I know a Process Engineer. His day seems to involve a lot of what IT folks would call Project Management - deciding how many workers to hire, how many widgets they can actually make, when they can make them by, what equipment they need, whether or not they can meet the customer’s tolerance specs (they do a lot of custom task-order manufacturing/machine shop type stuff rather than just making thousands of the exact same thing over and over). He also ends up as the go-between between the blue-collar factory workers and management.
Interesting. In the O&G area the Process Engineer works at a refinery lab checking and verifying the component of the hydrocarbons. There is a fair bit of design work and a strong background in Chemistry is necessary. The one I know here got his degree in Chemical Engineering
I think **robert_columbia **pretty well described a process engineer at a manufacturing facility.
As for the engineer’s dress code, it’s almost always business casual; slacks and a collared shirt. Maybe a jacket if you’re visiting customers.
Former civil (structural) engineer (with an architecture minor) here.
AutoCAD will “do the drawing for you” in the sense of you tell it “draw a box with these dimensions here” or “draw a line tangent to this circle there”. It doesn’t turn you into Leonardo da Vinci.
I actually had artistic ability, but it’s not really required.
I’ll echo what Dorjän said about the math. I struggled a lot with calc and differential equations to the point where I took some additional math classes during the summers at the local state college in order to get up to speed.
Career-wise, I didn’t stay with engineering long. I went on to get an MBA and spent most of my career in technology, management consulting and project management. But as a foundation, engineering is a great degree to have because it actually teaches you how to do shit.
Like any technical discipline, it can be frustrating dealing with more “soft skills” based business types who think that all problems can be “talked through” or “realigned with our new strategic paradigm”. In engineering you learn that certain things work or they don’t work and there is no compelling Powerpoint deck that will make it otherwise.
I can identify with the soft skills vs hard skills anicdote. I wanna learn about something I can touch, not just concepts and strategies. That’s one thing I hated about being in sales.
I work in a job that is essentially a mechanical engineering role although my degree is a BS in chemical engineering. I work for a company that makes construction equipment and I’ve been there about 7 years now although only 3 years in an official engineering role (I originally worked in Quality and then Technical Writing roles).
My job has a 40 hour week and I have reasonable flexibility in my hours. If I think I am going to do something that will take up most of my day I’ll take a vacation day but otherwise we can come in late or leave early as long as I let my boss know. I can come in early to cover my time and then leave early also. In my group there is a guy who is getting his BS in mechanical engineering and they are okay with him going to his classes in the middle of the day as long as he has someone to cover his responsibilities and he makes up the time in the evening.
It helps for our place to have significant experience in CAD drawing packages. Our product line currently is transitioning to Pro/E (Wildfire/Creo) but we have a hodge-podge of models/drawings in AutoCad, and Solidworks also. I had almost zero CAD experience when I moved to my current role but they were okay with that – I use and abuse AutoCad in ways that it was probably not intended. When I started in my current role I did some Solidworks tutorials and have modest proficiency there. Wildfile/Creo I am still learning but have a basic proficiency which I work on a little each day to improve.
In my role I am a generalist and I basically work on a variety of problems(mainly hydraulic and electrical but a few structural or software related) with our existing product line (manufacturing or customer issues) as well as small cost savings projects. I assign work to other less senior and contract engineers. I review work by other engineers. So most of my day is spent at a desk doing CAD work/paperwork but part of it also is to do shop support in the factory or run equipment to verify product fixes or troubleshoot production problems.
I think the starting salaries in engineering are around 45-50K and we live in a medium-low cost area although people who live further south (closer to DC) will have higher costs. Usually people are brought on as contract engineers for 6 or 12 months and after that time they are free to apply for internal jobs and become permanent employees. At that point once they have put in a year in a permanent position their salary will be bumped up to reflect that. I applied and got a job from the outside and eventually moved to the engineering department – there does seem to be a pretty fluid movement of people into different roles if they are motivated.
I do the occasional business trip for work usually involving a visit to customers in the US (along with our sales rep for the area) or training. We do have plants around the world so there are opportunities for people that want to do international travel although our product line is mainly a North American product. International travel is not required in my role. However my boss needs to travel and he will make about 2-3 international trips per year.
I usually do not consider my job very stressful however there are times when there is a customer issue or a machine that they need to ship so you have to concentrate on that until it is fixed. Things get busy at the end of the month or quarter or end of the year when they need to ship machines to meet targets. Also other departments do not understand how long it can take sometimes to create and release engineering documentation along with required price quotes to process changes. As a result they are calling you once or twice a day asking when it will be done.
Thanks for the responses everyone!
I appreciate the discussion we’ve had. Any decision I make will be a few years off so I wanna make sure it’s the right one.
Hopefully when I get to a slower time of year I can visit with some people in real life about opportunities and skill sets and potentially shadow some people.
I’m a chemical engineer, who has worked mostly at specialty chemicals plants for a couple decades.
I wouldn’t recommend ChemE unless you have a strong interest in chemistry.
Since you are at a plant now, talk to some of the engineers there. If you have an interest in Mechanical Engineering, try transferring into Maintenance; the more you know about equipment, the easier it will be once you get to the “actual engineering” classes.
As to that: you should check with whatever school(s) you might be interested in attending, and see what credits will transfer from local, community colleges. If possible, you’ll want to get a lot of the basic courses out of the way – math, physics, chemistry, and any humanities requirements. It’ll be cheaper, and probably possible to continue working at the plant. For that matter, check with your employer about education assistance.
If possible, you’ll want to try a co-op or internship once you’re an engineering student. Your current employer might be ideal for this, but check ahead.
You’ll actually have an advantage, having some experience working in actual industry. Most engineering students have no real idea of what an engineer might do, and are utterly gobsmacked at their first encounter with a real job. So make the most of the opportunity now to pay attention: watch and think of what you might enjoy. If pipefitting and pumps is more your thing, ME would be the way to go. But if you’re interested in control systems, EE or CompE (or even CompSci, if you want to be a control systems programmer).
Drafting and AutoCAD don’t really require an engineering degree (at chemical plants, at least); most places I’ve worked get by with having an engineer oversee the work. However, those jobs do require experience in CAD. Technical colleges would be an easier entryway.
None of the plants I’ve worked at have employed a CivE as a civil engineer, so if that’s your interest you’ll probably want to look beyond a plant environment.
Dress code is going to vary depending on what job and job environment you get into. I’ve worked in R&D jobs where I wore business casual or suits. I currently work at a plant lab, so it’s whatever under a labcoat or fire-resistant jumpsuit, with steel-toe shoes and safety glasses (plus hardhat in the plant).
Keep in mind that if your goal is working at a plant – like, that ethanol plant – your career will probably lead to you moving across the country at some point. Unless you’re in a few areas with lots of industry – e.g., Houston, southern Louisiana, few other places – there aren’t going to be a lot of local job opportunities. So you’ll end up moving. Willingness to relocate to a rural environment will be a plus in jobhunting… but you’re unlikely to remain in the rural area you’re at now. (unless you stay at that ethanol plant forever, and I’m unsure of the long-term prospects of that industry.)
“I wear several hats” engineer here, education in physics and EE. Creativity and aesthetics can definitely open more opportunities for you. Especially if you are someone designing a product that a customer wants to look nice, and not like a mechanical afterthought. Always keep an eye toward elegant modular user-friendly design, whether the user is a doctor, a maintenance person, an artist, etc.
Personally, beauty isn’t my strong point…ok, that’s being too kind, my designs are mostly post-apocalyptic brutalist approaches to pure function. I am the first to hire or recommend folks on my team that also possess artistic sense to help me out.
You can’t sell “ugly”
Starting salaries are highly dependent on region, company, and industry. PE type of work for governments and municipalities are pretty high, smaller machine-shop mills will start a lot less.
I’m lucky to be on a project currently that has very flexible days and hours, and telecommuting flexibility. It won’t last though, crossing my fingers that my next one isn’t a 60-hour-week-overtime meat grinder.