• Question: How did you know that engineering was the right job for you?

    Asked by laceyc to Amit, Emily, Joanne, Martin, Paige on 14 Mar 2012.
    • Photo: Joanne Davies

      Joanne Davies answered on 14 Mar 2012:

      Good morning laceyc! Good to see you here again. 🙂

      I knew that engineering was the right thing for me, after trying lots of other things first that weren’t right. It was a bit like trying on the wrong shoes until eventually, I found a pair that fitted perfectly! 🙂

      I love change. I do well in environments that constantly change.

      Engineering is all about change.

      If I was the sort of person who wasn’t comfortable with change though, I could concentrate on certain areas where the changes will seem to be a lot less.

      I’m a creative person (not all engineers have to be creative though) and I enjoy solving problems. If there weren’t any problems, there wouldn’t be any engineers to fix them and I wouldn’t have a job. 🙁

    • Photo: Martin Wallace

      Martin Wallace answered on 14 Mar 2012:

      I don’t think I’ve ever questioned it really. Before I started university I didn’t know anything about engineering – as I started to study and learned more little bits, I just started to think more and more like an engineer, until I suppose it became second nature to consider problems from an engineering point of view.
      However there is a big difference between studying at university, and using that knowledge in a job. It was a big shock when I started my first proper job after university when I had to start applying the skills I had learned and work out which ones were the best to use. It took a few weeks and months before I realised that engineering was the right career for me, but now that I know that, it means that I can enjoy the job and I’m ready for any new project that comes my way.

    • Photo: Amit Pujari

      Amit Pujari answered on 14 Mar 2012:

      Hi laceyc, I am really pleased with the quality of your questions!

      Frankly, untill I started my undergraduate, I was not entirely sure what exactly engineering would involve. But in the school, I was quite interested in science, especially physics and biology.
      I was interested in knowing ‘how things work?’, ‘how life forms?’….

      Looking back, I think thats why I was interested in choosing engineering as a career. Especially ‘biomedical engineering’ which has the best of the both worlds- engineering+biology and medicine.

    • Photo: Emily Bullen

      Emily Bullen answered on 14 Mar 2012:

      I didn’t, until I started my job. Its a shame, but I’ve found it’s really hard to get a really good idea of what a job is all about until you actually start it! So you need to study something you are interested in, have as good an idea as you can of what the job will involve, and give yourself the best chance!

      And as Jo says, you don’t have to stay in the same job forever, you can move around!

    • Photo: Paige Brown

      Paige Brown answered on 17 Mar 2012:

      Hi laceyc,

      I knew engineering was right for me because I could stay in the engineering laboratory (or write about engineering research) until 2am in the morning without getting bored or tired. 🙂

      When you like doing something that much, you know it is right!

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