What they don’t tell you in school

[u/WannabeChE]

You will meet people that have worked at the plant you work at that started off as operators 15+ years ago that are miles and miles ahead of you in experience. They will know the process and have a good understanding of what is happening. They will know their system and won’t need to (but can) trace lines. A degree does not make you smarter but it gives you a deep understanding of the physics and science behind something explaining why. It will put you at about the same level as an operator who has worked there for 10-15 years in terms of pay, but learning never ever stops! In my opinion the experience is so much more valuable to the company, but experience and understanding why is gold!

[u/friskerson]

I didn’t get an internship. I had one rug-pulled and then the wheels fell off. I went to a badly paying job ($66k salary) out of college for an equipment manufacturer (instrumentation measurement technology) which had a really good team atmosphere and made a bunch of friends. By servicing all the major industries (7, or 8 in total major ones) you learn a lot about all of them, then worked hard for a few years, trying to reach escape velocity. A refinery in the same area was hiring so I leapt onboard into a disaster (I have a blog I wrote about my experience there, nightmare fuel for a new engineer), but went in willing to solve their problems and leveraged that after a layoff into the next, and so on. Every opportunity is paid not just in $$ but in experience. Grads seem to value just the $ because that’s what everyone uses as the dick-measuring yardstick. Persist! That is my advice. I graduated with a 2.83gpa and now have a project manager role lined up with a $9B/yr revenue chemical company that’s closer to my favorite city.

I was a smart cookie in hs but college kicked my ass, and I didn’t know how hard to work to secure an internship (first engineer in the family) so I struggled a bit, but what is life but a series of events loosely connected by the thin strand of the passage of time?

Internships are excellent for exposure and connections and lots will brag about them as a gateway to superiority, but all it really means after 2-3 years in industry is $100k in missed salary over those years and over the course of a career (should you persist) it doesn’t mean much as the salaries cap out about the same even if you weren’t a 4.0 student. It’s a head start to have internships, sure, but it’s not end-all-be-all.

Oh, and I forgot your question. In 2025 mining is HOT. Do that. California and Arkansas just struck lithium gold. Read up. Based on dialect and time zone you’re probably not in US but battery tech is booming so the mines globally are in boom cycle. I’d go mining if it were in a location I wanted to live. I like a bit of city in my life. Something to think about.

Still interview with the finance people even if just to practice talking about yourself and selling your value and skills to someone who doesn’t know anything about you and didn’t study in your field. Makes it even easier to sell your value to an engineer. Economics is a core skill of business (one of my favorite subjects I studied tbh) and if you go corporate in engineering (even capital projects engineer or eventually later something less technical and more business acumen related) understanding that element of the business can get you out of a plant and into an office if you hate the bustle of plant life. I like the machinery, personally, but I’ve done office and plant jobs about equally.

In my experience, it’s better to get the boots on ground experience because you’ll be seen as more trustworthy working with the operators and other departments.

But I also think the order you learn things doesn’t have much consequence a decade on, as long as you keep growing and expanding your skills and knowledge. I just try to grow and learn with my job… someone’s dumpster fire is someone else’s paradise and you may not know til you try. It’s the fun part of life.

[u/Superb-Taro6082 → u/friskerson]

Thanks for the advice, it was really eye-opening.

I am situated in South Africa, where mining is a big deal. You might not know this, but we have a system called BEE (Black Economic Empowerment), which basically gives preference to black people for jobs due to apartheid, which ended about 30 years ago. I got a bit sidetracked, but my point is that leaving the finance company to apply for a mining company is a big risk because there’s a high chance I might not get it (I’m not black, by the way). Some undergraduate bursaries for Chem Eng from really big companies (like oil and coal) strictly follow the BEE system, leaving little room for other races.

The finance company I applied to has a 99% retention rate for their interns. So for me, it’s like working two years as an intern and then having a secure job, and if I’m not happy, I still have the choice to leave. As the first person in my family to pursue a professional job rather than going into business, I have this fear of not getting a job—is that normal?

But if I’m being really honest with myself, I would love to work in both the mining and finance sectors to get a feel for what I truly want to do.

[u/friskerson → u/Superb-Taro6082]

It’s normal to worry about finding/keeping a job. I don’t know SA’s work environment whatsoever, but at the end of the day, it’s economics - market rate for engineers goes higher when demand is high and supply of engineers is low, and engineering can be off putting to people afraid of the work culture. In fact during the 2008 recession is when I decided to pursue engineering because of the fear of being out out of work if I chose something less demanding.

Since you’re starting a career, it’s not a bad thing to get into raw materials and you’ll absorb practical engineering knowledge like a sponge which reinforces the degree you have, which in turn makes you more marketable for the next role. That is a great safety net to have - degree matches the experience and practical knowledge, things line up and “look right” to a hiring manager and the next job opening will be putting your resume in the highly desirable stack. I’ve never been out of a job for more than a few months despite the setbacks, and the time off I’ve used to be with my retired parents and relax and while tight on finances I wasn’t completely unhappy leaving those roles. One was a failing company, sinking ship, one was a remote location I didn’t want to be in for too long in my life, and the third had some Machiavellian management with high expectations and a field that didn’t match my degree (mechanical engineer would have been a better suited hire for them with the technical analysis the team was doing). That said, things I learned and accomplished will be on my resume, which is now growing in length, and it says a lot to employers that you’re constantly pursuing work in the field rather than going somewhere else. Though, with a family in business ownership, finance would be a somewhat healthy field too for you. When I’m faced with difficult decisions I write out all my +/- for each, a SWOT analysis of my own situation, and it makes the decision at least feel more logical. Finding a local career mentor is hard these days but there are online services (I recently learned of strawberry.me).

I have two close friends who left engineering after only a short time and never found their way back (5 years or so now), and they then have a really difficult time because the exit strategy was not considered, seems in retrospect they just wanted out of the hard work to pursue passions instead. I imagine it could be a regret of theirs since I heard rumblings they wanted the paycheck again. But then again they got their degrees paid for by dad and granddad, which in the US is a huge deal. I still have $60k left on my loans.

There’s always work to be done in raw materials somewhere in the world, but it’s also hard to strike out on your own anywhere new. Life is full of decisions.

I’ve been through 3 jobs in 3 years and it’s tough when it happens, because whether or not it is in your control it’s a sinking feeling that something will happen and make you doubt your abilities, but what follows the doubt is a self-fulfilling prophecy of underachieving and questioning the past. For me it’s move on season. Job interview Tuesday! :)

[u/Superb-Taro6082 → u/friskerson]

Thank you.