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You will learn most of what you need to know on the
job, after you have completed your degree; technology
advances so rapidly that no degree program can prepare
you to be productive immediately. The most important
skill you need is the ability to direct your own learning.
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engineer should be flexible enough to go from one
field to the next. I think the lines of just being
a mechanical engineer or civil engineer or electrical
engineer, a computer engineer, are fuzzy nowadays.
You have to have the ability to go from field to
field almost. Yes, you do need the background, but
you should have the ability to go from item to item
or field to field. - Norris Allman, Senior Supervising
Test Engineer, Public Service Electric & Gas
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You
can expect to change jobs a half dozen or more times
during your career. Given the current business climate,
it is important to develop and pursue career management
as well as technical skills. The following attributes
are key:
Self-marketing ability - Get used to thinking
of your work assignments in terms of how they fit with
an overall, marketable package. Revisit your resume
regularly to assess your marketability.
Ability to Network - Since most engineers find jobs
through contacts, it is important to network within
your industry and through professional societies, which
often have job referral services and "bridge" insurance
plans for those between jobs.
Communications and interpersonal skills - Major
corporations expect all employees to possess cultural
and social awareness as well as oral and written skills.
These skills not only allow you to do a better job,
but also to present yourself more professionally to
prospective employers, through your resume and cover
letters and during interviews.
Commitment to lifelong learning - Most recent
graduates can't fully comprehend the technical literature
in their fields until they've been on the job an average
of two years. In that time, the combination of intensive
mentoring, on-the-job training, and continuing education
gives them the tools they need. It is critical that
you recognize that your education essentially begins
when you finish college.
Ethical standards, integrity - Engineering is
similar to professions such as law and medicine in that
it has specialized knowledge, the privilege of self-regulation,
and a responsibility to the public. We use our training
and abilities to benefit society, and society expects
that we will oversee and regulate the performance of
our fellow engineers. Thus, in your education and professional
practice, you must consider the ethical dimensions of
engineering.
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very much resign yourself to the fact that you will
always be in school to a degree. I've taken a number
of courses since I've been at Ford. Ford has great
opportunities to allow you to take courses and they
pay for them and everything. But, even if that's
not your situation, you need to keep your education
current. They say there's a "half-life" to the education
you pick up in school and I think that's very true.
You need to keep up on courses. - James Forbes,
Research Engineer, Ford Motor Company
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Professional ethics are not just a personal preference
established and governed by the individual engineer.
Because of the importance of professional behavior,
most companies and professional societies have drafted
codes of ethics to which their members are required
to commit. Adherence to a professional code of ethics,
as well as maintaining a personal level of integrity,
will leave you with a good reputation, your most valuable
asset in today's competitive environment. For an introduction
to ethics, and the ASME Code of Ethics, visit the PPC
module Engineering
Ethics.
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had a lot of difficulty with my second job because
I had been doing an engineering-ethics conference
that was coming up and my boss had asked that I
do two things that were illegal at the time. I went
to the corporate-ethics officer and, apparently,
he got the corporate "finger-slapping" for one of
them. I was only there three months, he was there
40 years -- and he spent the next year basically
trying to "deep-six" my career by giving me projects
that were destined to fail or had the worst people
to work with or whatever, and I really believe that
I should have left there earlier. - Kathryn Ingle,
Consulting Engineer, KT Enterprises |
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