Author Topic: Wayward EE lost and lamenting  (Read 7775 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline NSCI0T7Topic starter

  • Newbie
  • Posts: 7
  • Country: ca
Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« on: October 04, 2020, 03:18:43 am »
So I have my masters in EE, designed phased array RF coils, ultrasound amps, made energy harvesting circuits to charge phones, and dabbled at ATI Technologies (Nvidia) during my internship.  Cool, right?

But I wouldn't say EE is very lucrative or plentiful, and rarely exciting outside of a university lab.  My small town graduates 40 electrical engineers, and all but 2 of them have to leave town to find EE work.  I decided that contract teaching wasn't very stable, so now I work an x-ray repair job that can be done with a 2-year community college diploma.

Yes, x-ray machines, CT, ultrasound, etc. are very fascinating.  But my boss says "very nice theory, now replace this ethernet cable"

No passion anymore.  Can someone light a fire for me? I see everyone posting projects of electronics they did, but I'm not into hobby circuits.  I need something serious with hard physics to get me going.

Start a design firm with no meny? Start a high risk design/manufacturing company? Waste 5y to get a PhD??

What future could possibly result for someone like me.
 

Offline james_s

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 21611
  • Country: us
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #1 on: October 04, 2020, 03:47:51 am »
I'm not sure what you want anyone to tell you. I'd have thought if you were going to take so much schooling you'd have a reasonable idea of the sort of company you'd like to work for? You might have to relocate to where the jobs are if you want a job that is particularly interesting and challenging. Nobody can tell you what you're going to enjoy, you'll have to decide that for yourself.
 

Offline NSCI0T7Topic starter

  • Newbie
  • Posts: 7
  • Country: ca
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #2 on: October 04, 2020, 04:18:32 am »
Well I can't relocate. So should i ask what other jobs an electronics designer should do?
 

Offline james_s

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 21611
  • Country: us
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #3 on: October 04, 2020, 04:21:08 am »
I've worked with quite a few EE grads who were working as software developers. There seems to be a lot more money overall in software. If you're unable to relocate then it pays to look into what jobs are available in your area prior to spending the money on school. You might be fortunate and find remote work, especially in the post-Covid world.
 

Offline bob91343

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 2675
  • Country: us
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #4 on: October 04, 2020, 05:05:59 am »
Everyone is different.  In my heyday as an engineer I loved the electronics but hated the politics and proposals and stresses.  So I became a consultant.  That worked for a few months but that was all.  Then I grabbed the bull by the veritable horns and asked a girl friend if she'd like to go into business with me.  She instantly said yes and we opened a retail store repairing electronics of all sorts.  Originally we targeted marine electronics but found a more lucrative field in stereo.  We had a successful business for about 13 years.

I went into engineering again for about a year and then retired at the tender age of about 55 and haven't looked back.  I still love electronics but it's a hobby.  Now and then I take in a repair job but it's minimal.
 

Offline ebastler

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 7375
  • Country: de
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #5 on: October 04, 2020, 07:58:34 am »
If you live in a "small town",  "can't relocate", and want complex design work with "hard physics", it seems that your only option is to work remotely.

You could set up a design consultancy, but without a track record of industry experience it will probably be challenging to find your first customers. If you have strong design skills and can prove it with your university grades and projects, you might be able to find employment with a company based elsewhere? Not being able to work on-site and in the lab will limit your choices and will make you a less attractive candidate for employers. But with working from home being the norm for many companies at the moment, they might be more willing to give this a try if you bring the skills they are looking for.
« Last Edit: October 04, 2020, 11:04:11 am by ebastler »
 
The following users thanked this post: cdev, Yansi

Offline bsodmike

  • Regular Contributor
  • *
  • Posts: 229
  • Country: lk
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #6 on: October 04, 2020, 10:40:18 am »
Way back in 2008 I faced the same issue, and what was worse for me was that I couldn't stay in the UK without a work visa.  No job, no work visa.   No work visa, no job... and no one was keen to hire me.  In any case, I decided to return home and I've worked 100% remotely as a software engineer.

For me, it was easier as I've always generally excelled in programming.  In 2007, I moved to London for my Masters in Mechatronics at King's College, graduated with a Distinction, and while it was impressive (to my Mum at least!) for shits and giggles, I continued to gain as much experience building and managing Cloud services, end-to-end. From nitty-gritty things like Encryption to hard-core DBA skills, I've spent the past decade absorbing and getting better and better with time.

I'm now working 100% remote and generally enjoying it.  I've just gotten back to setting up my bench lab and the hobby projects I'm working on are really fun...

Thought I'd share my experience in taking this journey...

Cheers, and all the best of luck to you.
 

Offline nctnico

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 28429
  • Country: nl
    • NCT Developments
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #7 on: October 04, 2020, 11:21:14 am »
So I have my masters in EE, designed phased array RF coils, ultrasound amps, made energy harvesting circuits to charge phones, and dabbled at ATI Technologies (Nvidia) during my internship.  Cool, right?

But I wouldn't say EE is very lucrative or plentiful, and rarely exciting outside of a university lab.  My small town graduates 40 electrical engineers, and all but 2 of them have to leave town to find EE work.  I decided that contract teaching wasn't very stable, so now I work an x-ray repair job that can be done with a 2-year community college diploma.

Yes, x-ray machines, CT, ultrasound, etc. are very fascinating.  But my boss says "very nice theory, now replace this ethernet cable"

No passion anymore.  Can someone light a fire for me? I see everyone posting projects of electronics they did, but I'm not into hobby circuits.  I need something serious with hard physics to get me going.

Start a design firm with no meny? Start a high risk design/manufacturing company? Waste 5y to get a PhD??
Contract work is the way out. And you don't have to do this fulltime. Just look for people needing an electronic circuit designed and try to get the project. One thing leads to another and depending on how things go you might not need a regular job.

Forget about manufacturing. There is no money to be made there. High risk and no reward.
There are small lies, big lies and then there is what is on the screen of your oscilloscope.
 
The following users thanked this post: bsodmike

Offline VK3DRB

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 2272
  • Country: au
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #8 on: October 04, 2020, 12:20:51 pm »
Contract work is the way out. And you don't have to do this fulltime. Just look for people needing an electronic circuit designed and try to get the project. One thing leads to another and depending on how things go you might not need a regular job.

Forget about manufacturing. There is no money to be made there. High risk and no reward.

You still get stressed contracting because everything is one your shoulders especially when they are paying the big bucks.

Manufacturing.. you may be right.  Maybe this is what happened to the uCurrent Gold. A nice device which I actually use professionally. But Dave does not make them anymore. Maybe a lot a hard slog for little return.
 

Offline Warhawk

  • Frequent Contributor
  • **
  • Posts: 836
  • Country: 00
    • Personal resume
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #9 on: October 04, 2020, 12:47:12 pm »
So I have my masters in EE, designed phased array RF coils, ultrasound amps, made energy harvesting circuits to charge phones, and dabbled at ATI Technologies (Nvidia) during my internship.  Cool, right?

But I wouldn't say EE is very lucrative or plentiful, and rarely exciting outside of a university lab.  My small town graduates 40 electrical engineers, and all but 2 of them have to leave town to find EE work.  I decided that contract teaching wasn't very stable, so now I work an x-ray repair job that can be done with a 2-year community college diploma.

Yes, x-ray machines, CT, ultrasound, etc. are very fascinating.  But my boss says "very nice theory, now replace this ethernet cable"

No passion anymore.  Can someone light a fire for me? I see everyone posting projects of electronics they did, but I'm not into hobby circuits.  I need something serious with hard physics to get me going.

Start a design firm with no meny? Start a high risk design/manufacturing company? Waste 5y to get a PhD??

What future could possibly result for someone like me.

I understand you frustration but let's face the reality. If you want to do high-end electronics professionally you likely need to relocate. Even multiple times.

I am not sure if my example motivates you, but I had to leave my home town at  the age of 18 to get a degree in Microelectronics. Six years later I relocated again to get a decent job. Again, five years later I relocated again even to a different country with language I still struggle with. But yeah, from an ugly industrial town behind the iron curtain to the heart of Bavaria. With every relocation, I lost contacts, a few friends and took high risk. This way I made it to the semiconductor industry which has been my dream, since I saw the famous Bob Pease Show at dial up internet at the age of 15.

If your situation prevents you from pursuing your dream somewhere else you need to improvise but still you need to take a risk. If you're not a risk taker, get a job that pays your bills and do hobby electronics at home. It's fun too.

Stop whining, do something, good luck!



« Last Edit: October 04, 2020, 12:49:44 pm by Warhawk »
 

Offline rstofer

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 9963
  • Country: us
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #10 on: October 04, 2020, 04:17:06 pm »
What tech jobs are available in your area?  How many courses would it take to have the equivalent of a major in that subject.

EE is mostly math and physics plus a very few specific electronics courses.  Converting to a major in software probably takes 6 classes and no other 'general education' courses.  A dual major, I suppose.  You might even be able to swing a Master's without having a Bachelor's.  This is typical for Master's in Business Administration (MBA).  In fact, it might be worthwhile to look into an MBA.  The field of "Operations Research" is very interesting (learning curves, scheduling, optimization, etc).

If there are no tech jobs in your area you might be able to get a 'work from home' job but I would bet it would be easier to do for software than for hardware.

In the US, we have the Bureau of Labor Statistics (www.bls.gov) which provides information on various careers and, to tell the truth, EE doesn't have much growth potential when compared to software.  Furthermore, BLS provides regional data - engineering in South Dakota doesn't pay as well as engineering in Silicon Valley.

https://www.bls.gov/ooh/architecture-and-engineering/electrical-and-electronics-engineers.htm
https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/software-developers.htm

Look at the difference in Employment Change.  There will be a LOT of jobs for software folks but EE newgrads are likely to have a problem.  The field only expands by around 1,000 jobs per year and I suspect we graduate a lot more than that!

You can click on the "State and Area" tab to find out that EE in Silicon Valley has a 90th percentile wage of $164k

https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes172072.htm

Picking a major because it is fun is to duplicate my path.  I have an MSEE in electronics and never worked a day in that field.  I spent a lot of time working in the area of electrical systems and, ultimately, project management for all kinds of construction (more like an MBA grad which I am not).  I kept electronics as a hobby.  I can't imagine the boredom of sitting around designed little circuits for big projects when I could be out playing on a construction site.  I never liked drafting board work.  CAD sucks and is best left to others.  If the company needs a draftsman, they should hire a draftsman.  I did my work on the back of napkins.

Your degree does not limit you to a particular path, just consider it a cost of entry into any kind of technical or engineering path.  A technical degree of some sort is just table stakes.  I never actually did much engineering, I bought it.  I still had to be conversant in a wide range of topics but that comes with exposure.
« Last Edit: October 04, 2020, 04:22:55 pm by rstofer »
 

Offline coppercone2

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 11333
  • Country: us
  • $
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #11 on: October 04, 2020, 07:11:18 pm »
I don't know if manufacturing is so much on the way out with all the trouble with China, it would just take a few sanctions. Eventually those crusty cheap PCBs everyone is ordering might be burned at the port. And not all companies are going to work with a Han Solo getting them shipped through a neutral country.. I think there is still a bit of sweet CCP subsidy making that whole thing so appealing (economic warfare).
« Last Edit: October 04, 2020, 07:14:24 pm by coppercone2 »
 
The following users thanked this post: eti

Offline ANTALIFE

  • Frequent Contributor
  • **
  • Posts: 516
  • Country: au
  • ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
    • Muh Blog
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #12 on: October 04, 2020, 10:23:37 pm »
OP are you working on any projects at home, if not then now might be a good time to start

Also is it possible for you to see your current job as a way to generate income to partially fund you hobbies/projects, or are you ready to jump to something new?

Offline nctnico

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 28429
  • Country: nl
    • NCT Developments
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #13 on: October 04, 2020, 10:45:55 pm »
I don't know if manufacturing is so much on the way out with all the trouble with China, it would just take a few sanctions.
You have to take a few steps back. A manufacturer of bulk items may get a 10% margin on the products. The margin between the manufacturer's price and what the end customer pays is around 80%. So guess where most of the money is made... So any way you turn it: manufacturing is the least profitable step in the entire process.
There are small lies, big lies and then there is what is on the screen of your oscilloscope.
 

Offline rstofer

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 9963
  • Country: us
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #14 on: October 04, 2020, 11:26:07 pm »
I don't know if manufacturing is so much on the way out with all the trouble with China, it would just take a few sanctions.
You have to take a few steps back. A manufacturer of bulk items may get a 10% margin on the products. The margin between the manufacturer's price and what the end customer pays is around 80%. So guess where most of the money is made... So any way you turn it: manufacturing is the least profitable step in the entire process.

Which is why the US has out-sourced it.  The money is in creating magic, not manufacturing it.

A subjective view:  The rate of increase in 'magic' dm/dt has fallen considerably since the late '70s and early '80s.  I was there when the 8080 was new, 8" floppy drives were $400 and a 5 MB hard drive was a couple of grand.  I had a lot of fun writing BIOS code for CP/M on the Z80/8080/8085 platforms.  I was an early adopter of UCSD Pascal on the Z80 - I wrote a lot of interpreter code to add various peripherals.  Today it's just incremental improvements in stuff that's been around a long time.  Cell phones are an example; they are more sophisticated than what I had in the early '90s but it's evolutionary, not revolutionary.

The Internet is a counter example!  It is as close to magic as anything can get.  Whatever I need comes UPS in a day or so.  If they closed every brick-and-mortar store in town I wouldn't even notice.

EE is boring!  I wouldn't recommend spending the time and money to major in something with no growth.  Software development or applied mathematics would be my suggestion. I'm becoming more enamored with applied math as time goes on.  Large data, machine learning, AI; those are the growth areas.  Amazon and Google are the places to work.  The good news is that Google has fully embraced 'work from home' - even if it is a long way from Silicon Valley.  I could see myself working on a laptop while sitting on a beach in Thailand.  The big decision would be Mai Tai or Margarita?

I used to be of the opinion that you should find a career that required you to lay your hands on something.  You have to be physically present, the work couldn't be out-sourced or off-shored.  Now, with WFH, I'm rethinking that.  Of course, I'm long retired and this isn't a discussion that involves me.


« Last Edit: October 04, 2020, 11:29:06 pm by rstofer »
 

Offline Bud

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 7276
  • Country: ca
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #15 on: October 04, 2020, 11:39:48 pm »
Become married, get a child and then your value system will change.
Facebook-free life and Rigol-free shack.
 

Offline rstofer

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 9963
  • Country: us
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #16 on: October 05, 2020, 12:34:45 am »
Become married, get a child and then your value system will change.

I did undergrad at night, married, one kid, 60 hour workweeks - a lot of things changed, nothing improved.

I even did grad school at night because I needed to work for a living.  The good news is that it took just a year.  It was a lot more fun than undergrad.  The MS thing opened a lot of doors.

Seventeen years into retirement, things have changed again.  This time things have improved.
 

Offline coppice

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 10031
  • Country: gb
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #17 on: October 05, 2020, 12:43:01 am »
If you want a profession where you can work almost anywhere, become a doctor or lawyer. If you become an engineer, and especially a design engineer, you need to go where the work is. There is just no way around this. If you are flexible about location, you can find interesting things to do in electronics.
 

Offline DimitriP

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 1420
  • Country: us
  • "Best practices" are best not practiced.© Dimitri
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #18 on: October 05, 2020, 12:57:06 am »
Quote
Waste 5y to get a PhD??
It's funds, brains and time. Easy to figure out :)


 




   If three 100  Ohm resistors are connected in parallel, and in series with a 200 Ohm resistor, how many resistors do you have? 
 

Offline NSCI0T7Topic starter

  • Newbie
  • Posts: 7
  • Country: ca
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #19 on: October 05, 2020, 01:51:23 am »
Check check and check.  That's why I can't just move to whatever city has the most interesting job.

And when I talk about manufacturing, I'm not talking about PCB assy.  I'm talking about making and selling medical equipment.
 

Offline bd139

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 23099
  • Country: gb
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #20 on: October 05, 2020, 06:17:56 am »
Replying to original post. I bailed out and went to work in software. Money is good, jobs are plentiful, get to work from home, no relocation so you can establish a family easily. I do the EE stuff at home on my own schedule.
 

Offline VK3DRB

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 2272
  • Country: au
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #21 on: October 05, 2020, 10:54:54 am »
Replying to original post. I bailed out and went to work in software. Money is good, jobs are plentiful, get to work from home, no relocation so you can establish a family easily. I do the EE stuff at home on my own schedule.

You guys miss a big point. With so many of you bailing out of hardware, there is money to be made by good hardware design engineers because there is a shortage of experienced and skilful hardware design engineers out there. I am finding there is heaps of hardware development work that pays well. It is simply the law of supply and demand. I do not have to advertise to get work. In fact I am knocking back work, so I can select good companies that are prepared to pay my rates.

Why do you need to move location to do hardware design? Most of my work is done with Altium so I can do it all at home or in the office or at a client's location, just like software development. I also have my own hardware lab. Admittedly, a software "lab" can be very cheap in comparison. Altium is bloody expensive, but you do get bugs thrown in for free.

There is however, one huge advantage with software development over hardware development: Software engineers can make a small mistake, fix a line of code in a few minutes, compile and deploy the code, and everything is hunky dory. But hardware engineers can make a small mistake, resulting in a PCB re-spin with a massive impact to delivery time and budget, accompanied by very upset people. Added to that, you think you have finished your design and it fails the IEC 61000-4-2 8kV or 15kV air gap ESD test intermittently. Hardware development can be very stressful. Plus hardware development is always on the critical path in the early days of development.

As for boredom, hardware development can get quite tedious compared to software development. I have done both for many years. But I would prefer designing a PCBA any day to cleaning up, debugging and refactoring some clown's undocumented and badly commented software. (I did that on a complicated firmware project for 18 months some years ago. I vowed never again, unless the fee is $300 per hour plus costs like psychiatrist fees :scared:). 
 

Offline coppice

  • Super Contributor
  • ***
  • Posts: 10031
  • Country: gb
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #22 on: October 05, 2020, 01:18:49 pm »
Replying to original post. I bailed out and went to work in software. Money is good, jobs are plentiful, get to work from home, no relocation so you can establish a family easily. I do the EE stuff at home on my own schedule.

You guys miss a big point. With so many of you bailing out of hardware, there is money to be made by good hardware design engineers because there is a shortage of experienced and skilful hardware design engineers out there. I am finding there is heaps of hardware development work that pays well. It is simply the law of supply and demand. I do not have to advertise to get work. In fact I am knocking back work, so I can select good companies that are prepared to pay my rates.
Every organisation I've ever worked in, or observed from the outside, paid and respected mediocre software people better than the very best hardware people. It has just become a strange norm that software people get paid better. There is never a shortage of capable hardware people. There is only a shortage of people prepared to work for the pay that is on offer. Shortages self correct when the money is right, but the culture in many countries is to not pay what it takes to get the best people.

 

Offline bsodmike

  • Regular Contributor
  • *
  • Posts: 229
  • Country: lk
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #23 on: October 05, 2020, 02:24:24 pm »
I got mine about a month back but they seem to be out of stock again! https://www.eevblog.com/product/ucurrentgold/
 

Offline bsodmike

  • Regular Contributor
  • *
  • Posts: 229
  • Country: lk
Re: Wayward EE lost and lamenting
« Reply #24 on: October 05, 2020, 02:29:35 pm »
There is however, one huge advantage with software development over hardware development: Software engineers can make a small mistake, fix a line of code in a few minutes, compile and deploy the code, and everything is hunky dory. But hardware engineers can make a small mistake, resulting in a PCB re-spin with a massive impact to delivery time and budget, accompanied by very upset people. Added to that, you think you have finished your design and it fails the IEC 61000-4-2 8kV or 15kV air gap ESD test intermittently. Hardware development can be very stressful. Plus hardware development is always on the critical path in the early days of development.

As for boredom, hardware development can get quite tedious compared to software development. I have done both for many years. But I would prefer designing a PCBA any day to cleaning up, debugging and refactoring some clown's undocumented and badly commented software. (I did that on a complicated firmware project for 18 months some years ago. I vowed never again, unless the fee is $300 per hour plus costs like psychiatrist fees :scared:).

Very true! Right now I'm also taking care of my client's entire stack - this involves the deployment and CI stack as well.  Fixes are cheap, and there's very little to "break"; it's designed for high SLA and with Cloud providers that's pretty simple.

I can really appreciate the stress of being responsible for a PCB design; so much to go wrong and rather than doing `git blame` and applying a patch, that fault is yours and you'll have to own up to it one way or another.
 


Share me

Digg  Facebook  SlashDot  Delicious  Technorati  Twitter  Google  Yahoo
Smf