should i become an engineer?

[ddavidebor]

hi guys. i'm pretty near 18yo and in a couple of year i need to decide if i will go to university or not.

electronic has been my interest since i've memory. a lot of my "side" interest way science, biology, chemistry, nuclear physics, medicine...
about me, i'm a nerdy fat guy who loves horses, girls and i have been able to build everything i want, despite of people say that it way impossible.
and i've the money to open a company.

i've never been good at math. really, for me is a instrument and i can use it event in advanced manner for my age but it's nothing more for me.
i hate the idea to live my life in front of a computer screen.

i don't want to work for somebody for 35 years doing the same thing with the same money.
really, my mom has a degree in literature and has worked for 35 year for the country. actually, my best friend had worked 35 DAYS and he receive monthly double my mom's money.

i want to open a company in the next future, some kind of start up if needed.

i'm in italy. economy here SUCK. the things are improving but still suck. i can speech english better than i can write, and i don't have problem to leave my country but not for study, maybe after.

i must do the first 3 year in my city, here is the program of my local university.
first 3 years http://translate.google.it/translate?sl=it&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=it&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fdidattica.unipd.it%2Fofferta%2F2013%2FIN%2FIN0507%2F2011&act=url
4th and 5th years http://translate.google.it/translate?hl=it&sl=it&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fdidattica.unipd.it%2Fofferta%2F2013%2FIN%2FIN0520%2F2008

i can do only the first 3 year if i want. it's still a degree. a degree for pussycat but is a degree.

so, as the name say, we're on a Electronic Engineering videoblog. so, i'm asking here.

should i go to university? why, or why not?

[AG6QR]

Greetings to Padova.  My wife's father was from Bassano del Grappa, and we went there to visit her relatives about five years ago.  Che bel posto!

It's very rare that anyone knows exactly what they want to do when they're 17 years old.  And if they DO feel sure of what they want to do, most of them eventually change careers, at least to a slightly different field.  So it is normal to be a bit unsure.  Keep searching, and you'll find what is interesting to you.

To be an electrical engineer requires some use of math.  Some engineers use more than others, but all electrical engineers need to be very comfortable with basic algebra, and should know enough calculus concepts to understand why their oscilloscope is usually filled with all those sine waves and exponentials.  You can see that your university program contains many math classes.  You don't need to love those classes, but you need to be able to finish them, and you will use the results.

For one example of the ways math is used, I suggest you look at Dave's EEVblog episode 204, http://www.eevblog.com/2011/09/29/eevblog-204-designing-a-li-ion-battery-gauge-with-the-lm3914/ and watch how he applies the formulas he finds on the data sheet.  This is mostly basic algebra, not higher calculus, but it illustrates how the math can be useful.

Most of your other "side" interests you list also involve quite a bit of math.

If you think you can finish the math, I think a university degree will give you many opportunities.  If you want to start your own company, and make the company produce good profits, you'll need to have the company produce something useful that most other companies can't or won't produce.  The knowledge you'll gain by completing the University program could help you design some useful products.

[Dave]

In the end it's really only your decision, I'm just sharing my opinion here.
I say yes, go to college. From what I've seen after my 1st year of studying electrical engineering, I'd say it's pretty good. But then again, I wasn't hesitant whether I'd go or not. I knew I would be pursuing an EE degree 4 years before I had to make the decision. It was a no-brainer.

You should know that electrical engineering is one of the hardest courses you can take in college (at least that's the case at my university). Are you prepared for that?
You may have a problem regarding maths. If you do decide to study EE, I suggest you fall in love with maths soon. You should know calculus off the top of your head. Are you willing to do that?

As for the job, I think electrical engineering is anything but sitting in front of your computer. I have been working at a local company for the past month, I am currently helping develop an advanced truck alternator regulator. I can assure you that so far my job hasn't been monotonous at all. It involves researching stuff, developing circuits, programming micros, extensively testing them (thermal chambers and stuff), squishing bugs (a.k.a. troubleshooting), etc.


Starting your own company at 18, without much education, would be a pretty ballsy move. I know I wouldn't have the guts to do it. But do you even know what you would be doing? Are you dreaming of making it big like Bill Gates? You should know that there are very few people that managed to do this, especially without formal education. Most of people who try this fail miserably and lose all their savings along the way.

[nctnico]

A bachelor degree is nothing to be ashamed off. Its a very solid base to apply technology into working products. Its basically all you need to be an EE. How good depends on how hard you want to study. The biggest trick is to find an internship where you could work after you graduated. Preferably a small company (and certainly not a company attempting to building trains  ). Starting your own company is a good goal but I recommend working for 6 to 10 years before attempting to fly by yourself. Better to learn all the tricks of the trade with a safety net in place than to stumble in one pit after the other.

The economy shouldn't be too bad. Two weeks ago I've seen lots of expensive shops in Padova.

[Stonent]

My goal in life is to be come the next Silvio Burlusconi! (Without the jail part) 

[EEVblog]

Only you can answer that I'm afraid.
Generally, if you have the time and money, yes, just do it.
But there is a lot of math. If you don't like math then there will be much to groan about.
Were you work, how much fun it is,  and how much you earn often has quite little to do with what degree you do or don't do.

[John Coloccia]

Well, I was an engineer for 20 years and I recently left to start my own business.  I'm actually doing some engineering kinds of things, but in a much more creative way.  What a difficult question to answer.  If my own son asked me if he should become an engineer, I would give him a qualified NO.  I would tell him to LEARN about engineering if that's what he's passionate about...learn everything you can.  There are incredible courses online.  There are incredible resources online to draw from.  There are incredible resources for learning, and designing your own widgets (software, electrical, mechanical, whatever).  Get into that, and absorb everything you can, and work your ass off.  Design something...ANYTHING.  Keep designing, and building.  Do it in your spare time.

Go to school and learn about business and marketing.  I couldn't in good conscience recommend that any youngster become an engineer as a profession anymore.  Times have changed.  I would tell my son to learn about business.  Learn how to market yourself.  Learn how the world works.  Learn how money ebbs and flows from place to place, and what you need to do to get your piece of it enroute.  You want to be an engineer?  OK, fine.  Do it doing your own thing, and then your credentials won't matter.

I hate to be so cynical, but my only regret at this point is that I didn't walk away from my career 15 years ago instead of 2 years ago.

[Corporate666]

You should definitely go to college.  Although if you hate math, electrical engineering may be difficult.  If you want to have your own business, consider a business degree.  There may also be technical business degrees that appeal... or (at least in the USA) you could major in business and minor in something technical, or vise versa.

Regarding starting a company... I started several companies over the years.  It sounds like a great plan and the path to a life full of freedom, wealth, working on your own terms, etc.  The reality is a lot different.  My first company I started at 17yrs old.  I knew nothing about business, and after 6 months it was clear it was not working out.  The next one was when I was around 22 - a partnership on a software project that also didn't work out.  The next was when I was about 25.  A dot.com where me and 3 other guys got a bunch of venture capital, rented swanky offices and created our 'enlightened modern company' with bright IT guys.  That didn't go as we planned since we ended up radically changing the business model a few months in, but we sold out to Cahners a year later and did well.  The next was an IT services company that I ran for about 5 years and ended up selling it when I just started to hate the field.  Then I took a chunk of my earnings and started what I am doing now, which is a manufacturing company making products I've always wanted to make.  It's had up and down years for sure... and nothing can be taken for granted, but I really love what I am doing.

My point in saying all this is that you need to keep in mind...

-Most businesses fail.  Over 90% of them.  They fail for many reasons, but that's just the fact of the matter. 
-If you have no experience starting and running a business, your odds of being successful are even less.  Much less.  Much much less. 
-It's a very good idea to have something to fall back on.  A college degree is a very good "something to fall back on".

It's a fact that most people do not end up doing exactly what they intended when they chose their career path.  If the idea of sitting behind a desk gives you the chills, then avoid jobs that will have you doing that.  If your first job is a desk job, then you would need to leverage that experience into another job - which will also likely be a desk job.  It's not always the case, but in most cases it's pretty hard to transition from one aspect of a field to another.  In other words, they get railroaded into their career and work style as opposed to choosing it.  I went to college for mechanical engineering and the first engineering job was designing satellite antenna ball-mount bases in a giant building with hundreds of other engineers who all sat in cubicles just like me.  I got out because I knew I'd be a lifer in that kind of work and I didn't want to do it.



tl;dr

-Get some experience before starting a company
-Be prepared to fail a few times before you succeed
-Have something to fall back on

[smashedProton]

Yes, but don't be like my big brother!  He is a mechanical engineer but his only interest is bodybuilding.  He is telling everyone that he wants to design a new excersize equipment.. 

[ptricks]

I think one of the most beneficial things people can do before choosing a career path is to spend time with someone who does that field of work. Ask around your area at places where engineers work and see if you can find someone willing to give you some firsthand information. There are forums and those are okay for information but something as important as a career , you really should spend time with actual people doing the job. There are lots of things we pick up on as humans when we experience things first person that can't be learned from text or video chats.

If you are lucky you might find an engineer willing to let you spend a day with him at work.  At one point I wanted to go into veterinary medicine until I got to spend a few days at a clinic. I learned that while I liked animals and liked the idea of helping them, the actual job wasn't what I really wanted to do.

[ptricks]

Yes, but don't be like my big brother!  He is a mechanical engineer but his only interest is bodybuilding.  He is telling everyone that he wants to design a new excersize equipment.. 

 I know someone that spent 6 years in college to become a architect. He graduated , worked for one year and then quit. He said that he wanted to be involved with the actual building, choosing the materials and watching them be installed, not sitting behind a desk all the time and just going on the job occasionally.  He opened his own contracting business and says he is happy now, could have saved himself 6 years though.

[Bored@Work]

He opened his own contracting business and says he is happy now, could have saved himself 6 years though.

See, this "could have saved himself 6 years" is questionable. This 6 years formed him not only to become an architect in particular, but also when it comes to general skills like technical understanding or work ethics or even personal skills, like not addressing everyone as "dude" . And I bet when he talks to architects these days they recognize he is somehow "one of them" and that helps his business. Or when he talks to customers they get the feel he somehow knows what he is doing and has a bit of a clue about buildings.

Some years ago, I think it was before the financial crisis, is saw a statistic about the leaders of companies in all kinds of technology business. 70% of CEOs of these businesses had an engineering or related field degree. You don't do a lot of engineering as a CEO, but an engineering degree apparently helps to become one. I.e. contrary to common MBA believe "It doesn't matter what type of business you manage, all businesses are the same", it somehow helps to know a bit about technology if you manage a technology company.

I don't know if the percentage is still the same after the financial crisis. In my personal opinion I see more and more of the wrong kind of people at the top of companies. Those even too stupid to piss in a straight line - I.e. those with an MBA only, who plunder the company where they can, instead of working for the company. Especially math doesn't seem to be a strong point of any MBA. Which would explain the financial crisis a bit. SO yes, of you want to run a company and don't want to do math, an MBA sounds like a good idea these days.

[ejeffrey]

hi guys. i'm pretty near 18yo and in a couple of year i need to decide if i will go to university or not.

electronic has been my interest since i've memory. a lot of my "side" interest way science, biology, chemistry, nuclear physics, medicine...
about me, i'm a nerdy fat guy who loves horses, girls and i have been able to build everything i want, despite of people say that it way impossible.
and i've the money to open a company.

i've never been good at math. really, for me is a instrument and i can use it event in advanced manner for my age but it's nothing more for me.
i hate the idea to live my life in front of a computer screen.

i don't want to work for somebody for 35 years doing the same thing with the same money.
really, my mom has a degree in literature and has worked for 35 year for the country. actually, my best friend had worked 35 DAYS and he receive monthly double my mom's money.

i want to open a company in the next future, some kind of start up if needed.

So I have never had any desire to run a company at all, but several of my family members and friends have started small businesses, some of them successful.  For the most part, I think the "I want to start a company but I don't know what I want to do" is a backwards attitude.  It is much better off if you start with something you want to do, and the only way to make it work is to start your own company.  I am sure there are counter examples, this is just my experience.  So my recommendation is put the idea to start a company at the back of your mind for the moment.  Study, go to school, meet some people, work a job or two and get some experience.  If nothing else, you will hate it.  That is important, because you will remember that hate.  Then, when you have your own company and you wake up in the middle of the night in terror because everything is going wrong and you don't know if you can make payroll this month, you can remind yourself how much you hated the alternative.  At best you will learn some things that will be useful, make some friends who are possible future business partners, get a better idea of what you want to actually do, and learn the background you will need to accomplish it.

[ElectroIrradiator]

Go to school and learn about business and marketing.  I couldn't in good conscience recommend that any youngster become an engineer as a profession anymore.  Times have changed.  I would tell my son to learn about business.  Learn how to market yourself.  Learn how the world works.  Learn how money ebbs and flows from place to place, and what you need to do to get your piece of it enroute.  You want to be an engineer?  OK, fine.  Do it doing your own thing, and then your credentials won't matter.

I hate to be so cynical, but my only regret at this point is that I didn't walk away from my career 15 years ago instead of 2 years ago.

I have no idea of how the situation is in the US these days. However, here in Denmark, this must be considered absolutely horrible advice. The idea that you go to business school, 'get connected' and learn the secret handshakes to get rich, has been rather firmly debunked over the last 10 years or so. Today, post economic crunch, MBA's are among the absolutely least employable among new graduates, while EEs are among the absolute top.

Most successful businesses I encounter, have been started in some field actually doing stuff, including service industries like programming. These companies all have founders with some relevant technical background in their chosen field. Conversely, the classic idea of a bunch of investors/MBAs starting a company together, with none of them having any technical knowledge within their field of operation, is a running joke over here.

Very, very few MBAs end up as CFO/CEO, or even high level managers, of MegaCorps, or as a happy 'investment portfolio manager' with ten Ferrari's in the garage(s).

[BravoV]

Sell your soul to devil, study law and no intense math required  , and become a lawyer. 

Once settled, you could buy youself a ranch filled with expensive horses, oh yeah .. and "collect" tons of "exotic" girls too if you like as mistresses. 

[ElectroIrradiator]

Sell your soul to devil, study law and no intense math required  , and become a lawyer. 

Being a well spoken lawyer doesn't work nearly as well in the major parts of Europe, compared to the US. Check the differences between Common Law (US) vs. Civil Law (Europe minus UK and Ireland).

[ddavidebor]

A lot lf you say that i should take a degree and i should work 5 or more years.

And i probably agree, but that's 10 year guys, is 50% of my actual life.

[ptricks]

A lot lf you say that i should take a degree and i should work 5 or more years.

And i probably agree, but that's 10 year guys, is 50% of my actual life.

You are young and at your age your views on things are going to change a LOT in the coming years.
Also realize that electronics is a HUGE field with many different possibilities. I don't like it when people say , get a EE degree , because that isn't really helpful in finding the area of electronics the person would fit best.

Get a sheet of paper and write down what it is that you like and don't like about electronics as well as your other likes and any hobbies.  Is it the hands on that you like ? If so an EE degree isn't required and most of that will not be used for assembling or repairing. Do you like the PCB design area ? Do you like the locating parts and finding what parts fit the current project best ?

[BravoV]

Sell your soul to devil, study law and no intense math required  , and become a lawyer. 

Being a well spoken lawyer doesn't work nearly as well in the major parts of Europe, compared to the US. Check the differences between Common Law (US) vs. Civil Law (Europe minus UK and Ireland).

Ok, so no lawyer then, but remember his "dream" ..... this is matter.

about me, i'm a nerdy fat guy who loves horses, girls
i've never been good at math.
i hate the idea to live my life in front of a computer screen.

Any idea whats the easiest path to get these while doesn't need to learn math and no/much less sitting in front of computer ?

Not sure though, may be its just me, its just I don't see many EEs are having their own personal ranch filled with horses + handful of mistresses. 

[nctnico]

Women and horses are a bad combination. The horse always comes first. Same for dogs. Dog or smoking are a 'no go' for me.

I'm not sure about the mistresses either. A guy I used to know cleared out all his credit cards and bank accounts and went to party in Thailand. He send me a picture of him with two beautiful naked ladies sitting on his lap and he still didn't look happy. There is no happy end to that story BTW.

[bookaboo]

Regarding whether to get a degree or not, that's a tough question. In the UK Electronics degrees are virtually useless from a practical point of view. A friend of a friend has a doctorate in electronic engineering, he now works lecturing and in the R&D lab at one of the top universities in Ireland, he asked me to have a look at a particular HF Welder repair that I know well so we decided to work it out together. I'm not making this up but he couldn't identify basic components like 100nF caps (i.e. he didnt know they were caps).
But then again he makes a pretty penny doing something with FPGA and rf substrates (I didn't understand his gig either).


One thing I would recommend before starting your own business is to work your way around a few firms first, or at least one very well run firm. The idea being to learn how a successful company runs, from all points of view.
I started my own electronics design service when I was 23 after working 6 years for another firm. I didn't realise at the time how badly run my previous employer was, they basically survived off grants, subsidies and huge dollops of lucky contracts - I picked up loads of bad habits and really didn't have a clue how a business should work. I made so many business mistakes at the start it's not even funny, cost myself a lot of time and money before I got going properly.


Running an engineering business is VERY VERY different to being an engineer. We are engineers because we don't want to be accountants, salesmen, marketers, managers, administrators or any other nasty job like that.
Unfortunately you either need to learn those skills of have a business that is profitable enough that you can hire people for all those tasks.

Anyway good luck on your journey.

[nuhamind2]

Be a politician. No math and a lot of girl.

[AG6QR]

A lot lf you say that i should take a degree and i should work 5 or more years.

And i probably agree, but that's 10 year guys, is 50% of my actual life.

Whether you like it or not, those ten years are going to pass, assuming you don't die first.  You get to decide now and over the next ten years what sort of accomplishments you want to have completed when you're 28.  One choice is to have completed the degree and some work experience.  What other choice do you think would put you in a better place when you're 28? 

[Bored@Work]

A friend of a friend has a doctorate in electronic engineering, he now works lecturing and in the R&D lab at one of the top universities in Ireland, he asked me to have a look at a particular HF Welder repair that I know well so we decided to work it out together. I'm not making this up but he couldn't identify basic components like 100nF caps (i.e. he didnt know they were caps).

Not that bullshit again. You don't ask a highly decorated chef to warm up a can of soup and you don't ask an EE PhD to repair a fscking welder.

[ptricks]

Not that bullshit again. You don't ask a highly decorated chef to warm up a can of soup and you don't ask an EE PhD to repair a fscking welder.

quit making excuses for people that have no practical abilities, they are usually the ones that can give a thousand reasons why something will not work but not one of how to fix it.


example : an EE that couldn't find the fault in his design when asked why all the units were failing. A 1 year experience  no college  tech found it , the parts were installed , a diode, in reverse.  That EE had never physically worked with the parts he was telling people how to use.