the Panda Inn in Pasadena.

TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert! faq731-376 forum1529
 
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