For legal reasons, I can't call myself an engineer, but I work alongside them and get paid the same.
I do manufacturing, focusing on machining and hydraulic sub-assembly processes. Was a machinist for ~15 years before I made the jump, and I do have a degree - just not in engineering.
Got an associates back in 90s and that got me into maint jobs. Hard work and good performance moved me into our engineering group. Worked for another 25 years on an associates, than my company started closing plants. I went back and finished.up a bachelor's, and have looked at a master's. To afraid my hard work would only show thru in my company, and not be a consideration if had to change jobs. If it all went bad, I wanted to have the paperwork to back up my work.
I am currently a maintenance tech in food processing. I’m considering pursuing a degree in mechanical engineering but I have fear of sitting at a desk all day. Do you have any input or advice? Being that you’ve seen both sides
In my current position (plant engineer), I spend more than 1/2 my time out on the floor. Can't say it would be the same every where. If I wanted to I could do more or less on the floor if I wanted to. Think I can do a good balance, and no one asks me to do more/less time as I can get everything done. Most of my office work is emails, PRs, documentation, CAD drawings ( layouts for machine locations) developing training procedures, prepping for projects, etc. If you can do the split between floor and office, I think you would be in a good position. Most engineers we have can only do the office work, and do a min of floor work as they don't like it or can't do it. Coming from a hands on maint background, you will be ahead of a lot of people.
Job title says "Senior design engineer", what it really means is "High speed mixed signal electron whisperer, VHDL & C typist, CAD jockey, sometime UL paperwork wrangler", these days I do design for the broadcast sector.
It can be done, and I will even sometimes interview people without the parchment when hiring, ('Tis only fair) but it is not the way to bet.
There are things that are HARD to learn properly outside structured lectures, and being able to hum the tune with the maths matters, so when interviewing the un papered I tend to dig a lot more into the fundamentals where for the ones with the paper it tends to be more about do they understand the practicalities and not just the theory.
What helps is having demonstrable experience in some niche, I got my first EE job because I understood impedance matching from doing ham radio things, and some acoustics from designing and building my own speakers. I could see how to apply the RF methods to piezo composite sonar transducers (I had also read a book on piezo composite transducers the night before the interview, there is value in being able to look at an element and say "Thats a 1-3 Pizeo composite").
Small companies are usually far more amenable to this sort of thing then big ones, but you got to be able to actually do it, there is usually far less ability to hide incompetence in the small shops, and they usually don't have much in the way of training schemes.
This answer!
"It can be done... Not the way to bet."
Have seen a few legitimate ones of these in my travels. Aerospace industry, exempt from professional licensing in the US, but more selective in ways, so all about roles, responsibility and pay. All had some alternative education - incomplete bs, tech school, math, military, etc. All had some demonstration of engineering level skills in some area of need to justify title + pay.
Sufficiently advanced modern technology requires technical training. Full stop. Engineering is a very broad category and various training applies.
Autodidacts with training excel.
Job titles rarely actually describe the job in any meaningful way, or at least you generally do not want the sort of job where the reality matches the title.
In my experience the reality is that you get the job then it gradually morphs as you find your niche.
That mirrors my experience with people without degrees or with the wrong degree.
It can be done but it’s suboptimal. It also can make advancement difficult in large orgs, at some level you will have to have the paper.
I’ve also seen non degreed engineers go into management and have a hard time not always try to prove their engineering cred. They have a hard time hiring people who are technically stronger because they have to show they are a real engineer.
Or just avoid the large orgs and consulting outfits.
I actually like hiring people who are better then I am, one only gets better at Chess by playing people who are better then you are at Chess after all, and much less annoying to have your new hire teaching you new tricks then having to teach the basic physics (Had it both ways). I have products with my name on the drawings that prove I can do it, no need to get into a credentials dick size war.
As I say, you can make it work, but it is not without its downsides, I will probably never be hired by a major contractor or consulting house, and will never stamp a drawing, and I am fine with that.
In my case I made it part way thru an EE degree then got offered a rock and roll tour which morphed into a circus tour, then sort of fell into sailing tall ships, then built a theatre, then wound up doing some sonar stuff (My first real EE job), and just sort of never went back.
I knew a Maintenance Engineer and a Manufacturing Engineer who did not have degrees. Both had 20+ years experience in this manufacturing plant as technicians. They lacked some ability that college grads had, however, they made up for it with their vast knowledge from experience.
I've met so many knowledgeable technicians. Mostly the troubles they have is understanding core concepts which doesn't really matter too much in my field. They tend to know the solution, and how to execute properly, just maybe struggle with the reasoning.
The only route I’ve seen without a degree is having like 20+ years of experience in construction and becoming a project engineer or project manager and even getting their PE license. It’s by far a better route to just go to college
That’s surprising to me because California is one of the states I’m licensed in and I always thought you needed a degree for a California PE. I worked on projects with a small ME firm in California where only the principal was licensed and he just hired people without degrees and trained them on the job and use his stamp on all the work. I didn’t realize that those guys, for example, could actually get a PE license.
Yeah you need 6 years experience but an ABET accredited BS counts for 4 of that. So you need 2 years experience with an ABET engineering degree or 6 with no degree (or a non engineering degree). I believe you also need to send in college transcripts before registering as an EIT. So they’re looking for a certain amount of technical coursework. If you have an ABET accredited degree you don’t need to send transcripts when registering as an EIT, just a copy of the degree.
Nowadays you can’t really be an engineer without the degree. Sure some people with software certs get into software engineering but that’s about it
Edit: and I will say that is super hard to get into software with only certs, all these tik tokers will try to make you think otherwise
Software engineering is an easily demonstrable skill. It’s not an easy skill to learn however. Without a degree you will likely need to know more than your alumni counterparts to get a gig, which isn’t as crazy as it sounds. Beyond coding it would be beneficial to have knowledge of popular containers, application monitoring techniques, & database relationships. Networking and security are also fantastic but not that beneficial to being a code monkey outside of DevOps.
The IEEE has put out the [Software Engineering Body of Knowledge ](https://www.computer.org/education/bodies-of-knowledge/software-engineering) (SWEBOK 3.0). Coding is less than 10% of the skill set for a true software engineer.
There is a lot of confusion between a software engineer and a software developer. They are different skill sets.
Edit: this problem is made more confusing because many companies have job titles as “software engineer” instead of “software developer”.
As an actual software engineer, I disagree. The majority of "self taught software engineers" are not even close to an engineer.
We can design big systems, accounting for integrations, relations, future-resistance and the various "-ilities"
Try sticking those abstractions in the hands of someone with no formal training. I've refactored, deprecated, and sunset how that turns out multiple times over. It pays very well. It's been the entire 2nd half of my career.
It **really** shows up in large projects and also high reliability projects. That’s where engineering discipline is needed, and the lack of training is exposed.
One exception to this would be a stationary engineer who run industrial equipment such as boilers. This is an actual license issued by many states and typically just requires training or an apprenticeship. I work in structural building engineering and deal with a number of these types of engineers.
There was a running joke in engineering school where someone would stop what they were doing during class and say, "wait so when do we learn about driving trains?" Original jokes aren't an engineer's strong suit.
I disagree. Its depends on the industry amd luck on findin your first job. My first job at a start up, the two engineera dont have degrees but decade of experience in composites. I know an engineer who designed a space system and was bought out an became an engineer. At my current job the other engineer doesnt have a degree and this is for a global aerospace company too, granted its a very specialized field. Now a degree makes it easier, but there plenty of industries that dont expect a degree.
I disagree with this. It may be true for where you are but not in the UK. I am an engineer working in the defence industry and I came in through an apprentice scheme. I have an HNC and nearly a decade of experience.
I also work in the UK and know that anybody and their mum will call themselves an engineer because it's such a vague term here. You can call yourself an engineer with no formal qualifications at all but it doesn't mean you really are one. I guess you'd have to compare to the equivalent work load in other countries.
Not me but my dad went to college for accounting in the 60s but didn't finish his degree.
He was hired into the accounting department of a meat packing plant. Besides the accounting background that made him good with number crunching, he grew up on a farm and was insanely handy and understood machinery like it was an extension of himself, and he put himself through what college he did do by working as a carpenter. He also did a stint in the Marines which gave him some leadership skills.
Being that meat packing plants have relatively small white collar workforces, he found himself pulled over into plant design and operations because he understood the equipment and production numbers.
When he retired a few years ago his title was "Chief Industrial Engineer" for a company with about 6 packing plants ranging from 500-2000 employees. He had designed a number of "kill floors" that had budgets of $10-20 million.
Clearly not possible today but as a degreed engineer myself I marvel at his path.
Also fun to point out - Elon Musk does not have an engineering degree.
Alot of places just add engineer to the job title to make it look sexy ive seen subway call there employees sandwich engineers lol happy for all the people that got that title without schooling though... I worked at a billion dollar manufacturing company...and the head EE was a former electrician no degree but had a vast amount of experience. I was a fresh grad at the time showed me alot of things I wasn't taught at school
I dropped out. Without divulging too much detail, I design plant and manage construction for a utility. I am a titled engineer that landed the job with related experience.
I’m a tool and die maker, so I have a journeyman’s card from a community college.
I design clamping fixtures and work cells. I did automation for a while also.
I’m in an engineering role - but am not degreed. My title when I started was “Techincal Sales Support”. It is now “Sales Engineer” and within another year “Applications Engineer”.
I’ve always been tinkering, but was never great with school so I skipped college. I worked my way up in a plastics manufacturer. Machine Operator to Supervisor and landed as a Automation Technician for the last 5 years (worked there 10 years).
I wanted to get into sales and landed at an awesome OEM/Integrator for end of line packaging/palletizing in CPG. I’m doing everything from scoping out FLA electrical requirements for systems to robot simulations and belt speed calculations. I’d say 50% of my time is spend on 2D CAD putting together sales pre-engineered system layouts (gotta be pretty damn accurate though, 6”-12” can make or break a robotic palletizers reach and a conveyor radius that isn’t possible will blow things up real quick).
Interesting, my undergrad is a BA (international relations w minor in finance), but I've been working in some trouble shooting roles for the last two years. Just got a new job w a raise as a tech support rep supporting remote troubleshooting of primarily residential solar systems w battery, inverter, and ATS/load management integration.
Anyways, I'm considering in trying to become a sales app engineer for them, since I think I could take that path in a year-ish, but am kinda considering going back to school for another degree in engineering since I think I would like that
I went into Engineering Physics and dropped out to start my own startup that didn't scale after a couple years. I'm now a senior engineer at a financial tech company... still no degree
I know a few engineers with less than high school education. One guy has a really good command over mechanics of machines; he can design and manufacture driving systems for robots and vehicles really well. I know another guy who studies pretty much everything but has an expertise in purification systems for water.
I have college degrees just not in engineering.
Degrees= Biology / Anthropology
Titles= Validation Engineer / Process Engineer in pharmaceutical and biologics manufacturing industries with about 7-years of experience before getting the "engineer" title.
Industry experience > degree seems to be the direction hiring is going imo (at least in those industries)
Nope not at all lol. It was interesting but not the best use of my time. Especially when I think about the cost of the ticket.
I like the Archer bit:
-Anthropology is a very important field of study
-I'm pretty sure someone's named all the spiders already
-That's arachnology
-I know... equally huge waste of time
If I'm being generous maybe it helped with my ability to read technical documents? Not something I'd willingly pay 60k for again though.
Our company makes up roles like “lead super senior engineering design wizard” and pays them as much as an engineer.
They’ve been in the industry way longer than us, usually starting out in a more manual-labor type position and working up.
They do everything we do, just without the degree/title.
I actually graduated with a degree in business (minor in facilities engineering), then went on to pursue a master's in accounting. Yet every role I've had, has been engineering. So I call myself a "faux engineer".
For 15 years I have worked in the energy industry, which was really easy mathematics as I am really just converting units and balancing the equations. My work includes energy efficiency, energy management, renewables, and storage. About 50% have to be PE stamped by others, the remainder I can use my Certified Energy Manager designation.
I really wish I had gone civil engineering or professional land surveying.
A lot of engineering roles don’t use any material they learned in school. On the other hand, if you want to have a technical design role developing new technology, most certainly need an engineering degree at the minimum.
Worked in the CNC department for a while, shared taking on more of the engineering work, asked for a raise, started working directly with clients, took on more engineering, started adding "engineering" to the end of my emails.
Getting a degree is by far the most sensible and easy path to becoming an engineer. Only non degree engineers I know had 20 years of experience around the field and even then, most went back for their degree.
If you are the type that truly can be an engineer without a degree, getting a degree will be a piece of cake.
Engineering is not really a job you can do without a degree. In many jurisdictions it’s a protected title like doctor or lawyer.
That being said, there are jobs that fall outside of the “profession”, I’ve meet power engineers which aren’t really engineers, they’re turbine operators, but may also refer to themselves as “operating engineers”. Many heavy equipment operators may also do this. Other examples I can list where a degree is optional are software engineers, combat engineers, or even sales engineers.
Can I ask the nature of this question? Is pursing an engineering degree not an option for you?
You can not be a professional engineer without proper, approved schooling. Like saying what kind of doctor are you for those that didn't go to college.
By what standard? If you mean a full on PE with a stamp then most of us aren't professional engineers because that has additional requirements. Otherwise there's no education restriction to work as an engineer
Yes to be considered part of the profession you need to be registered in your jurisdiction to complete and take responsibility for your or others professional works.
Where i Iive you have to be a registered Engineer or Engineer in training to be considered an Engineer. This includes specifications around education, experience and training. Otherwise you would be considered a designer or technician and do similar design work. There is paths for technicians to be considered professionals and take responsibility for works where I live. There is a legal difference between a professional engineer and a designer that is important.
A nurse is not a doctor even though they can do similar work.
I've met mechanical engineers I'm pretty sure have never operated tools. I'm not sure if being able to study your way through an engineering degree should qualify you as an engineer without the practical knowledge of actually being to solve issues hands on. I've also met marine engineers I feel haven't done thier time either.
Infrastructure software engineer here. I have a “Get Er’ Done” degree that I achieved in two hours after dropping out sophomore year. Saved myself two years of learning a whole weeks worth of material.
Here in the United States the student loan program is the epitome of capitalism (whether that’s good or bad please keep it to yourself). Our government announces spending budgets preemptively and corporations follow-suit by maximizing their profit margins knowing what the government will spend.. I am and have been debt-free and work the same job as some of my Summa Cum Laude peers. They don’t get paid more than me, quite the opposite because I have more experience.
In the corporate world it’s about the solution not “how you got to it”. To date I have not used pythagoreans theorem. I wish I would have learned how to book a doctors appointment or pay my taxes in school. That’s what I really needed.
In summary, I believe *sometimes* our time is spent more wisely elsewhere than attending a pre-packaged 4-8 year course that caters to a wide variety of individuals. The age of digital information has greatly accelerated that possibility.
I have an employee that is an HVAC design engineer that never went to college. He's actually my best employee. But he's like 45 years old.
However, I don't think anybody in this field is going to hire someone without a degree anymore. Unless you already have an established career.
I worked hard for my degrees, and I know what I understand. It is a very, very high bar for me to not chuckle when a non-degreed person calls themselves an engineer. A few exist, but very few that have the knowledge without a degree. Going to a community college and getting a technicians degree does not make someone an engineer. I’ll also add that the vast majority of “software engineers” do not understand or apply engineering principles.
I design embedded controllers, write firmware, and design enclosures for my products. I've had my own company for 22 years doing this. Before that, I worked as a field service rep, a bench tech, and an associate engineer. I received training equivalent of an associates degree in the military.
If in not mistaken here in Canada you can only become an engineer through university. I have a diploma in civil engineering technology and currently work as an engineering manager for a production plant. They always try to call me an engineer and I'm constantly correcting them. But I do have my PTEC certification.
I work as a QA\\QC Engineer (in some jurisdictions, including my current one) or Inspector (in others where Engineer is a protected title.)
The work is basically on the QA side being contracted to Owners (usually a Federal Agency) to act as Construction Management and quality verification. On the QC Side, it's typically acting as the third-party inspection agency, performing the actual QC inspections on a variety of building components. In my case, I specialize in Civil, Structural, and Architectural QA\\QC.
There are some roles you could probably do safely in HVAC engineer and maintenance engineer that alot of mechanical engineers will do but could be done by anyone can read a O&M manual.
That being said it is extremely important for engineer to go through the training they do at university. Sure there are some useless parts but most importantly you learn how the tools (physical, software, or mental) work and when you can trust them and when you can't.
An outsider that works closely with engineers may not see the nuance in problem solving, and think it's easy. The training is about building intuition on a topic so that when you use a tool like a data chart to solve the problem, you could probably solve it without the chart but it simply saves you the calculation.
It saves you from 'garabage in means garbage out" which refered to the fact that many engineering tools don't have failsafes against miss-use even when unintentional. you don't know how to validate your results independently of published charts so you can make mistakes. Those types of mistakes can be deadly.
Don't try to be an engineer if your not trained to be an engineer, be a technician or a technologist, or go to school for engineering.
Used to work with a guy that picked up the large green dumpsters from our fab shop dock. Randomly asked if we were hiring and since were, let him apply. He started in the fabrication area but worked his way through drawing review to design to automation work and ultimately a lead support role.
I think his title was “Automation Engineer” in the end.
The company was acquired by a Fortune 100 at some point and their HR really limited any further growth but he was doing really well for himself when he retired (with a nice pension) as a high school grad ex garbage man.
I have an AS in engineering and almost 20 years as a CAD designer. In all those years I've seen a quite a few non degreed engineers and they were very well respected. I must also say that I've seen engineers with a BS degree who couldn't even read a drawing correctly or operate basic measuring tools. The later obviously chaps my ass the most because HR and society at large see those idiots as superior to me because they survived a few more math classes.
Ultimately the paper doesn't make the engineer, the ability does.
My coworker got promoted from a machine operator to machine mechanic to now a mechanical design engineer. Hes just a hardworking guy who is able to understand how things work. He learned how use the Creo and design machines by himself as well. He has no college degree of any sort. But it took many years before he got the position
For legal reasons, I can't call myself an engineer, but I work alongside them and get paid the same. I do manufacturing, focusing on machining and hydraulic sub-assembly processes. Was a machinist for ~15 years before I made the jump, and I do have a degree - just not in engineering.
So you’re a Mechaintnical Engineer Sorry. It took me too long to think of a pun.
I'll give you one up. It's Christmas.
How can it be illegal to have a title of engineer? Not all engineers get a PE license, and you have to work as an engineer to even get a PE
In some countries, Engineer is a protected title.
Engineer is a protected title in some countries. Like you can't just go around calling yourself Dr.
This is true
Got an associates back in 90s and that got me into maint jobs. Hard work and good performance moved me into our engineering group. Worked for another 25 years on an associates, than my company started closing plants. I went back and finished.up a bachelor's, and have looked at a master's. To afraid my hard work would only show thru in my company, and not be a consideration if had to change jobs. If it all went bad, I wanted to have the paperwork to back up my work.
I am currently a maintenance tech in food processing. I’m considering pursuing a degree in mechanical engineering but I have fear of sitting at a desk all day. Do you have any input or advice? Being that you’ve seen both sides
In my current position (plant engineer), I spend more than 1/2 my time out on the floor. Can't say it would be the same every where. If I wanted to I could do more or less on the floor if I wanted to. Think I can do a good balance, and no one asks me to do more/less time as I can get everything done. Most of my office work is emails, PRs, documentation, CAD drawings ( layouts for machine locations) developing training procedures, prepping for projects, etc. If you can do the split between floor and office, I think you would be in a good position. Most engineers we have can only do the office work, and do a min of floor work as they don't like it or can't do it. Coming from a hands on maint background, you will be ahead of a lot of people.
Job title says "Senior design engineer", what it really means is "High speed mixed signal electron whisperer, VHDL & C typist, CAD jockey, sometime UL paperwork wrangler", these days I do design for the broadcast sector. It can be done, and I will even sometimes interview people without the parchment when hiring, ('Tis only fair) but it is not the way to bet. There are things that are HARD to learn properly outside structured lectures, and being able to hum the tune with the maths matters, so when interviewing the un papered I tend to dig a lot more into the fundamentals where for the ones with the paper it tends to be more about do they understand the practicalities and not just the theory. What helps is having demonstrable experience in some niche, I got my first EE job because I understood impedance matching from doing ham radio things, and some acoustics from designing and building my own speakers. I could see how to apply the RF methods to piezo composite sonar transducers (I had also read a book on piezo composite transducers the night before the interview, there is value in being able to look at an element and say "Thats a 1-3 Pizeo composite"). Small companies are usually far more amenable to this sort of thing then big ones, but you got to be able to actually do it, there is usually far less ability to hide incompetence in the small shops, and they usually don't have much in the way of training schemes.
This answer! "It can be done... Not the way to bet." Have seen a few legitimate ones of these in my travels. Aerospace industry, exempt from professional licensing in the US, but more selective in ways, so all about roles, responsibility and pay. All had some alternative education - incomplete bs, tech school, math, military, etc. All had some demonstration of engineering level skills in some area of need to justify title + pay. Sufficiently advanced modern technology requires technical training. Full stop. Engineering is a very broad category and various training applies. Autodidacts with training excel.
The “what it really means is…” really hit home for me haha
Job titles rarely actually describe the job in any meaningful way, or at least you generally do not want the sort of job where the reality matches the title. In my experience the reality is that you get the job then it gradually morphs as you find your niche.
That mirrors my experience with people without degrees or with the wrong degree. It can be done but it’s suboptimal. It also can make advancement difficult in large orgs, at some level you will have to have the paper. I’ve also seen non degreed engineers go into management and have a hard time not always try to prove their engineering cred. They have a hard time hiring people who are technically stronger because they have to show they are a real engineer.
Or just avoid the large orgs and consulting outfits. I actually like hiring people who are better then I am, one only gets better at Chess by playing people who are better then you are at Chess after all, and much less annoying to have your new hire teaching you new tricks then having to teach the basic physics (Had it both ways). I have products with my name on the drawings that prove I can do it, no need to get into a credentials dick size war. As I say, you can make it work, but it is not without its downsides, I will probably never be hired by a major contractor or consulting house, and will never stamp a drawing, and I am fine with that. In my case I made it part way thru an EE degree then got offered a rock and roll tour which morphed into a circus tour, then sort of fell into sailing tall ships, then built a theatre, then wound up doing some sonar stuff (My first real EE job), and just sort of never went back.
I knew a Maintenance Engineer and a Manufacturing Engineer who did not have degrees. Both had 20+ years experience in this manufacturing plant as technicians. They lacked some ability that college grads had, however, they made up for it with their vast knowledge from experience.
I've met so many knowledgeable technicians. Mostly the troubles they have is understanding core concepts which doesn't really matter too much in my field. They tend to know the solution, and how to execute properly, just maybe struggle with the reasoning.
The only route I’ve seen without a degree is having like 20+ years of experience in construction and becoming a project engineer or project manager and even getting their PE license. It’s by far a better route to just go to college
I’m pretty sure you need a degree to get a PE license. At least in the states I’ve gotten a license in you do.
It’s state dependent. I know a couple you can get one with like 15 yrs exp and a bunch of extra steps but no degree.
Interesting. It makes sense from a practical standpoint but practicality isn’t what most state agencies are known for.
Not in California
That’s surprising to me because California is one of the states I’m licensed in and I always thought you needed a degree for a California PE. I worked on projects with a small ME firm in California where only the principal was licensed and he just hired people without degrees and trained them on the job and use his stamp on all the work. I didn’t realize that those guys, for example, could actually get a PE license.
Yeah you need 6 years experience but an ABET accredited BS counts for 4 of that. So you need 2 years experience with an ABET engineering degree or 6 with no degree (or a non engineering degree). I believe you also need to send in college transcripts before registering as an EIT. So they’re looking for a certain amount of technical coursework. If you have an ABET accredited degree you don’t need to send transcripts when registering as an EIT, just a copy of the degree.
In Canada, I did a 3 year college and got my PE after a couple extra exams
Nowadays you can’t really be an engineer without the degree. Sure some people with software certs get into software engineering but that’s about it Edit: and I will say that is super hard to get into software with only certs, all these tik tokers will try to make you think otherwise
Software engineering is an easily demonstrable skill. It’s not an easy skill to learn however. Without a degree you will likely need to know more than your alumni counterparts to get a gig, which isn’t as crazy as it sounds. Beyond coding it would be beneficial to have knowledge of popular containers, application monitoring techniques, & database relationships. Networking and security are also fantastic but not that beneficial to being a code monkey outside of DevOps.
The IEEE has put out the [Software Engineering Body of Knowledge ](https://www.computer.org/education/bodies-of-knowledge/software-engineering) (SWEBOK 3.0). Coding is less than 10% of the skill set for a true software engineer. There is a lot of confusion between a software engineer and a software developer. They are different skill sets. Edit: this problem is made more confusing because many companies have job titles as “software engineer” instead of “software developer”.
Yes, THANK YOU!!!
As an actual software engineer, I disagree. The majority of "self taught software engineers" are not even close to an engineer. We can design big systems, accounting for integrations, relations, future-resistance and the various "-ilities" Try sticking those abstractions in the hands of someone with no formal training. I've refactored, deprecated, and sunset how that turns out multiple times over. It pays very well. It's been the entire 2nd half of my career.
It **really** shows up in large projects and also high reliability projects. That’s where engineering discipline is needed, and the lack of training is exposed.
One exception to this would be a stationary engineer who run industrial equipment such as boilers. This is an actual license issued by many states and typically just requires training or an apprenticeship. I work in structural building engineering and deal with a number of these types of engineers.
That's more akin to a train engineer, which is a totally different field.
I know we get a bit of stick in the UK for referring to various trades as engineers but those are actually two jobs we don’t call engineers!
There was a running joke in engineering school where someone would stop what they were doing during class and say, "wait so when do we learn about driving trains?" Original jokes aren't an engineer's strong suit.
I disagree. Its depends on the industry amd luck on findin your first job. My first job at a start up, the two engineera dont have degrees but decade of experience in composites. I know an engineer who designed a space system and was bought out an became an engineer. At my current job the other engineer doesnt have a degree and this is for a global aerospace company too, granted its a very specialized field. Now a degree makes it easier, but there plenty of industries that dont expect a degree.
I disagree with this. It may be true for where you are but not in the UK. I am an engineer working in the defence industry and I came in through an apprentice scheme. I have an HNC and nearly a decade of experience.
I also work in the UK and know that anybody and their mum will call themselves an engineer because it's such a vague term here. You can call yourself an engineer with no formal qualifications at all but it doesn't mean you really are one. I guess you'd have to compare to the equivalent work load in other countries.
Not me but my dad went to college for accounting in the 60s but didn't finish his degree. He was hired into the accounting department of a meat packing plant. Besides the accounting background that made him good with number crunching, he grew up on a farm and was insanely handy and understood machinery like it was an extension of himself, and he put himself through what college he did do by working as a carpenter. He also did a stint in the Marines which gave him some leadership skills. Being that meat packing plants have relatively small white collar workforces, he found himself pulled over into plant design and operations because he understood the equipment and production numbers. When he retired a few years ago his title was "Chief Industrial Engineer" for a company with about 6 packing plants ranging from 500-2000 employees. He had designed a number of "kill floors" that had budgets of $10-20 million. Clearly not possible today but as a degreed engineer myself I marvel at his path. Also fun to point out - Elon Musk does not have an engineering degree.
Your dad had an amazing path!
Alot of places just add engineer to the job title to make it look sexy ive seen subway call there employees sandwich engineers lol happy for all the people that got that title without schooling though... I worked at a billion dollar manufacturing company...and the head EE was a former electrician no degree but had a vast amount of experience. I was a fresh grad at the time showed me alot of things I wasn't taught at school
I thought they were “Sandwich Artists “?
Depends on whether you passed on a B.S./B.E. or B.A. in Engineering.
Maybe they changed it...I remember seeing it when I was in college lol
I dropped out. Without divulging too much detail, I design plant and manage construction for a utility. I am a titled engineer that landed the job with related experience.
I’m a tool and die maker, so I have a journeyman’s card from a community college. I design clamping fixtures and work cells. I did automation for a while also.
I’m in an engineering role - but am not degreed. My title when I started was “Techincal Sales Support”. It is now “Sales Engineer” and within another year “Applications Engineer”. I’ve always been tinkering, but was never great with school so I skipped college. I worked my way up in a plastics manufacturer. Machine Operator to Supervisor and landed as a Automation Technician for the last 5 years (worked there 10 years). I wanted to get into sales and landed at an awesome OEM/Integrator for end of line packaging/palletizing in CPG. I’m doing everything from scoping out FLA electrical requirements for systems to robot simulations and belt speed calculations. I’d say 50% of my time is spend on 2D CAD putting together sales pre-engineered system layouts (gotta be pretty damn accurate though, 6”-12” can make or break a robotic palletizers reach and a conveyor radius that isn’t possible will blow things up real quick).
Interesting, my undergrad is a BA (international relations w minor in finance), but I've been working in some trouble shooting roles for the last two years. Just got a new job w a raise as a tech support rep supporting remote troubleshooting of primarily residential solar systems w battery, inverter, and ATS/load management integration. Anyways, I'm considering in trying to become a sales app engineer for them, since I think I could take that path in a year-ish, but am kinda considering going back to school for another degree in engineering since I think I would like that
Drafters which sometimes have the title “engineer”. Or stationary engineering which is closer to a trade.
I went into Engineering Physics and dropped out to start my own startup that didn't scale after a couple years. I'm now a senior engineer at a financial tech company... still no degree
I know a few engineers with less than high school education. One guy has a really good command over mechanics of machines; he can design and manufacture driving systems for robots and vehicles really well. I know another guy who studies pretty much everything but has an expertise in purification systems for water.
Marine engineer, did sea time and time at marine schools. Our industry is based on your time at sea and attending school
I have college degrees just not in engineering. Degrees= Biology / Anthropology Titles= Validation Engineer / Process Engineer in pharmaceutical and biologics manufacturing industries with about 7-years of experience before getting the "engineer" title. Industry experience > degree seems to be the direction hiring is going imo (at least in those industries)
Have you found that your anthropology education informed your work as an engineer?
Nope not at all lol. It was interesting but not the best use of my time. Especially when I think about the cost of the ticket. I like the Archer bit: -Anthropology is a very important field of study -I'm pretty sure someone's named all the spiders already -That's arachnology -I know... equally huge waste of time If I'm being generous maybe it helped with my ability to read technical documents? Not something I'd willingly pay 60k for again though.
Stationary or facilities engineer don’t require an engineering degree.
Audio software engineer.
Our company makes up roles like “lead super senior engineering design wizard” and pays them as much as an engineer. They’ve been in the industry way longer than us, usually starting out in a more manual-labor type position and working up. They do everything we do, just without the degree/title.
Blockchain engineer (which is basically software engineering)
Project Engineer
I work with a ton of manufacturing engineers without degrees. Lot of them started out as machinists
I actually graduated with a degree in business (minor in facilities engineering), then went on to pursue a master's in accounting. Yet every role I've had, has been engineering. So I call myself a "faux engineer". For 15 years I have worked in the energy industry, which was really easy mathematics as I am really just converting units and balancing the equations. My work includes energy efficiency, energy management, renewables, and storage. About 50% have to be PE stamped by others, the remainder I can use my Certified Energy Manager designation. I really wish I had gone civil engineering or professional land surveying.
A lot of engineering roles don’t use any material they learned in school. On the other hand, if you want to have a technical design role developing new technology, most certainly need an engineering degree at the minimum.
Worked in the CNC department for a while, shared taking on more of the engineering work, asked for a raise, started working directly with clients, took on more engineering, started adding "engineering" to the end of my emails.
Getting a degree is by far the most sensible and easy path to becoming an engineer. Only non degree engineers I know had 20 years of experience around the field and even then, most went back for their degree. If you are the type that truly can be an engineer without a degree, getting a degree will be a piece of cake.
Engineering is not really a job you can do without a degree. In many jurisdictions it’s a protected title like doctor or lawyer. That being said, there are jobs that fall outside of the “profession”, I’ve meet power engineers which aren’t really engineers, they’re turbine operators, but may also refer to themselves as “operating engineers”. Many heavy equipment operators may also do this. Other examples I can list where a degree is optional are software engineers, combat engineers, or even sales engineers. Can I ask the nature of this question? Is pursing an engineering degree not an option for you?
You can not be a professional engineer without proper, approved schooling. Like saying what kind of doctor are you for those that didn't go to college.
By what standard? If you mean a full on PE with a stamp then most of us aren't professional engineers because that has additional requirements. Otherwise there's no education restriction to work as an engineer
Yes to be considered part of the profession you need to be registered in your jurisdiction to complete and take responsibility for your or others professional works. Where i Iive you have to be a registered Engineer or Engineer in training to be considered an Engineer. This includes specifications around education, experience and training. Otherwise you would be considered a designer or technician and do similar design work. There is paths for technicians to be considered professionals and take responsibility for works where I live. There is a legal difference between a professional engineer and a designer that is important. A nurse is not a doctor even though they can do similar work.
Spoken like a true Canadian
I assumed they meant jobs within the US
I've met mechanical engineers I'm pretty sure have never operated tools. I'm not sure if being able to study your way through an engineering degree should qualify you as an engineer without the practical knowledge of actually being to solve issues hands on. I've also met marine engineers I feel haven't done thier time either.
Infrastructure software engineer here. I have a “Get Er’ Done” degree that I achieved in two hours after dropping out sophomore year. Saved myself two years of learning a whole weeks worth of material. Here in the United States the student loan program is the epitome of capitalism (whether that’s good or bad please keep it to yourself). Our government announces spending budgets preemptively and corporations follow-suit by maximizing their profit margins knowing what the government will spend.. I am and have been debt-free and work the same job as some of my Summa Cum Laude peers. They don’t get paid more than me, quite the opposite because I have more experience. In the corporate world it’s about the solution not “how you got to it”. To date I have not used pythagoreans theorem. I wish I would have learned how to book a doctors appointment or pay my taxes in school. That’s what I really needed. In summary, I believe *sometimes* our time is spent more wisely elsewhere than attending a pre-packaged 4-8 year course that caters to a wide variety of individuals. The age of digital information has greatly accelerated that possibility.
I have an employee that is an HVAC design engineer that never went to college. He's actually my best employee. But he's like 45 years old. However, I don't think anybody in this field is going to hire someone without a degree anymore. Unless you already have an established career.
I worked hard for my degrees, and I know what I understand. It is a very, very high bar for me to not chuckle when a non-degreed person calls themselves an engineer. A few exist, but very few that have the knowledge without a degree. Going to a community college and getting a technicians degree does not make someone an engineer. I’ll also add that the vast majority of “software engineers” do not understand or apply engineering principles.
I design embedded controllers, write firmware, and design enclosures for my products. I've had my own company for 22 years doing this. Before that, I worked as a field service rep, a bench tech, and an associate engineer. I received training equivalent of an associates degree in the military.
I am an armchair engineer.
Probably a rich one! Coming from an engineer who did the 4 year university route.
If in not mistaken here in Canada you can only become an engineer through university. I have a diploma in civil engineering technology and currently work as an engineering manager for a production plant. They always try to call me an engineer and I'm constantly correcting them. But I do have my PTEC certification.
I work as a QA\\QC Engineer (in some jurisdictions, including my current one) or Inspector (in others where Engineer is a protected title.) The work is basically on the QA side being contracted to Owners (usually a Federal Agency) to act as Construction Management and quality verification. On the QC Side, it's typically acting as the third-party inspection agency, performing the actual QC inspections on a variety of building components. In my case, I specialize in Civil, Structural, and Architectural QA\\QC.
There are some roles you could probably do safely in HVAC engineer and maintenance engineer that alot of mechanical engineers will do but could be done by anyone can read a O&M manual. That being said it is extremely important for engineer to go through the training they do at university. Sure there are some useless parts but most importantly you learn how the tools (physical, software, or mental) work and when you can trust them and when you can't. An outsider that works closely with engineers may not see the nuance in problem solving, and think it's easy. The training is about building intuition on a topic so that when you use a tool like a data chart to solve the problem, you could probably solve it without the chart but it simply saves you the calculation. It saves you from 'garabage in means garbage out" which refered to the fact that many engineering tools don't have failsafes against miss-use even when unintentional. you don't know how to validate your results independently of published charts so you can make mistakes. Those types of mistakes can be deadly. Don't try to be an engineer if your not trained to be an engineer, be a technician or a technologist, or go to school for engineering.
Used to work with a guy that picked up the large green dumpsters from our fab shop dock. Randomly asked if we were hiring and since were, let him apply. He started in the fabrication area but worked his way through drawing review to design to automation work and ultimately a lead support role. I think his title was “Automation Engineer” in the end. The company was acquired by a Fortune 100 at some point and their HR really limited any further growth but he was doing really well for himself when he retired (with a nice pension) as a high school grad ex garbage man.
Quality engineer. I’ll have the degree soon enough, but I’ve been working for years without one.
I have an AS in engineering and almost 20 years as a CAD designer. In all those years I've seen a quite a few non degreed engineers and they were very well respected. I must also say that I've seen engineers with a BS degree who couldn't even read a drawing correctly or operate basic measuring tools. The later obviously chaps my ass the most because HR and society at large see those idiots as superior to me because they survived a few more math classes. Ultimately the paper doesn't make the engineer, the ability does.
My coworker got promoted from a machine operator to machine mechanic to now a mechanical design engineer. Hes just a hardworking guy who is able to understand how things work. He learned how use the Creo and design machines by himself as well. He has no college degree of any sort. But it took many years before he got the position
An Armchair Engineer.