• Question: What can you get out of engineering that you cannot get from other types of work?

    Asked by Jasmine to Fran, Peppe, Greg, Petros, Pooja, Rumman on 6 Nov 2017.
    • Photo: Greg Chance

      Greg Chance answered on 6 Nov 2017:

      I guess there is a great variety in engineering, especially in Research & Development roles where you will be inventing and discovering new ways to do things. Compared to an accountant or banker, engineering roles may offer more and engage you more in technical and creative ways.

    • Photo: Fran Zuch

      Fran Zuch answered on 6 Nov 2017:

      Hi

      I think it depends on what you are looking for. So I have been working in Retail, as an Assistant in various companies, different jobs in Finance. What I love about building a software and products is that you can decide what to build and how. Hopefully, it will work and make the world a better place as well. But it is interesting and challenging and means you have to keep learning. And that is what for me is the most important thing.

    • Photo: Pooja Narayan

      Pooja Narayan answered on 7 Nov 2017:

      To be very precise and honest, “nothing”. There are people with varied choices and preferences. And there are several career options which match their ambitions. What you get out of a job, in a broader sense is the satisfaction of doing your job right. That is a part of every successful career whether in Engineering, Medicine or Business or whatever.

      Being an engineer, I get to travel a lot. I get to interact with people from industry at conferences, summits, etc. I get to learn on a everyday basis. I also get to interact with youngsters like yourselves. May be this wouldn’t be all possible in a different career option. But then that’s generalisation and may not be true.

    • Photo: Petros Papapanagiotou

      Petros Papapanagiotou answered on 7 Nov 2017:

      I’m not good at art. I can’t even draw stick figure properly. What I get out of engineering is as good as art for me. I get to create new things (programs) that people use and appreciate. I also get the satisfaction of being able to help people, sometimes on the other side of the world, by simply writing some code that is useful in their lives. This is quite unique in engineering, because you can help many different types of people. Programs and computers can help doctors, lawyers, small shops, big shops, internet companies, banks, gamers, charities,… even other engineers! You can contribute in endless ways!

    • Photo: Giuseppe Cotugno

      Giuseppe Cotugno answered on 10 Nov 2017:

      Engineering gives you the knowledge and the confidence of exploring how things work and making new things by yourself. An hardware engineer with the right tools can fix a computer charger (I witnessed this with my eyes), I can fit my the light bulbs in my car (although I know little of mechanics) and many of my friend engineers do such little things. This gives you a lot of confidence as you don’t need to ask anybody if you need to repair your shower or worry that the repair was not done correctly or was overpriced. Either you do it yourself or you will be able to understand if the repair is done properly or not.

      In the computer lab registration office back in Italy there were two statements: “Since I am an engineering, I will fix the washing machine by myself” and “Since I am an engineer, I am too busy to fix the washing machine by myself”, this is pretty much what engineering can give to you

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