HIRING MANAGERS ONLY 1

[socalsoccer]

Can anyone tell me how is the hiring process of an aerospace enginneer go??? Is HR have that big of a pull in selecting a candidate for an interview or they forward the resume to a busy manager (oh and do u guys sit and attentively look at them, and if u do what do u look for?)so what happens next, i am just curious i have been dealing with the LockMart – BoGrum (Lockheed, Boeing, Northrup) and they are driving me crazy to get one single interview) help is appreciated guys.

 

[MikeHalloran]

Busy managers will excoriate any HR person who forwards a communication that includes a phrase like

"... what do u look for...".

Assuming you don't really speak or write that way, here's a hint that may help:

Read your resume, from the top, aloud. Time it. Stop after ten seconds. At this point, anything you haven't said will never be seen, unless what you _have_ said grabs the reader by the throat.

If you've been pestering HR or trying to bury them in resumes, any further effort on your part is a complete waste of your time. You're on a list.



Mike Halloran
Pembroke Pines, FL, USA

 

[GregLocock]

Well, I'm an engineer, but I do select people for interview, and interview them occasionally.

Firstly, I would never write such a sloppy note as you have, in a professional forum.

Secondly, yes, we only get a selected few of the resumes that HR have harvested.

Thirdly, make sure your covering letter is good. If the guy reading the letters is the one who wrote the job spec, then he'll be miffed if you don't cover what was in the advert.

Fourth, don't tell me about your high school swimming certificate, your cat's name, and what your aspirations are. I don't care about most of those, and I know you want my job.



Cheers

Greg Locock

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

 

[IRstuff]

Well, what do you think we're going to do with a resume? If we're looking we read it and toss it out if your resume looks like your posting. Our HR does not filter, other than to weed out those that fail due our diligence tests and possibly poorly written ones as well.

Check the spelling with a dictionary. Nothing irritates me more personally to find spelling mistakes in a resume. The most recent example is someone having taken a class in "Principals of Systems Engineering." While there's a off-chance that there might actually be a class on famous people in Systems Engineering, it's unlikely and certainly not worth putting in a resume. Review your grammar.

What job are you looking for? There may simply not be any openings for your background.

TTFN

 

[wes616]

I want to reiterate the third point made by Greg. I am beginning to believe that the resume is becoming a somewhat obsolete form of selling yourself. With a cover letter, a person can get a sense of who you are as a person. Well written, yes, but as you tell this person about your past, give them insight into who you are through your phrasing and choice of vocabulary. That is honesty the best way to get past the hiring hr personnel and into the hands of someone who can do something for you. Remember, after a while all resumes look the same.

Wes C.
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Light travels faster than sound. That's why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.

 

[CESSNA1]

socalsoccer: Regardless of the type of engineer you are the way to get hired is not by applying for a job. Only about 20% of the jobs are advertised and then you have to go through the HR firewall. The remaining 80$ are not advertised but created for the person. You need to get in touch with people who have hiring authority (not HR). Use friends/classmates/societies/conferences?and so on to get contacts that you can call.

Contrary to popular opiinion resumes' do not get jobs. Resumes' get interviews. Interviews get jobs.

Regards
Dave Hall

 

[kontiki99]

In my experience, it depends on a company's culture, internal politics etc. Senior Management may put HR in the drivers for every personnel action (hiring, promotion, transfer etc).

I worked for one such company. The VP for engineering couldn't answer for any salary issues whatsoever. At large auditorium meetings (300 engineers) salary questions were always handed off to an HR specialist.

I believe this is all about controlling wages down on a large scale. In my mind it made meeting's with the VP a waste of time too. It was a title, he had no power. It's better to be caught up on your work than to go listen to him talk.

I was taught in my one industrial psychology course that the resume describes your technical qualifications and the interview is to determine how well you might fit in. In an HR dominated setting, I believe it’s done that way.

One day I decided to sit down with the department HR rep for the engineering division and have him evaluate my current resume. I recommend everyone that works for a company like that, sit down with each department HR specialist as they come and go. It’s good to feel them out and play to their style.

The postings typically listed a number of qualification. Your resume must map to as many of those qualifications as possible to secure an interview. The correlations must be very clear. In this case, the HR person got the resumes and did the initial comparative analysis for the hiring managers.

He came a cross as a young, low paid, a ex-basketball jock (tall is good for a business mullets) that could have flunked all of his business courses with a C. He used Excel. He scanned the resumes for matches to the list of requirements. The name’s column was coded. The matches were counted and the resumes sorted by number of matches. The top few resumes were contacted.

It’s unusual to find a resume that contains all of the requirements, but if you don’t have at least 2 or 3 direct hits forget it.

It was very instructive. He was a youngster that knew absolutely nothing about the business. I’ve been in aviation a long time. At one time I listed the types of aircraft I have worked on in some capacity as an a mechanic or engineer.

He told me he placed no value on that list if it didn’t include the specific aircraft types our company operated. It had no value to him. The company operated 767s if you listed 4 other large commercial aircraft that weren’t 767s, he didn’t see any value!

He showed me his resume. The accomplishments on his resume were things like producing a spread sheet for the VP (the same guy I mentioned earlier). Someone he also personally admired very much too.
It was a very instructive day.

That particular company was the most anal company I ever worked for. They were technically very good, and very professional, but salaries were very low. I don’t regret going there, I don’t regret leaving.

 

[fbdandloadpath]

This is the third attempt I've made at responding to the original posting - the first two were just not appropriate.

You must realize that HIRING MANAGERS, and the actual engineers you are trying to get a job with, are mostly old guys/gals that get irritated by the style of language exhibited in your posting.

I am going to suggest to my manager that we hire future direct engineers ONLY from current job shoppers. That way we can ascertain whether or not they can perform on the job during their temporary assignment.

FBDANDLOADPATH
Stress Analysis Lead at one of those LockMart BoGrum companies

 

[kontiki99]

fbdandloadpath,

I think that's a great idea.

I worked with a man that had a great resume (different ethnic culture). After reading his resume you might form the impression that he single handedly developed electronic flight control systems for Lockheed Martin aircraft. He had a degree from a prestigious school.

He could not type a single sentence in reasonable English (no exaggeration, no joke). He seemed to lack even basic technical knowledge and ability supporting repair shops for electromechanical gear.

He eventually found a niche doing the rubber stamp work, until the downturn and layoff's started. Then he was escorted out.

It was disturbing to see how the company handled the situation. He wasn’t a bad person. He seemed like a dinosaur with far too long to go before retirement. He was a problem for those that needed his technical support though. Everyone knew.

After he left, we had to clean out his cube. We found his last promotion review package.

In this organization, you applied for promotions annually. Applications were reviewed by a board of engineering managers. The process was implemented to reduce the effects of favoritism and personality on promotions.

Some of us had heard that his lead suggested he not submit his last application. Until then, we never knew why.

Most of the responses to the application questions were outright rants (in broken English). In the 4 years he worked there, apparently he never received a single raise. I'll never forget the line, "Why, Why, Why."

Somehow he got in the door. To a degree, I believe the management somehow failed him and the company from then on. It’s better to just hire people that demonstrate that they can do the job.

 

[socalsoccer]

Well, i really appreciate your feedbacks. I would like to apologize for the "sloppy writing". i agree with most of what you guys said about the importance of first impressions (meaning a well written resume with no grammatical errors)to land you an interview. However, if the hiring managers are only spending 10 seconds looking at a candidate's resume, then the chances to select a good candidate based on the 10 seconds are slim. Another point that i would like to add is according to many social psychology researches regarding hiring an individual based on his resume/interview does not predict the perfomance on the job. Having said that, as an entry level engineer out of college, i know that there is a lot to learn in the aerospace field, i would assume that hiring managers would know and would be looking at someone who is coachable, confident, not affraid to admit a mistake or to speak his mind, fit and work good as a team member, and willing to learn from mistakes. fbdandloadpath , i think your suggestion is brilliant. I whish that LockMart BoGrum try an incentive like this rather than gambling on a resume or a cover letter. Not that i am saying resume/cover letter is not important, but there is more to an individual than a piece of paper. Anyway, your comments are greatly appreciated. Apologize again for offending some of you with the sloppy writing

 

[wes616]

The problem with this line of thinking is that it does not work to replenish your workpool. Eventually you need to hire someone with no experience and train them, on-the-job, to perform the tasks requred of them.

If you "ONLY" hire contractors, then you eliminate this important aspect of our profession. How would you feel if, when you graduated from college, everyone that you talked to told you that you could not work for us until you have experience.

This has happened in other industries, to the detriment of those industries as a whole. Eventually attrition requres hiring those that don't have experince if you want to keep skilled workers here. If you don't believe me, look at your fabricators and technicians.

How many apprentice level workers are in your shop. Not many I suspect. What happens to the quality work in ten or 15 years when your current fabricators retire. I believe(It scares me a bit)that the work then will be shoped out to where the experience will be... china, india... etc. We can already see this happening, as more major overhaul work is being shopped out to chinese MROs.... blah! sorry for the little rant, and I've lost my train of thought now.

My basic point is, hiring people without experince, but a willingness to learn is so incredibly important in our industry (in any industry) to replenish the job pool and keeping americans working, keeping tax dollars here, keeping our schools open, so when our children grow up and look for jobs they wont find the doors not only close to those without experince, but the rooms behind them empty.

Wes C.
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Light travels faster than sound. That's why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.

 

[socalsoccer]

OH i agree with you. that's what brought me over here, i am trying to get a job but everyone is asking me for experience or a security clearence, which is frustrating, how can i get the experience if you don't hire me ? you go to northrup website, all they want is engineer 3 and up. you are absolutely right wes, we need to replenish the job pool in our country. the sad thing is you work so hard during your senior year and spend all summer looking for a job and everyone wants 5/10 years of stress analysis experience and an active top secret clearance, sometimes i wonder if I chose the wrong career.

 

[wes616]

Socalsoccer,

Be aware that you are not going to get a job through a website or through a recruiter until you have experience. You must utilize other resources to land your first job.

You need to do a couple of things here. I think someone previously said for you to utilize the job center at your school. Also your college advisor and your Alumni Association can be helpful.

Also you seem to be limiting yourself to the OEM’s. I think you should look elsewhere (and stop using those obtuse descriptions for the OEM’s). Try seat manufacturers, companies building aftermarket equipment, tier 1 and tier 2 suppliers, mod shops, and airlines.

What college did you go to if you don't mind me asking? I have a thing or two to discuss with their English/Composition department.


Wes C.
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Light travels faster than sound. That's why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.

 

[socalsoccer]

UCLA, with a 3.7 GPA, and yes english is my fifth language, only spoke it for the last four years.

 

[Sparweb]

Considering how long the list of FAA DER's is, isn't that a good place to start? Even in California, there should be a lot of intependent contractors that need people.



Steven Fahey, CET