Work Situation - Comments Please 14

[Jack808]

I have been working at a small company (6 person) for the past 4 months and I am seriously considering quitting or going back to school and changing professions. I was hoping to get people's comments and opinions on:

1) What your engineering career is like in terms of task difficulty, peer/superior relationship, salary (satisfied or not), personal satisfaction, future prospects, daily routine and anything else you think is pertinent in regards to what I should expect from a career in engineering.

2) What your thoughts are based on what I say below.

What I LIKE about my job:
* Co-Workers - the ones I liked have already quit, save one
* Our Product - best/cheapest on the market but has had poor marketing by the only person in marketing, the president
* The Work - the design/critical evaluation tasks, not when I'm told to bully sales people into lowering their prices
* The Commute - 10 minute bike ride (saves on gas/time)

What I DISLIKE about my job:
* The President - although he is clearly an incompetent engineer (even to a novice like me), he pays himself over $160,000 a year to yell at his employees and make them work "harder than anywhere else"
* My Salary - $40,000 (although higher than more senior co-workers)
* The Environment - everyone (except the co-founder) is on edge when the president is in the building
* The Yelling - I hate being yelled at, especially in front of co-workers
* The Unrealistic Expectations - there is too much to write here
* The President - as the cause of most of my dissatisfaction was worth mentioning twice

I guess this turned out to be more of a rant than anything else; however, since I am new to the career world, I would really like to hear what people do/expect from their job. I have only been an "engineer" for 4 months, but I have been so frustrated and depressed about my job that I would consider going back to work at Long John Silver's, where they treated me people like human beings, a step in the right direction. I would also appreciate any advice on how you think I should handle my situation.

 

[ctopher]

Most of us have been through the same experience. Don't give up on your profession because of your first job. There are better companies to work for. Mark it down as a learning experience and move on. Good luck!

Chris
SolidWorks/PDMWorks 08 3.1
AutoCAD 06/08
ctopher's home (updated 10-07-07)

 

[corus]

A company that has 6 people, and the one in charge is called the President?? If the company ever expands to 10 people would he be God? Bring the man down to earth and call him by his first name. When 'Bob' starts to yell just sit and listen and don't respond. It usually quietens them down. I think they use the same method in nursery school. Works for kids and presidents too.

corus

 

[jmw]

You'll likely survive longer than the President.
We had a General manager at one company who used to fly into fearsome rages, usually in the middle of a meeting when someone would do something to annoy him.
We used to worry about his blood pressure, er, I think we were all hoping it would get the better of him. As it happened, the owners turfed him out after a while.

But, even so brief as your post is, there are some telling signs that this is not a company that will last long.

You say the product is good and cheap.
You also say the president is no engineer and isn't marketing the product well. The real clincher is the pressure put on sales to lower prices. The usual situation is the other way round. This sounds like an incipient cash flow problem and they need the sales to pay the bills. Watch out for purchasing starting to look frazzled as suppliers start to press for bill payments and for problems getting supplier deliveries.

The next thing to watch out for is problems with the payroll and you can bet Mr President will get his $160,000 before you get yours.

But, take the view that this should be a learning curve, yes, and tell yourself it can only get better. Stick with it long enough to be innocuous on your CV/Resume and, well, try not to take it seriously. Engineering is fun and you need to stick around long enough to realise this. It is fun if you don't take these people as seriously as they take themselves.


JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[TheTick]

I grew up with that in the home and while working for my father. I absolutely refuse to accept it anywhere else. It is simply not acceptable, even from Mr. President.

Your choices are walk or suffer.

 

[PSE]

It sounds like this is your first job since graduating?

If the president is also the owner, within the limits of labor and other laws, he can pretty much do whatever he wants. It is his company and you are not going to change how he acts. Your choices (unfortunately) are pretty much to accept it or to move on. I've been in a similar situation and chose to move on.

Regards,

 

[EddyC]

I had a similar job environment for 3.5 years. After I couldn't take it anymore, I moved on. You should do the same. Don't start to think that all engineering jobs are like your current one. They are not.

 

[Noway2]

It is really sad how having a Ghengis Khan at the top of the management chain can really drag a whole operation down. The comment about yelling at them to get them to work harder really struck me. It is appalling that some idiots do think that way. It is simialr to the ones who believe that if someone is afraid of loosing their job (i.e. getting fired) that they will work harder to keep it.

The thing is that with a boss like that, the company will never excell and the people will never really put forth a supreme effort.

Jack808, your choices are clear, stay or leave. If you choose to stay, though it is difficult to do, you ***NEED*** to learn to adopt the attitude of "making like a duck and letting the water roll off your back". The advice of sitting quietly and not speaking is excellent. If he yells and demands why you aren't responding, well then you should politely say something about waiting till he starts talking to you respectfully as an adult.

 

[MadMango]

I visited a packaging equipment OEM, their president yelled at an employee while I was there, telling the man he messed up again, and made him go stand in the corner to think about what he had done. What amazed me was he stayed in that corner for a good hour before the president yelled at him again for wasting time and to get back to work.

I would look at your situation as a great learning exercise. By only having 6 workers, the opportunities for you to get a taste of everything related to manufacturing is a huge one. Not many people get a chance to be exposed from receiving to shipping, purchasing to accounts payable. The downside is that by only having 6 people, there are probably a few processes that are just plain wrong across the entire board. If you can identify them and learn to never do them in the future, you'll have a good foundation for your next job.

Being the first job of your career, I would stick it out for at least 12 months. You won't lose anytime with your peers in the overall scheme of things, and will have more practical experience. If you don't think you can handle your work conditions for another 8 months, then start looking now, as there is nothing you can really do to change the work conditions in as small a company as you have described.

Don't give up on your profession just yet.

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

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

 

[rtmote]

Reminds me of my first job in engineering, I had a company director who was like that. He was terrifying, cruel and smart. I called him Napoleon(sorry to all nice Napoleons out there), he was tiny and it didn't help I am tall....That was enough to put us on a path to confrontation.

He was so terrifying that when he entered the room the silence was deafening. I used to work in big hall of stand up draughtsman and desk engineers (going back 30 years now!). The first guy he walked up to, a new draughtsman just started, from Ireland had a nice pleasant smile. Napoleon asked him he has having a nice time. When the draughtsman replied he was, Napoleon said he was fired. The shock and the fear was palpable.

A year later, I was asked to approve some calculations which I refused as they hadn't met the required standards. He insisted I signed but I stood up to him so he posted me out of the office, while the clcualtions got issued without my signatures. I got posted to a site where things went really super bad. Another entertaining story. When I came back to the office and find him penny pinching my meagre expenses I quit. I had lasted eighteen months.

I still look back on that time as a great experience, the comradeship,the engineering and the learning with my co-workers. It was a dreadful benchmark for my future career but fortunately, it has never been repeated.

As ctopher says, its part of the fabric of experience for most of us but it won't define you. This happens in any profession. It will get better!


Robert Mote

http://www.motagg.com

 

[csd72]

I will answer your question with a few questions:

Do you have more to learn from this place?

Is it possible to cut out the negative atmosphere by concentrating on the tasks at hand? Keep telling yourself tht it is water off a ducks back (i.e. of no consequence).

Do you have a good number of alternate employment options if you need to jump ship in a hurry?

If you answered yes to all of these then it may be worthwhile staying.

 

[KENAT]

1) I've had difficult tasks & I've had boring mundane tasks. Some people I get on with others I don't, I've probably seen more what I would call poor management than good management. My salary is pretty good but I work in a high cost of living area which means my standard of living isn't as good as the $$ would suggest. Right now I'm not happy because of a change in responsibilities amongst other things, & I'm biding my time. My future prospects here are limited, I'm not in a core technological role and the role I do perform is only valued by maybe half the office, which leads to issues. Daily routine - get in, check Eng-Tips, jump from one fire fight to the next, while trying to avoid as much confrontation as possible, go home, come back for a couple of hours, go home. (I work out of town so it's actually not home but you get my point).

As to what to expect, I'm not sure there's a one size fits all answer but be aware there are good jobs out there, my last one was great, especially in comparison to this one.

2)Start looking for other employment. School's an option but working for 4 months then quitting and heading back to the perceived safety of school may look bad. Leaving for another place wont look bad as long as you stay there for a little while. Even then, plenty of people have job hopped and are still gainfully employed. For as long as you are there develop a coping strategy, preferably one that doesn't involve drugs or excessive alcohol;-).


KENAT, probably the least qualified checker you'll ever meet...

 

[Jack808]

Thank you, everyone, for your posts. I really appreciate it. I am sorry to hear that so many of you have had similar experiences.

I have decided to let things "roll off my back" and my work ethic (and performance) has improved. I am learning a lot about how to interact with people (one of my weak points) and will stay with the company until I'm offered a position elsewhere. I might still end up back in school for a Masters in a field that I feel would suit me better, but not because of this one experience.

If anyone has anything to post about their current position (like KENAT) I would really like to hear it!

Cheers,
Jack

 

[mizzjoey]

Wow. Corus' comment is very familiar to what happens in my office.

Mr Boss is called Mr <FamilyName>, as if he's the principal of a prep school. So he acts like one, and treats us as if we're his students who need reprimands every now and then. Most of us are entry-level, granted, but we don't need bosses who tell us how the monitor should be positioned on our desk etc.

On the other hand, bosses from other lead centers (even Mr Boss' own boss) are called by their first name, and they have no problem with it.

As my previous employer once quoted from that famous thinker Anon, "To know a man's true character, give him power."

To answer Jack's question, I'm on my third job (in 4 years) and I think I've found a fit. Commute is short, salarywise I think I'm doing okay but could use more :-D, co-workers are generally friendly but there are some I wouldn't trust. We have weekly indoor soccer sessions (from which we try to exclude Mr Boss), and other outdoor activities that we can afford because the company will not sponsor them.

That said, my boss is a bigot who likes to yell at female employees (this has been discussed in another thread). Sometimes work requests dry up and we spend our days watching the clock (and try to put up with Mr Boss' temper, who gets unhappy because of the rise in non-billable hours). I read or try to learn other skills during the free periods.

If you don't like your first job, it's okay. Just try to learn what you can and look out for other opportunities. My friend who takes part in recruiting new engineers for his company says it's common for graduates to change jobs within the first 3 years. Just make sure you can explain to the interviewers what you get from those work experiences and can carry over to the prospective companies.

hope this helps,
jo

 

[jmw]

Excuses for changing jobs when starting out: broadening ones experience.

Mizzjoey touches on a very important point, one thing you have to be able to do is work out who you can trust and who you can't. Some of these people can do serious damage to you or your career.
I'd love to find out how some people can act as they do, to find out what goes on in their brains (lava beans and chianti diagnostics?).

JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[KENAT]

If in doubt follow Fox's advice. "Trust no one"

KENAT, probably the least qualified checker you'll ever meet...

 

[Zogzog]

My advice, not that is necessarily the best is to get fired instead of quit, dont do anything really bad, just take your time and enjoy getting fired. Chances are with the type of personallity you described the president as having if you quit he may take that personal and make things harder for you, if he fires you his ego is not damaged and you might walk away with a severance.

Just another way of looking at it, I have quit twice and got fired on purpose once (It took 3 months), the getting fired was the best thing for me in that situation, I had a similar boss as you.

 

[sundale]

Your boss/president believes in the "silver back gorilla" management theory. It is his company and he can do pretty much whatever he wants that is within the labor laws.

On the contrary, Abe Lincoln freed the slaves and you are perfectly free to leave such a miserable place. There is NO WAY you should put up with that for $40K/year...

Go join another troup of primates.

 

[lowedogg]

It sounds like you are fairly young. It isn't worth waiting around for the president to leave. These type people usually retire on their death beds. They never want to give up the power to make others miserable.

Go get a new job somewhere where you will have the chance to learn something. Work for a little bit bigger company, there will be better projects and more resources. I would avoid any huge companies where you will become a faceless number in the abyss.

Your first few years (in any engineering field) should be spent with a good mentor who can show you the ropes. Working for a yelling, incompetant tyrant is the last place you should be at this juncture. Only work that job when you have a good chance of usurping the tyrant.