Hi friends. This month, I will do a short post about some things I might want to tell a younger self. This is also for the bright engineering minds that are near graduation or have just graduated.
First of all graduating with an engineering degree is of in itself a very very big achievement. Congratulate yourselves. All the hours spent on the Moody friction chart, root locus plots, and taking a break at the boba shop weren't wasted!
Now, graduation anxiety is only natural. After all, before that, all we kind of needed to do was to study and be good at it. It felt like a cliff for me. However, I wished I could tell myself that everything would work out, except I just didn't see it that way haha. But I would also be frank with myself that there would be many challenges the likes of I have never experienced before, and through those challenges, I would learn and grow. Be it break-ups, job searches, living by yourself, or the biggest pandemic the world has ever seen in a long while. What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, I suppose that is true! This would also be the decade that one gets to know him/herself and explore his or her place in the world. Don't miss the adventures.
The fact is it took me around 7 months after graduating with a Master's degree to find my first mechanical engineering job. So in hindsight, which is always 20/20, I think I should have treated myself better in those 7 months. It was time that one does not get back. Maybe think of it as a vacation that is longer than most ones that you are ever going to have. Of course, there is the pressure of "oh I don't want to move back home" and "I want to prove my worth by staying here." All valid. Been there done that. Now, I would advise getting a survival job like I did tutoring, but be more optimistic about the outcomes and try to live in the present in a similar situation. In fact, going back home to live with parents is a completely reasonable path. Living at home doesn't have to equal bumming at home. Those two are not the same. You can still pay parents rent. Times of unemployment require structure, and I had burned out looking for a job back then. It was not pretty. The more productive way would have been to set blocks of time for job searching, doing one's part-time survival jobs, having a little bit of fun within budget, exercising, and most importantly connecting with people and socializing. This should never be a time of shame. Connecting with friends and family is paramount.
Another piece of advice I would tell my younger self is that building a career takes time, and rarely do people hop onto their dream job out of college and be set for life. Building transferable skills technically and socially is so so important in the early career phase. Be humble and take it easy. Rome was not built in one day. Rarely is your first job your dream job, but without it, in engineering, one cannot possibly have the experience to move onto something better. I would advise staying at a job for at least a year before looking for something else. For one, it shows a degree of dependability to your next employer, and gives you enough time to have developed some technical and soft skills alike. This is also the time point where you have more options to choose from simply because you are viewed as having enough engineering experience for a change of entry level job. This is also a time to start really saving some money and forego the new car lease. I would seriously advise my younger self that yes a new 2019 WRX does look cool, but you could have really saved a bunch by getting into a Civic Si or used Golf GTI. I also did not really think too much about rent and rented out a $1600/mon apartment. Don't be me. Invest in the future and watch how much take-out and dine out you are doing. By invest, also, really invest that cash into a Roth or Index fund. You will have funds for a rainy day or something big down the line. A better place to use these saved up funds would be to travel once a year somewhere far. The older I get, the more I see experience as invaluable versus what car you drove which year.
Next thing, interviews. One can only get better at them, the more they do it. I would tell a younger self that really failures are the harbinger of success. When one door closes another opens too. So don't beat yourself up. Actually, I have been able to use the knowledge gained from working on a problem in a previous interview in a current one. It is also about presentation as it is about hard skills. This is where the soft skills developed are equally as important. Appearance is and isn't everything. Good presentation accentuates your technical background as if its providing excitation at your own natural frequency. I think often, interviewers would like to see a resilient engineer that gives his or her all in the face of challenging questions that someone who refrains from trying. They are also asking themselves "do I want to work with this person as a person?" And lastly, I would tell myself, "your worth is not dependent on the amount of rejections you get, but on the perseverance you give for that single acceptance toward your goals."
To those who are still studying engineering, oh give yourselves a break sometimes. Grades aren't everything. They matter, but they aren't everything. You are studying some of the hardest things man has discovered. The stress that comes with it needs to be balanced by social activities, sports, sleep, and fun. I think my college experience after the first year really was too focused on studying and not enough about discovering myself and developing those soft skills and resilience that would have been so valuable later in life. So to my younger self, "yeah go to that party tonight, maybe you won't get a good score on this one homework assignment."
Equally as important is the art of saying no. I would tell myself that I am the navigator and decision maker of my life and I have to power to say no to many things that would make my life not what I want it to be. Saying no isn't about being a mean human being, but about setting boundaries for oneself and enforcing those boundaries to protect one's core values.
About the friends that I made in college. Yeah, at one point I kind of wished that they never left the same town. When we graduated, I wished I could tell them that it would be somewhat painful having to part ways and walk my own path and only to be able to meet up occasionally. So yeah for the new graduates, this is going to be a hard experience. At some point each one of us will face a city of strangers. It's not too bad though as even an introvert like myself can make new friends. So can you. Taking up new hobbies now that you have financial freedom usually generates friends pretty quickly!
On relationships. I think most of us will have one or two that hurts so bad that it almost breaks us. But the emphasis is on the "almost". I am glad to tell myself that "the future you sends his greetings, and he is in a much happier place." If something didn't work out, the process of dating is working, and you are learning. It's brave enough for two individuals to try than to have never tried. Yes engineers also have relationships. Trying to break the stereotype one post at a time.
Oh yeah take the FE (Fundamentals of Engineering Exam)before or soon after you graduate. You don't want to be like me, who studied for the last month to pass the FE just now. Even if your field doesn't need it, a PE license down the road can only be beneficial for credentials and even consulting work.
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