Some Advice for Experienced Engineers in this Down Market_ Part II

Our previous post discussed the general business situation and its impact on management level and higher engineers.

This second part will continue to provide suggestions in your job search and conclude with some insights into breaking the current “experienced engineer” barrier.  Other recommendations include:

• Check out the Army Corps of Engineers and other military related sites, as regardless of the economic conditions they have needs for personnel that have well rounded careers, particularly in the field of civil engineering.  Different types of experience can be a plus in this sector and “not so recent” experience is better received at these agencies.

• Update your resume frequently, at least every three months.  A cover letter dated three months ago says that you are getting discouraged and are just sending out “whatever resume(s) you have” on file.  Current dates and specific job experience descriptions are key to getting an interview.  Tailor your cover letter to specific positions that you are most attracted to.  Remember that the first and primary goal of a resume is to get an interview.  When you get that interview your resume has done everything it has supposed to do, so reward yourself when these successes occur.

• For those with diverse experience, create two or three cover letters/resumes that are specific to these sectors.  It will take only 10-15 minutes to tailor your general resume toward these areas of project experience and qualifications, and these resumes will always have a better chance of landing an interview.

• Try to focus on more recent employers and projects in your resumes.  Employers are looking for middle aged project managers more than experienced project managers who are looking at five to ten years of service left before retirement.  I am not saying to falsify your resume, but jobs before state registration do not need to be referred to for the most part.  They date you and could contribute to your resume being “filed” a lot quicker than those with more years of service left.  I will talk a bit more about this later.

• Keep good records of your job search.  A good method of tracking your work is the ENR lists of employers in your area.  When you apply electronically or by FAX or mail place notes beside the firm’s listing recording the date of electronic or hard copy submission.  Also, if you have different resumes for different sectors note what resume was used in the application.  This could avoid some embarrassing discrepancies in the interview process should you be selected for interview.

• Keep open to other professional opportunities, particularly the construction side of engineering.  I have found that broad based or extensive project experience is respected more at construction firms than pure engineering firms.  Many times the right or wrong thing to do in the field is better determined by past experience, rather than courses at the Masters Degree level by more recent graduates.  Engineering theory many times will take a back seat to practicality and cost of a specific field solution.

• Most importantly, do not get discouraged.  You need to stay in the hunt as the employment market improves (hopefully).  As you continue to apply online and otherwise, be consistent with your computer ID and password.  Most sites have saved your resume information from a previous submittal and a new application for a position could take seconds instead of a half hour or so repeatedly filling out basic resume fields.

Finally, you must take into consideration what engineering firms are actually using as criteria for candidate selection.  In this area I have mentioned that age and experience sometimes can be a bigger “roadblock” than “highway” to hiring.

A recruiter I know mentioned recently that larger firms, particularly those in the top 100, would rather make an investment in “35-something” year old engineers with 10+ years of experience.  So if you fit in this category you should feel better about your job search and your chances of success.  The larger firms are frequently looking at the remaining years of service a candidate represents.  As I said previously, 20-25 years of career left looks much better than 5-10 years of service left.  Salary and benefits are big ticket items too, sometimes overriding qualifications and experience.  Plus, in many cases these firms conclude that the “35-something” engineer has made all of his or her “learning mistakes” and is ready to do the best work of their career.  Also the younger candidate is somewhat “closer” to current design methodologies, particularly in structural engineering (such as allowable stress design versus strength design with factored loads).

So what can you do to break through this invisible barrier?  Consolidate your experience on the resume to the fullest extent while not falsifying your background.  As I said before, forget experience before your PE.  Also, try not to date yourself by indicating what year you graduated from undergrad or grad school.  A lot of times you cannot do this as the electronic forms on job application sites have “asterisked” entries that require a response or the form does not get submitted.  In no way consider falsifying any information on your resume because if discovered could result in your being reprimanded or worse, terminated.

I hope that this post will shed some light and provide suggestions on experienced job searching in the current design/construction environment.  Also, I hope that it will provide encouragement to the many thousands of productive, highly capable and valuable engineers in the last phases of their career.