Finally A Job!

[Sir Sam]

I graduated engineering school about 2.5 years ago now(ME), been flipping Jeeps and doing some other Jeep related work(diesel KJ work, etc).

 

Back in august or so I applied for a job with company here in town, I didn't even expect to hear back on the position, and really didn't put much effort in to applying.

 

To my surprise I heard back for a phone interview, then I heard back for an in person interview, then I heard back for a job offer, I accepted back in dec and started January 2nd.

 

 

Comes with great benefits health insurance wise, 401k matching up to 4.5% on 6%, 2 years in I'm vested and start getting a stock contribution(we are a publicly traded company).

 

The job I'm doing is a "Field service engineer", basically I perform field service work on a bunch of different industrial turbine systems, so if there is a warranty issue or more commonly a repair needed I go onsite to perform the work.

 

The cool things about the job are; I can make 50%-100% of my base pay in my travel premiums, eg if my base pay was 100k(it isn't, I'm just making the numbers easy for my example) I could make 150-200k a year. I'm salary when I'm in the office, but the second I go on travel I'm hourly, anything over 40 hours a week I get the typical time and a half pay, plus a premium depending on where I'm traveling, international is 20% premium, offshore 10%, and travel advisory times are an extra 5%. So I get compensated for the travel pretty well, I could make up to 30% depending on where I am traveling.

 

The downside is that I will be traveling about 60-80% of the time, the upside to so much travel is the extra pay.

 

I could be traveling anywhere from the north sea on an offshore oil platform, to the carribean to work on a cruise ship(one of the best jobs you can get, even better if they want you to stay on board for testing during at sea), to china to work commissioning on a power plant for 6 weeks, to basically anywhere.

 

Keep an eye out for updates about where I am in the future!

[Keyav8r]

Congratulations! Sounds like the only downside may be limited time for your MJ. But, one of the upsides is more MJ fund availability!

[jimoshel]

D*mn Sam. I thought you talking about my old job. Then I reread it and caught the ME instead of EE. I loved it. The travel, the people, always something different and not the same old routine. Congratuiations and good luck.

[Sir Sam]

Congratulations! Sounds like the only downside may be limited time for your MJ. But, one of the upsides is more MJ fund availability!

 

Funds aren't so much the issue with the MJ right now, its the time, the MJ is going to be backburner for awhile more while I try to get some other stuff reorganized.

 

I finally have the funds to finish out my basement, so I'm going to do half of my basement, a bed and bath, and then I will be able to rent that out, my smallest bedroom will become an office for me and the GF, the GF is moving into my bedroom, and I will keep renting out my larger bedroom. Same number of bedrooms being rented by roommates, GF will pay me some rent, I will have more space in my bedroom without my desk and such, and I will get more rent from renting a bed and bath in the basement.

 

 

Another up for me is that I just refinanced my mortgage, went from paying 1445 a month to 1071. (374 a month savings). Here in a few months when I have my basement done I'll be bringing in about 1125 a month in rent. Boooooya!

 

Very exciting for me, big financial situation turn around, it means that for me within a couple of years I can think about having enough money saved for a down payment on a vacation/rental house in ouray(been my dream since I was basically a kid).

 

D*mn Sam. I thought you talking about my old job. Then I reread it and caught the ME instead of EE. I loved it. The travel, the people, always something different and not the same old routine. Congratuiations and good luck.

 

Thanks jim, ya there is lots of electrical related stuff, work is going to be buying me a nice new fluke multimeter! Plus a bunch of other tools, too bad I won't get to keep them. It should be very different, new stuff all the time, the downside is being away from home so much, so I need to maximize my productivity at home. I won't be doing any travel for a couple of more weeks at least, so before then I am trying to get as much stuff accomplished and knocked out of the way as possible.

[Dadinator]

Congrats.

Freaked me out a little, because I posted the same title on my post the other day. I saw this one and said I hadn't posted in it. ??

 

Good Luck in your new position. :thumbsup:

[jimoshel]

If enough people can get jobs and get back to work, maybe the Republicans can win next election? Or is that to political?

[ftpiercecracker1]

Are you an electrical engineer by trade? College degree an such.

[HOrnbrod]

Way to go Sam - you deserve it. I loved the travel for 30+ years in telecomms for Uncle. Get it in while you're young mate and invest well. With the good benes and all - maybe Siemens or a sub?

[jimoshel]

Are you an electrical engineer by trade? College degree an such.

BSEE, CTI. '73

[Sir Sam]

Congrats.

Freaked me out a little, because I posted the same title on my post the other day. I saw this one and said I hadn't posted in it. ??

 

Good Luck in your new position. :thumbsup:

 

Thanks, and to you too, I posted this with the same title because you posted yours, figured I would share.

 

 

Are you an electrical engineer by trade? College degree an such.

 

Me? ME

 

Way to go Sam - you deserve it. I loved the travel for 30+ years in telecomms for Uncle. Get it in while you're young mate and invest well. With the good benes and all - maybe Siemens or a sub?

 

Thanks, while I'm not traveling for uncle I'm sort of breaking the mold from my parents, my old man has been a federal employee since the mid 80s and current works for NASA, my mom works for a private company that is defense contractor. So for me this is the most private sector anyone has been in awhile.

 

Siemens is one of our clients, GE is our primary, we make most of the control systems on GE turbines.

 

Planning on investing, I'm still trying to figure out how to build my budget and make plans, trying to figure out the order in which I spend money, some parts for the vehicles here, finishing a bed/bath in my basement, paying off student loans, build a down payment on a second house, etc etc etc. So much to think about.

[HOrnbrod]

Yes, remember about your parents. Uncle's contracting most everything out now, especially in DoD, and when they offered a deal to retire, I jumped. The private sector is the best way to go now I think, especially with who's in power. Sounds like you have a good handle on things and a good background from your folks. Best wishes for a successful future mate. :cheers:

[ftpiercecracker1]

Me? ME

 

 

 

Yes.

 

I am currently on a degree progam to become and electro/mechanical engineer and having a VERY difficult time with motivation. I wanted to know if the job you landed, congrats, requires college education or did you get it because of your resume/ prior job experience.

 

ftpiercecracker

[terrawombat]

Congrats, man. Before I switched positions to where I'm at now, I pursued a similar offer but ultimately turned it down because of the high probability of travel. If the travel doesn't bother you're in a good field with strong benefits and pay. My best advice would be to get in real good with the customers you service and the other contractors you'll ultimately wind up working with. My previous job was with a consulting firm and I was the "on-site field engineer" and had a lot of interaction with our clients and other contractors. When I put in my two weeks notice, I let all of the guys on the various sites I was at know I was leaving. I had two different contractors offer me positions on the spot, both of which I had to turn down because they were located in the opposite direction of where I was headed. If you can display good engineering fundamentals while also being socially apt, you'll find you're a rare commodity.

[Sir Sam]

 

 

 

Yes.

 

I am currently on a degree progam to become and electro/mechanical engineer and having a VERY difficult time with motivation. I wanted to know if the job you landed, congrats, requires college education or did you get it because of your resume/ prior job experience.

 

ftpiercecracker

 

Get the Degree. Then get a masters. Make sure you get some internships. There are so many entry level jobs that you will need a masters to even be competitive for. Part of the reason that its taken me as long to find a career job is that I did not have internships or a masters.

 

While my job actually stated that a 2 year associates and 2 years experience was sufficient qualifications I doubt I would have gotten it with an associates. Likewise there were many jobs I was looking at that I could have done and done well, but they wanted a masters or 2-4 years experience. There are many engineering related paths where if you don't have at least a BS in an engineering discipline its going to hold you back bigtime. There are lots of younger guys starting their careers after being in engineering school for 4-6 years that are doing jobs that really someone with an associates degree is qualified for. But because you have shown via a piece of paper that you are competent enough to stick with school, they assume you have a better and more rounded skill set and knowledge base, while somewhat true I have seen guys with masters that had almost no hands on experience or ability to work in a practical day to day problem solving way get chosen over someone with a BS. Likewise there are guys coming out of school with a BS that don't have any real experence outside of school that will get picked over someone with an Associates.

 

The other thing you need to keep in mind is that having that degree will mean you are always worth more(ie bigger paycheck), and you will always have that "baseline" knowledge.

 

School was tough for me, took me 6 years, repeated more than one class, I'm better learning by doing than sitting in a classroom and filling in a piece of paper to show what I know. That hindered me in school, that hindered me in finding interships, that hindered me in job hunting, yet at the same time its what will give me the greatest success career and life wise. Give me a problem and I will fix it, if I don't know I will learn to fix it and then do it.

 

My advice stick it out and get the degree, I cannot imagine doing any different.

 

Congrats, man. Before I switched positions to where I'm at now, I pursued a similar offer but ultimately turned it down because of the high probability of travel. If the travel doesn't bother you're in a good field with strong benefits and pay. My best advice would be to get in real good with the customers you service and the other contractors you'll ultimately wind up working with. My previous job was with a consulting firm and I was the "on-site field engineer" and had a lot of interaction with our clients and other contractors. When I put in my two weeks notice, I let all of the guys on the various sites I was at know I was leaving. I had two different contractors offer me positions on the spot, both of which I had to turn down because they were located in the opposite direction of where I was headed. If you can display good engineering fundamentals while also being socially apt, you'll find you're a rare commodity.

 

Thanks man. The travel does bother me a bit, but its good experience, its good pay, its a good career move, there are so many positives that it makes up for the travel and being away from the GF/dog/chickens. My base pay alone means I could have my student loans paid off in a year, and within 2 years I could buy a second home as a vacation/rental.

 

My social skills are more developed than that of the ordinary stapler or even 3 ring binder, so I ought to do pretty well.

[Rymanrph]

My best advice would be to get in real good with the customers you service and the other contractors you'll ultimately wind up working with.

 

I second this. I used to work for a small engineering company that serviced the power industry. I'm not an engineer, so I didn't travel, but most in the company did. The turn over was insane. Those that didn't quit after a month or so, stuck around long enough to earn the money to buy all the toys they wanted and when they got married and started having kids, they would all quit and go work for one of our customers. Less pay, but still very good and no travel.

 

If you don't mind the travel, its great money. I worked on a couple jobs and mine were only 6 days or so. I can't imagine being on the road 75%+ of the time, but that's just me.