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      09-30-2016, 01:24 AM   #1
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What am I doing here? (A career thread)

This is my first time seeking career advice, so bear with me as I ramble on.

About this sack of meat
I'm in my late twenties and have a MS in engineering. I've been working in aftersales engineering since I graduated 4-years ago, two at a enterprise computer company and two at my current job. I'm a tad OCD and bit of a perfectionist at my work.

My job
I'm an aftersales engineer for an avionics firm, working to fix issues on aircraft. International travel is about 30-40% and hours average to 50hr/week, up to 60-70. Our department is organized under the Sales and Marketing group and the team is comprised of ex-avionics technicians and mechanics. A lot of the work is highly technical, but also lots of tedious work with little benefit or gain. I've become a subject matter expert in the two years I've been here and deliver work that has been the praise of my managers and execs.

My pay and benefits
The job is salaried at $94k (no overtime pay), with about 9.5% yearly bonus and 3% yearly pay raise. Health and Dental are employer subsidized. A company car w/ gas and maintenance is provided. Hours and time off is flexible, but comp time is not guaranteed. 401k matches 50% of the first 8% contribution.

My gripes
Our group is under sales and marketing, despite having engineering responsibilities. Our group is often caught in the middle of conflicting priorities. Our VP often tells our team to drop everything to look at very minor issues, all because a customer-side VP demanded it.

As a result, other groups within the company dont take our team seriously and makes it difficult to get our (legitimate) work done. Management is aligned with sales and marketing, but fortunately my boss feels differently and shields our team from a lot of that mess. Corporate culture seems to focus on short term growth (sales) without consideration of long-term sustainability for said growth, so there are lots of inefficiencies that management and employees dont care to fix. I often do the job of three other people since the other two I rely on rarely contribute.

My dilemma
I'm not quite sure I'm happy here and feel burned out. The opportunity to travel and work around planes is great and are the perks of my job. However, the corporate culture, uncompetitive pay, and unpaid overtime frustrate me a lot. I'm also the only one in the team with an engineering background, so I often feel overqualified for the work I'm doing. There is an opportunity to take my boss' position and many people in the company as well as our customers have hinted that I should take it. However, it just means I'm exposed to more of the drama, politics, and crap that make me hate this job.

What should I do? Should I leave for greener pastures or stay?
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Last edited by capt_slow; 09-30-2016 at 01:33 AM..
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      09-30-2016, 01:38 AM   #2
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What do you see yourself doing long term?
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      09-30-2016, 01:40 AM   #3
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Hey OP, nice to meet you (virtually) fellow Engineer here although I'm in the UK.

Firstly, love the perfectly layed out and well constructed message - the OCD engineer in me is applauding you lol.

More seriously, I do understand where you're coming from. My background is Aeronautical Engineering and I moved into the Sales side of things some time ago. I went through a lot of what you described above and maybe I can help you out

It would be better to PM me if you're interested in having a chat as some info is personal and I could write quite a lot on this thread, but I'm more interested in giving you help/advice that you really need.
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      09-30-2016, 02:08 AM   #4
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I personally believe that life is too short to be working somewhere you aren't happy at. However, my advice would be that you leave your position only if it's for a lot more money (ie. your boss' position) or for a position that is lot more fun/less stressful.
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      09-30-2016, 02:09 AM   #5
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start looking for applications that have things you are looking for, no need to quit yet
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      09-30-2016, 04:19 AM   #6
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I will withhold my advice, because I'm not sure I know enough to contribute. I will only say that happy customers drive the most revenue. Way more than new customers, even. When you say that the team is jerked around for non-important things, I think you may misinterpret what important means in the context of your job. A customer sitting on a multimillion (or in aviation, multi-billion?) dollar order over something technically minor is far more important than a major technical issue not affecting revenue. In sales, the job is making money so that all the engineers can get paid. That money comes from the customers. Meaning is where you find it and where you make it. When customers order, your company's employees get paid and their families eat and go to college and take vacations. That's pretty damn important if you ask me. THAT is the job of sales - even if you are in a technical role. Everything else serves that purpose.

Why you do your job is at least as important as what you actually do. Remember the why. The company's why, the team's why and your personal why and make your decision from there.
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      09-30-2016, 06:40 AM   #7
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I work in engineering within automotive group and we are contracted from the end user. Our manager constantly has to cover our back because it's similar to your situation where the customer PM is demanding we look into frivolous things or do mundane tasks that should technically be assigned to their team. I haven't been able to do things relating to my actual position in the past 5 months, it's very frustrating.

With that being said, what kind of research have you done on positions that revolve around your area of expertise that can essentially put you in the drivers seat? Look around and see what kind of positions are open in your field, find out details of the work and exactly what would be expected of you. The grass can always be greener, but be tactful in available choices and overeducate yourself before making a choice.

Instead of being integrated to a single facility I've been contacting specialty cutting tool companies for regional technical specialist positions so I can put all of my focus on CNC tooling instead of having to deal with everything else that revolves around internal manufacturing.
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      09-30-2016, 07:43 AM   #8
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If your not happy with your job start searching for a new one.
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      09-30-2016, 08:12 AM   #9
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tl;dr
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      09-30-2016, 08:21 AM   #10
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Gotta love crappy management. I was in a similar situation in my old job and the best thing i ever did was leave. After i left i realized how miserable i actually was and what that misery did to my personal life (non-work hours).
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      09-30-2016, 08:44 AM   #11
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It sounds like you already answered your own question, OP. Time to look elsewhere. Just take your time and make sure whatever you jump to is right. That's what I did with the job I'm in now. My previous job to this was effing MISERABLE, but I made sure to take my time and find the right place for me and it has worked out well.
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      09-30-2016, 10:24 AM   #12
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Quote:
Originally Posted by M3 Number 86 View Post
What do you see yourself doing long term?
I like the idea of going into management, but also like the idea of getting more engineering experience in aviation.

Quote:
Originally Posted by bimmette View Post
However, my advice would be that you leave your position only if it's for a lot more money (ie. your boss' position) or for a position that is lot more fun/less stressful.
My boss doesnt make much more than I do, maybe +$10k. Unfortunately, they already maxed out the pay scale for my level when I hired on.

Quote:
Originally Posted by jtodd_fl View Post
A customer sitting on a multimillion (or in aviation, multi-billion?) dollar order over something technically minor is far more important than a major technical issue not affecting revenue. In sales, the job is making money so that all the engineers can get paid.
I agree with you there, but my point was we established processes to handle these scenarios. The fact that our VPs keep deviating from it instead of reasoning or compromising with the customer frustrates me. I honestly think if our group had a org change into the engineering division, we would be able to focus on our work.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Axius View Post
With that being said, what kind of research have you done on positions that revolve around your area of expertise that can essentially put you in the drivers seat? Look around and see what kind of positions are open in your field, find out details of the work and exactly what would be expected of you. The grass can always be greener, but be tactful in available choices and overeducate yourself before making a choice.
Our market is actually very small, probably under 10 companies globally that supply avionics to majority of the world's aircraft. I do have a mechanical eng. background too, so I can expand into the automotive industry. However, at this point, it may be too large of a career change.

Also, resume-wise, how good (or bad) would it be if my work history shows me dotting between jobs every two years?
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      09-30-2016, 10:30 AM   #13
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I always searched for new greener green when I was employed, usually within 4 years because everything bored me. After 3 hopping, I ended up on my own and never looking back ever since. And on every move, I tried different specific concentrations within my field and when I became on my own, different expertise made my resume well performer all around and landed on good projects right off the bat. Change is a good thing, go for it.
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      09-30-2016, 10:31 AM   #14
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What skill do you possess, or can develop, that will make you indispensable to your current company or another company.

Basically - how strong is your brand in the industry? If you are easily replaceable, then you might consider 'other' options more carefully.
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      09-30-2016, 10:34 AM   #15
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There's nothing wrong with keeping your eyes open for new opportunities while continuing to work at your current job. You don't have to make a decision to move until someone else has given you a job offer.

Take a look around, apply to a few positions that might interest you, and consider any offers. None of that is incompatible with continuing to work for your current employer.

One last, very important note, is open your eyes to opportunities that may seem out of your niche, especially within your current employer. I've been lucky enough to seize two opportunities that opened doors I never even knew existed when I was in University or even early in my career. Nothing wrong with leveraging your good reputation where it's already established.
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      09-30-2016, 10:39 AM   #16
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the grass is always greener on the other side. Everytime ive switched companies, usually for more money, ive always regretted it at least a little bit.

unless you just really hate your job and the people you work with, id probably stick it out while keeping an eye out for a great opportunity.
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      09-30-2016, 11:33 AM   #17
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I agree with the others that are saying, if you are not happy look elsewhere. With that said, your experience is fairly typical. We have a saying here that "Production (customer) always takes priority over development" and I agree with this but your boss has to understand where your time is spent and deal with the delays this causes on development deadlines. Every company I've worked for (IT Consultant) has these conflicts. Companies that seem to be run by the sales teams are the most successful that I've worked for but also the most maddening b/c of the reasons you mention (short term goals, etc). Companies that are run by the Operations or Accounting teams have different challenges to the value added teams like R&D and IT. The client I've been working with for over 18 years has evolved thru all of these managements types and we are currently sales driven. Since the change we have grown from $80M/year to over $800M/year in revenue but I really don't like working here that much anymore. I'd like to buy a car wash. Start with self-serve washes and work my way up to full-service tunnels/detailing/oil change/etc.
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      09-30-2016, 12:36 PM   #18
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The job hopping thing is interesting. My view has always been that I take an opportunity for a specific reason and once I've accomplished that I am free to look around (I also think there's a minimum commitment you're making to a new employer when you take a new position).

That said, I have a former colleague who, in the past 10 years, has worked for a Crown Corp, a private enterprise, back to the Crown Corp, the regional transit authority, one of the major provincial energy utilities, an aerospace company, a regional health authority, and now a municipality. Because he's well known to not care about moving, he's on every headhunter's list for the work we do and he gets calls every month for new opportunities. His ability to always have something in the hopper is reshaping my thinking in this respect.
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      09-30-2016, 06:12 PM   #19
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How much do you enjoy the ability to travel internationally? Is this considered an exciting part of the job or "whatever" How are you compensated while traveling overseas? Do you get stipends for meals? Stay at places? Have a few hours to enjoy the sights?

Are you in a long term relationship?

When I was your age, I was already in a relationship for over 10 years so traveling internationally a lot would not be ideal. Single me would eat it up.

Pay? Halfway there to having a comfortable life in pretty much any realistic place in So. Cal. So if the perks are good pay isn't too much of an issue. I just read that you are maxed out minus the 3% increases and your boss makes about $10k more. Seems limited, but if money doesn't matter to you then you should be fine.

Would suck to be in a position that is not respected within the organization. Is your division fairly new or has the company been restructured recently?

Hard to really see what the vision of the company is from your posts. However, when companies are established, it takes a lot of momentum to slow the routine to change the vision. I know places that have had the "new vision" for a year and people still haven't been able to put it into practice.

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      09-10-2018, 09:51 AM   #20
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An update

I think an update is in order, since much as changed since my OP.

We had a pretty drastic change of management, which exacerbated the nepotism and favoritism that was already there. A lot of politics later, I ended up in another position.

Its very similar to what I used to do, but the people there are great and management actively backs their people up. While I dont have perks like travel anymore, the better environment and modest pay raise does make up for it.
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      09-10-2018, 10:43 AM   #21
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Your salary + benefits package actually sounds very competitive given your amount of experience (I'm in SoCal too). I'm in med devices, but nonetheless, engineering salaries shouldn't be too different. I made the switch to management ~3 years ago, and it's interesting seeing this stuff from "the other side."
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      09-10-2018, 12:24 PM   #22
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Quote:
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I personally believe that life is too short to be working somewhere you aren't happy at. However, my advice would be that you leave your position only if it's for a lot more money (ie. your boss' position) or for a position that is lot more fun/less stressful.
Also:
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