gaining and loosing engineering specialties 6

[2dye4]

What engineering disciplines are on the way up from
the perspective of demand and what are on the way down??

My take on it

Advancing
Chemical,Eniviromental,Aeronoutical,Civil,Petroleum,Structural

Declining
Electrical,Mechanical,Mining,Computer

Agree / Disagree

Who did I leave out??

2d4

 

[sms]

With all due respect to moltenmetal, I went to the career page for the company I work for (

http://www.Lyondell.com)

and gathered the following wage data (full time positions):

Engr 1 or 2 (0-5 years experience) 65000-73000/yr plus bonus

Engr 2/Sr (5-8 years experience) 73000-83000/yr plus bonus

Sr-Principal (8-12 yrs experience) 83-92000/yr plus bonus

Not too bad I think, at a variety of levels of experience.

As I have said before,I have a problem with general statements like ones moltenmetal makes. Engineering is too diverse a field. Is there wage pressure in some areas of engineering, sure. Is the state of engineering different in Canada vs the US vs Europe, sure! Is there an oversupply in some fields, maybe, in all fields, no way! Blanket doom and gloomness can't be supported IMHO.


-The future's so bright I gotta wear shades!

 

[rb1957]

so the value of 12 years experience is <$30k ...

i don't really expect an answer, as when i was a "walking boss" i had to field this question (as our rates were were much the same), and all i came up with was "yeap ... and if you don't like it, you're an adult ..."

 

[macmet]

As a recent grad of an ontario school(near toronto) I would have to argue with what moltenmetal says when he states:

" If you're a recent grad or recent immigrant engineer currently looking for work in Canada as an engineer, most particularly Ontario and most particularly Toronto, things are pretty bleak. "

When I graduated the people who couldn't find jobs in matls, civ, mech and chem were literally the ones that didn't even look, the ones that are travelling europe or some other part of the world. The companies offering positions were generally larger companies that offered great opportunities.

I still get emails from my school about job postings for people looking, eventhough I have a job and am no longer looking. Some people were getting four or five offers. I know of nobody at this stage who has yet to find a job, sure some are better than others but imho almost everyone has found a decent place.

Perhaps my particular school's career services were just superior to others in the area but we basically had our pick of job opportunities.


--how is it not friday yet? honestly

 

[whyun]

sms,

For structural engineering in the west coast United States, your salary ranges seem very high for 0 to 5 years but very low for senior to principal level.

Starting salary is at around $40,000.00 (plus a mild bonus)and principals typically make $120,000.00 and up with shared profit with other partners. This is usual for engineers based in Los Angeles and Orange counties.

 

[bioengr82]

moltenmetal:

Bio-engineering is, again, a broad catagory broken into bio-medical, bio-processing, and bio-environmental engineering. I'm told that bio-engineering is what chemical engineering was 30 years ago and has no where to go but up. However, those who graduated in my class (04) with bio-medical had very limited options (most went for masters), bio-processing faired the best (people gotta eat!), and most with bio-environmental eventually found a job. I would say luke warm at best*.

I agree macmet, I think the hands on my clock have actually reversed.

*from my experience; sms - I know you can't extrapolate from one data point, but this is the only data point I have, and I belive it is assumed people here speak from their own experience seeing how we engineer and don't conduct labor studies for a living.

 

[sms]

Whyun, be careful of titles, the capabilities and experience for a principal in a chemical plant is probably significatly less than the principals you are talking about. There is a another couple levels above principal in our company that compare pretty well with what you are talking about. That is the level I am at, but I was just hired away by another company, which goes to show that there is at least some recruiting at even that level....(That is only one data point however. Not much to extrapolate on...)

Thank you bioengr for taking at least some of what I have said to heart.

-The future's so bright I gotta wear shades!

 

[moltenmetal]

macmet: Glad to hear that you and your friends at Mac are doing well. Nice to hear a positive anecdote once in a while. Unfortunately, for every recent grad positive anecdote I hear at least five to ten negative ones. What I'm hearing about for recent grads is mostly a situation of underemployment rather than unemployment though: grads taking jobs outside of engineering in order to pay off their student loans, not because they wanted out of the profession.

Unfortunately, the reports I'm getting indicate that placement rates from U of T, Queens and even Waterloo, where students have the benefit of 2 years of co-op work experience to help them in their job search- these aren't nearly as bright as you describe. And the Council of Ontario Universities' survey, which looks at job status 6 months and 2 years after graduation, puts engineering grads at the same basic rate of unemployment as any other average university graduate (i.e. including job-magnet programs like journalism and fine arts). All medical graduates of any sort, even vets, have unemployment rates indistinguishable from zero. These stats for engineering are hardly indicative of a profession whose grads are in short supply and have an abundance of great opportunities to choose from.

The situation for recent immigrants in Canada is worse still. The Council for Access to the Profession of Engineering (

http://www.capeinfo.ca)

interviewed 1000 recent immigrant engineers in Ontario and found that only 20% of them were working as engineers, and only 50% of them were working at any job.

My stats are for Canada only, they're not general "doom and gloom", but they're not opinion or anecdotes either: they're supply numbers for Canada versus time, verified independently and accurate within 10%.

We're massively oversupplied here, mostly because of changes in immigration policy which totally decoupled immigration supply of skills from their marketplace demand, whereas 10 years ago there were quotas by discipline. Whereas we took in 1300 engineers in 1991, we were taking in over 15,000 engineers in 2001 and levels have stabilized near there since. In comparison, we graduate only ~ 9,000 Bachelors' level engineers yearly in all of Canada. 75% of all skilled workers seeking to work in regulated professions in Canada are now engineers. If you want to see the stats, have a look at

http://www.geocities.com/martinsmoltenmetal/index.htm

No profession can survive a three-fold increase in yearly supply in a decade without some serious suffering.

 

[jplinn]

Work in the power industry (Mechanical and Electrical) will be up in future. It is estimated that the retirement rate will be 50% in the next 5 to 10 years. Several utilities expect to lose 70% in that time frame. At my company I am already seeing the rate of retirements grow. I also am seeing senior engineers leave for better paying jobs.

Look at engineering schools. How many have power programs. The school I went to (20 years ago) eliminated most power courses.

Two interesting articles;
The Aftertaste of Retirement Cake, By Brian K. Schimmoler, Power Engineering, May 2005
and
Draining the Talent Pool, By Drew Robb, Power Engineering, May 2005

http://www.power-eng.com

 

[wes616]

A big problem in my eyes, as far as placement of new engineers, must lie with the specialization of engineers at the university level. This is an across the board problem with all collegiate academic pursuits, but I will limit my discussion to the topic of engineering. Why must we churn out tons and tons of these specialty (on might even call them boutique) engineers from our colleges. Why not just graduate "engineer".... you remember - men and women that are well versed in sciences... physics, chemistry, (then an optional "specialty science" of the students desire - geology, biology, atmospheric science)... business... management, logistics, accounting... liberal studies... philosophy, ETHICS!, history, politics, WRITING!!!

Instead of trying to pack into four years what should be learned upon graduation, we could teach our posterity a method of learning and a method of solving problems. We may then be graduating engineers that are more adaptable to whatever the future brings (both in terms of technological need and employment opportunity), instead of pigeonholing them before their first job (at 20 or 21 years of age) as electro-bio-chemical-mechani-structural engineers

A more diversified engineering workforce can only benefit the “greater good” of the future of our society. Maybe industry will have to not expect new hires to be able to be productive on day one. If we spent more time teaching the art of learning instead of giving the overview of technical minutiae many of us spend our lifetimes honing, then we will have a next generation workforce that can think for themselves, learn on their own, and be better prepared for the unforeseeable changes in technology that lie ahead in the… (Oh my god should I say it…) 22nd Century.

 

[sms]

moltenmetal, I haven't said it before, but thankyou. I really appriciate that you have brought some real numbers to the discusssion, and I appricate that you acknowledge that your data is for Canada. I also agree that it doesn't look good.

But I am still upbeat about engineering in general...

-The future's so bright I gotta wear shades!

 

[GregLocock]

wes616, I'm not sure why people go for these boutique degrees, but it is probably because they appeal to the prospective student.

At my university, in a 3 year degree, all engineers did a common first year. In the second year we were split into electrical and non-electrical (which still did a fair bit of electrical), and in the third year we had to pick 4 papers from something like 30.

Strictly speaking I don't even have a Mechanical Engineering degree, I just have an Engineering degree.

Now, what this meant in practice was that even the electrical engineers were reasonably well acquainted with thermo and steam engines, and of course mechanical engineers could design simple amps and so on. Great outcome, but I bet the thought of learning thermo put more than a few electrical engineers off our course, compared with a course where they just did electrical stuff.

So if a schoolkid is interested in say electronics, he is much more likely to go for a degree in microprocessor design engineering, than a rather scary one which should be called "a lot of fundamentals and brain crunchingly hard concepts but not much application".



Cheers

Greg Locock

Please see FAQ731-376 for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips.

 

[wes616]

Greg,

I could never decide what I like to do, so I took as many courses as possible. It took me quite a bit longer than most of my peers to get my degree (mechanical), but I can design a a circuit. As a matter of fact I can design an RF-circuit.. and amazingly I learned this in a "physics" class. We designed RF circuits in order to study the E&M waves.

I have also taken a few courses in Surveying from a civil engineering dept at one of the colleges that I went to. Which always suprizes many of my co-workers when we talk about the classes we took in college.

It was a wonderful experience to have such variety, and I think that it has only made me a better engineer.

It is important to say, though, that I remember, and enjoyed the basic science classes much more than the engineering classes. They were much more robust, and I learned much more appliable knowledge than any of the engineering classes that I took.

Everything I have needed to know as an engineer in the Aerospace industry I have learned from more experienced engineers that I have been fortunate enough to work with. Not much from my "gasification of combustable liquids" class is used. Or the one on engine structures and vibrations. At the time I was taking them, they sounded "cool" but I would have been much better off passing them over for something more fundamental and less formulaic.

I'm not sure where the problem lies, but I would guess it is a problem with academia pandering to the "Needs" of industry, curning out tons of VERY SPECIFIC NEED ENGINEERS, that are subject to the ebb and flow of industrial need and government funding, instead of men and women who can approach any problem (from a circuit design to a hypersaturated hillside sliding down on houses), and solve it in an effective manner...

Well it's saturday, and i'm now just running on and on... so i hope this post makes sense as this is my 13 day of work in a row.

-w

 

[GregLocock]

When you've got a minute hit

http://www.benjaminhorwitz.com

and download his "portrait of a Chemical Engineer".

The scathing attack on academia is great fun.

Basically, as we all know, maths is a wonderful thing, but we, daily, have to do things that rely on judgement, experience and intuition, not maths. That's why engineering is not a science.

It's funny really, you see 15 year olds who've got it, and 30-40 year olds who probably never will, despite getting reasonable engineering degrees from OK universities.



Cheers

Greg Locock

Please see FAQ731-376 for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips.

 

[Atreides]

I'd have to agree with everything Moltenmetal has said so far. As a recent Engineering graduate from a university graduating the most engineers in Ontario, I have seen first hand how difficult it is for recent grads to get jobs in engineering.

Many (great majority) of my friends are still looking for jobs, some still looking for engineering related jobs after having graduated last year. I'm not saying there's no jobs for recent grads, but I find that 70% of my classmates (not just friends) who did get engineering-related jobs, actually got positions in the U.S.

Also, my friends and classmates have been looking since the beginning of our final year, and did not go off to Europe as Macmet believes. I'm not completely disagreeing with you Macmet, because i'm sure you and your friends did find it easy getting jobs, but there are many more who are not as fortunate. In my university, the same 4 to 10 people get several interviews, but the rest (more than 80%) are lucky to even get one interview.

 

[49078]

Unfortunately for sms, I have no numbers available, but I graduated a couple years back and similar to macmet had nearly everyone in my class find employment. That said, some other disciplines(comp/elec, etc) had a more difficult time and many decided to go back for more school. I don't have any info on if that has changed since then, but I imagine everything goes in cycles.

I also went to an ontario school and I'm surprised to hear of recent grads having so many problems. I guess i was lucky to finish at the right time.

 

[wes616]

Greg,

That was quite a good sight.

It's funny really, you see 15 year olds who've got it, and 30-40 year olds who probably never will, despite getting reasonable engineering degrees from OK universities.

Mabye I should tell that to the guy who sits next to me.

 

[ziggi]

Atreides, 49078,
What universities in Ontario did you go to?
I graduated from Ryerson 2 years ago, it took me 4 months to get a job and that was only b/c the manager happened to know one of the people I worked under while taking a summer job at Ontario Power Generation two years earlier.
I also got layed off a year and a half later and it took me two months to find another job. However some of my friends went back to univ and one even moved to Australia where he got a job, about a year after he graduated.

 

[49078]

i would like to keep my anonymity, but it was not ryerson or univ of toronto so we were probably applying in different markets even if it was the same year.

 

[49078]

I should also say that everyone I know got their job through our school essentially, and I don't know anybody that found one on their own. To be honest, the career centre really saved us, I don't know what I would have done if I did not have access to it.

 

[ziggi]

I don't think that any of my classmates used our career centre, which may have been a mistake. However I found my first job the same that I found my second, by driving around and handing out resumes to companies.

As for anonymity, why?