For those who don't know, I am an Engineering major focusing on mechanical engineering. Recently, I started an internship at a company that makes various sensors, mostly for large vehicles. I was told that I would be tasked with figuring out the appropriate "recipe" for some discs used in the pressure sensors, because they had been having a very low yield of usable ones. While the pay is decent, the location is about an hour drive from me and the hours are 6:00am-4:30pm Mon-Thursday, which means I need to wake up at 4:15am to insure I get to work on time and that I generally don't get home until around 6:00pm (thanks to rush hour).
None of this would be an issue, as I was aware of it all before I accepted the position. However, as part of my "orientation" with the company, they have decided to have me work the assembly line for the first two weeks. This means I am not practicing engineering at all, I'm just acting as cheap labor as I do the same repetitive tasks that they could train any person off of the street to do in five minutes. I was informed this was to familiarize me with the machines, but I figure if I'm an engineer and I can't figure out a machine in an hour (let alone the 20 hours they want me to put in at each station), that I shouldn't have been hired in the first place.
The first day, I had to stand pretty much all day, because they had removed the chairs to increase efficiency of the workers. Apparently, standing increases efficiency because there is some odd hope that if you rush through production faster that you'll be able to sit down and rest your aching back and legs.
When I inquired as to why I was working on machines that had absolutely nothing to do with the task I was hired for (not even for the same line of product), I was simply told that I will "see by the end of the month."
I'm seriously considering quitting and restarting my old internship, which would probably pay $5 an hour more, but I'd have to move and live away from home. Should I just tough it out or get a respectable job?
No, you should suck it up - if you really know the machines that well, call you manager show him/her you know it like the back of your hand and be on your merry way. Theres actually a reasonable chance that they say "cool. keep doing it". It's orientation, and a lot of organizations do it so that you have an appreciation of what is going on "on ground level". Military officers have to go through the same shit training and conditioning as a private new recruit - if you have a shit time with these systems now, when you get into a position that you can affect change you will be concious of the fact that dealing with them sucks.
If you don't respect their system, and it's not worth the pay then quit. Don't quit because the orientation is 2 weeks - it's nothing.
Scout for a new job before you quit this one is my only advice, otherwise I think it looks bad on the CV, if you don't get a new job right after. Until then tough it out! Don't take my word on it.
If you find yourself deciding to quit then may as well issue them an ultimatum first that you are gonna quit if they take you so far away from what they hired you for / you applied for. Politely though... not in an angry manner.
If I was in your spot I'd wait a while maybe a month or a bit longer to see if things improve but if they don't show promise fairly soon I would move off for more money and a better job considering the education you worked hard for. Since they said it was only for a couple weeks just kinda go with it but like I said if they don't stand by what they said then there not worth your skill. GL dude I have been laid off for almost two years looking for a job (about to have to choose a military branch to get by lol) but nonetheless I can still feel for your situation and companies will screw anyone any way they can in my experience.
My tip is that if you are doubting if you should be doing something, then you should quit it. If you are not confident about something do not do it then
One engr student to another, grow some balls, most of my days are 6 am-11pm, I browse tl as a break while eating, and now I have to finish 3 more assignments due in the next 2 days. I can't wait for my work term to start in the fall.
Edit: also, no one will like you if you go into it thinking you are too good for the job. Until you get your degree you are at the bottom and should be working your hardest to do well.
My advice, don't quit. A lot of times you have to wear different hats so to speak at your place of work. Just look at it as an experience, learn from it.
Since it's just an internship, as long as you don't plan on working for that company in the future, and you have another internship available to you, I would quit.
Is it written in paper that your orientation for doing that is two weeks? If so, if you want to stay in the area, you stick it out. If not... well just in case you should look elsewhere.
If this was like maybe 3-7 yrs ago, most likely you wouldn't have posters like qdenser bashing you, well I guess it would be not as common. I mean:
1. You KNOW there are people in the world that work in tougher conditions than you, getting paid most likely way less, and having to deal with more responsibilities in just being able to get by in life 2. There's probably hundreds of other students that would've killed for that internship, despite it being a crappy two weeks because they realize they need it for their well-being and their resume.
I wouldn't have seen this blog unless one of my friends linked me to it via IRC, and lets just say that guy didn't show me the link because he felt sorry for you. I don't blame you for complaining. Standing all day sucks, especially if you're not used to it (but then again... weren't you in ROTC at some point... oh well). In reality, given your skill set I don't think they hired you to work at an assembly line for like 6-8 weeks. If the "orientation" isn't 2 weeks then get out, but if it is 2 weeks just think... it could be a lot worse.
well a lot of the "orientations" are used to weed out the people who may quit before the internship length is over. It's really inefficient for a company to train someone and they quit after training. They'd have to look for a new person and then train them all over.
Quit if they keep you as cheap labor even after orientation.
On June 23 2011 11:41 operwolf wrote: My advice, don't quit. A lot of times you have to wear different hats so to speak at your place of work. Just look at it as an experience, learn from it.
The more hats you have, the better. Especially in tf2.
Also, i must say, I seriously wish that there was saumem rwork around my town. If I don't have a job by this friday afternoon, I won't be able to play any sc2 whatsoever, because I'll be away from home in a different town, at our family's(-entire- family) other house.
For those who don't know, I am an Engineering major focusing on mechanical engineering. Recently, I started an internship at a company that makes various sensors, mostly for large vehicles. I was told that I would be tasked with figuring out the appropriate "recipe" for some discs used in the pressure sensors, because they had been having a very low yield of usable ones. While the pay is decent, the location is about an hour drive from me and the hours are 6:00am-4:30pm Mon-Thursday, which means I need to wake up at 4:15am to insure I get to work on time and that I generally don't get home until around 6:00pm (thanks to rush hour).
None of this would be an issue, as I was aware of it all before I accepted the position. However, as part of my "orientation" with the company, they have decided to have me work the assembly line for the first two weeks. This means I am not practicing engineering at all, I'm just acting as cheap labor as I do the same repetitive tasks that they could train any person off of the street to do in five minutes. I was informed this was to familiarize me with the machines, but I figure if I'm an engineer and I can't figure out a machine in an hour (let alone the 20 hours they want me to put in at each station), that I shouldn't have been hired in the first place.
The first day, I had to stand pretty much all day, because they had removed the chairs to increase efficiency of the workers. Apparently, standing increases efficiency because there is some odd hope that if you rush through production faster that you'll be able to sit down and rest your aching back and legs.
When I inquired as to why I was working on machines that had absolutely nothing to do with the task I was hired for (not even for the same line of product), I was simply told that I will "see by the end of the month."
I'm seriously considering quitting and restarting my old internship, which would probably pay $5 an hour more, but I'd have to move and live away from home. Should I just tough it out or get a respectable job?
what year student are you? This sounds like a standard-ish internship imo. First they gonna have you do dumb shit, then they'll come up and give you a project that you have no idea how to do based on what possibly could have learned doing the stupid shit. I mean it's only their loss if they're having you do unskilled labor, and I would think they know better than to do that.
I agree with Kennigit. If you actually absolutely know the machines like you made them, demonstrate it politely to a manager, and ask if you can work on what you were originally hired to do now.
However, for the most part I feel like this isn't really about you wanting to get to the 'learning' part of it, but more than you don't like doing grunt work. It's for two weeks. I think it's really valuable for people to understand the jobs of others in their company/industry. Gives some empathy for others, and an actual understanding of how shit works instead of just book knowledge.
Once the two weeks are up, if you don't get switched over to the stuff related to your area of study, then you should speak to a manager. Until then, suck it up and learn how a good chunk of the world's population earn barely enough food to get by each day. Back breaking monotonous work on an assembly line.
I'm surprised at all these responses that say to suck it up. If the job ain't making you happy, its simply not worth it. Life is so short and spending half the day being miserable isn't living.
The old job seems like a great solution. Why are you so apprehensive about moving and living on your own? You can't live at home with your parents your whole life, might as well start now. The best thing to ever happen to me was moving out of my parents and being on my own.
as an engineering student myself, i would gladly take the internship u were given.
in ur situation, I suppose it depends on how easily u can move out of home , financially and if ur in a relationship etc. if you're 100% sure that other job that pays 5$/hr more and is better , then it's an easy decision, imo.
You may want to remind yourself that this is an internship which could lead into a career. More often than not, internships are used to judge a persons skill AND character, especially when dealing with hiring long-term, high end, positions.
I would normally agree that you should definitely tough it out and stick around until your designated time working the assembly line of hell is over but i detect a bit of dislike for the place or perhaps some second thoughts about the company's or your direction with them. Your degree is practical and in high demand, I say go with your gut cause you'll probably get a second chance if you're wrong.
Lots of thoughts from an old working guy (who was an accounting intern myself and has since managed many of them).
1. Internships are a lot of things, and actually doing the full-time job is pretty low on the list. I've sat in on intern reviews, and actual job ability isn't nearly as important as you think it is. They are going to evaluate you on your effort and character. People want to hire a person who is going to pitch in wherever they can. Need someone to go get dinner for the team? That should be you; you're not above it.
2. Everything you do now is fair game in your future interviews. I don't know how big this field is, but people are going to know if you quit. How are you going to explain it in an interview? Consider the alternative; you stick it out, put 100% effort in it, and hopefully win an ally from the people where you currently intern. That's hugely valuable, and the more references you have available the better.
3. These guys have been in your position, and they think there is value in what you're doing right now. No matter what you think, that's something you should consider.
I bet I have it much worse than you. Today, I had a booger that was about to come out, but didn't have anywhere to wipe it. I had to go a whole day with this booger at the tip of my nose. I had to breathe slowly so that I don't accidentally blow it out or suck it down my throat. You think your job is bad, trying being in my shoes.
With internships, you cant expect to always get to do what people (who have chosen the career path you want) get to do. The point of an internship is to get your feet wet, get you some contacts in the industry, and get a beefier resume. The employer will also be looking to see how you handle doing menial tasks and simple stuff, before hitting you with big projects. The way the employer sees you is as a potential employee that they get to observe and test.
A couple years back I had an internship at a web development company. (It was the summer after my freshman year of college). I expected to be doing web development for real, working with the real developers, learning the trade. But, for the first half of the summer, I did incredibly mundane stuff. I drove my boss's son to and from the day camp he was going to, I filed papers, made copies, even drove to the bank to deposit checks for the accountant who was there. Then one day, my boss sat me down and said it was time to actually get to work. He put me with the most senior developer at the company, and he had me work on pieces of his project, and helped me along the way.
After that summer was over, I was offered to continue the internship next summer, I opted to do research with my CS professor, but my boss was so happy with my work that he said, provided I complete my degree (next May!), I'll have a job waiting for me once I graduate, even if its not with his company, he's willing to use his contacts to get me employment.
So even though I felt like I was wasting my time that half of the summer, I ended up gaining skills and making some great contacts to help me out later in life.
I assume that your internship is a summer long thing. Stick it out, regardless of whether or not you ever end up doing work related to your major/career path. If you quit, it'll look bad on your resume, and you won't be able to get an internship for the rest of the summer; which would mean working at McDonalds or something (not fun at all, believe me).
EDIT: I creeped on your profile OP and we have the same birthday! woot!
I think your mistake starts in your lack of understanding of the idea of money. Its unfortunate schools and most families teach children growing up absolutely nothing about money. If you get a job, you should love the work so much you would be willing to work for free. You can still earn money through multiple, passive sources by leveraging to other people. Your pleasure comes from your work, not your leisure time. In my opinion, you should take which ever job will get your closer to your professional goal so you can spend your days doing what you absolutely love. After work and/or on the weekends you can set up some income sources that will provide you with the money you need to live how you want to live for the rest of your life.
1. Tough/seemingly worthless assignments are a 100% normal part of the internship experience. I believe the phrase is "shit rolls downhill." I know you're not new to interning since you've done it before, but I honestly think it's important to have your patience tried. If you're really going to be an engineer someday, this is probably your last and only chance to experience the less glamorous, real-world effects of your profession's work.
2. It's important for your work with this company and your future work to have first-hand knowledge of an entire process. How much did you really learn about this kind of thing in your last internship? Did you meet the people who implemented your designs/formulas? Did you really learn how those designs took shape and became real? Companies love someone with first-hand experience on the line because they better understand the constraints and implications of their upper-level decisions, whereas someone less experienced makes those decisions in a vacuum.
3. Finally, and most importantly, no company wants a job hopper. They want a team player. The company you're with now is doing this to see how willing you are to be selfless and help out (the manager said "we'll see by the end of the month" merely to test your patience imo), and your future company will look at this experience in much the same way. When you go into your first real job interview, the interviewer will ask you why you left this conveniently located internship after only a few days. It's not going to look very good when you tell her you left and moved away because they used you as "cheap labor" and you wanted more money.
All that being said, I'm sure you'll blossom professionally no matter what decision you make here. The line of work you're pursuing is way beyond what my brain is capable of, so it might very well be true that working an unrelated line job is beneath you. My point is that even if it is beneath you, you're an intern, and interns are supposed to do things that are beneath people (sometimes even themselves). At least you're not running around fetching cappuccinos for your boss.
My tax law professor used to go on in-class rants every time he got emails from students with titles at the bottom of their email signatures. He would start yelling, "You're students! Clerks! I don't care if you're president of this or editor of that. You haven't done anything yet. When you do accomplish something, then you can give yourself a title. Until then, work hard and keep your head down." That pretty much explains where I'm coming from on this topic I guess.
You really didn't give me much to go off. I feel like there's a few gaps of knowledge that make the situation more complex.
On June 23 2011 11:10 Riku wrote:
For those who don't know, I am an Engineering major focusing on mechanical engineering. Recently, I started an internship at a company that makes various sensors, mostly for large vehicles. I was told that I would be tasked with figuring out the appropriate "recipe" for some discs used in the pressure sensors, because they had been having a very low yield of usable ones. While the pay is decent, the location is about an hour drive from me and the hours are 6:00am-4:30pm Mon-Thursday, which means I need to wake up at 4:15am to insure I get to work on time and that I generally don't get home until around 6:00pm (thanks to rush hour).
None of this would be an issue, as I was aware of it all before I accepted the position.
1. Why would you mention your work routine if you've already accepted them?
2. A lot of my computer engineering friends can't find jobs, or can't find jobs related to computer engineering. They're really smart too.
However, as part of my "orientation" with the company, they have decided to have me work the assembly line for the first two weeks. This means I am not practicing engineering at all, I'm just acting as cheap labor as I do the same repetitive tasks that they could train any person off of the street to do in five minutes. I was informed this was to familiarize me with the machines, but I figure if I'm an engineer and I can't figure out a machine in an hour (let alone the 20 hours they want me to put in at each station), that I shouldn't have been hired in the first place.
The first day, I had to stand pretty much all day, because they had removed the chairs to increase efficiency of the workers. Apparently, standing increases efficiency because there is some odd hope that if you rush through production faster that you'll be able to sit down and rest your aching back and legs.
When I inquired as to why I was working on machines that had absolutely nothing to do with the task I was hired for (not even for the same line of product), I was simply told that I will "see by the end of the month."
I'm seriously considering quitting and restarting my old internship, which would probably pay $5 an hour more, but I'd have to move and live away from home. Should I just tough it out or get a respectable job?
First off, I think the job is really respectable. Secondly, I'm really surprised that no one has asked you why you quit your old internship to begin with. Did you just do it a previous summer and finish it? How are you sure that you will get your internship back?
If you worked at the other internship for one summer, you may find that working at a different company will teach you a wider range of skills.
Finally, for what it's worth, I think that, given what you've told me, were I in your position, I think I'd stay in the current job (again, I don't know as much as you). I think I'd just have some company loyalty. I did quit a web development internship this summer, but it wasn't really my choice to do so. My parents made me quit :/
Alright, as for moving away, I don't want to do it because I've spent the past two years away from home without visiting for more than a week at a time. Since this is my last chance ever to spend significant time with my parents and cats, I was hoping to work from home this summer. Trust me, I don't mind living on my own, but, as an only child, I feel like I should give my parents as much time as I can when I'm not my usual 1,200 miles away.
For the work itself, I understand many people are telling me to suck it up and realize how the rest of the nation earns a living. Great, I respect the rest of the nation for those efforts and I've spent the last three years of college working to assure I'll never have to do that work.
What concerns me is an internship is about LEARNING. It's supposed to be beneficial to me. Right now? Sure, I learned about the machines, but I learned basically all I could on the first day. Now I'm not being cheap labor (as I'm hired as a contractor, being paid less, etc). I am being forced to do assembly work that teaches me nothing, get paid less than the other workers, and still have to deal with a longer commute than anyone else who works there.
If money was a concern, there are many places more than happy enough to hire me that are closer to home and have a more enjoyable work environment. I took this job so I could learn and expand my current skill set. For those who don't know, I've already had two previous internships, both where I worked the ENTIRE TIME as an engineer from day one, and both were for extremely reputable companies. In fact, one of the comments that I received is that I am more highly qualified for engineering than some of the full time engineers that work at the current company.
Right now, I want to take data, run tests and work on rewriting one of their computer programs to record data for me. I only have the internship for two months before I go back to school, which might not be enough time to do that work, and yet they want me to spend a quarter of that time doing unproductive assembly line work on products that have nothing to do with my project? That is why I'm considering quitting.
On June 23 2011 12:58 thedirtyleg wrote: 3 reasons why you should stay at this job:
1. Tough/seemingly worthless assignments are a 100% normal part of the internship experience. I believe the phrase is "shit rolls downhill." I know you're not new to interning since you've done it before, but I honestly think it's important to have your patience tried. If you're really going to be an engineer someday, this is probably your last and only chance to experience the less glamorous, real-world effects of your profession's work.
It isn't an assignment, though. It's simply assembly line work. If putting a microswitch in a tester, hitting a button, then tossing it in the appropriate bin is giving me some sort of great insight the 2000th time I do it instead of the 10th time, then I couldn't complain. However, it doesn't. And, yes, I have done it over 2000 times thus far.
On June 23 2011 12:58 thedirtyleg wrote:
2. It's important for your work with this company and your future work to have first-hand knowledge of an entire process. How much did you really learn about this kind of thing in your last internship? Did you meet the people who implemented your designs/formulas? Did you really learn how those designs took shape and became real? Companies love someone with first-hand experience on the line because they better understand the constraints and implications of their upper-level decisions, whereas someone less experienced makes those decisions in a vacuum.
I actually did a lot of hands on assembly work at my last internship. However, it was on things I designed, helped design or review. I found that assembling them gave me great insight into how to improve the design, etc. I got to talk with everyone in the creation process, from engineers to the machinist to the lab techs who put it all together. That was a great, helpful experience, but I was constantly working on different devices and new designs. I didn't have to do the SAME THING over a thousand times.
On June 23 2011 12:58 thedirtyleg wrote:
3. Finally, and most importantly, no company wants a job hopper. They want a team player. The company you're with now is doing this to see how willing you are to be selfless and help out (the manager said "we'll see by the end of the month" merely to test your patience imo), and your future company will look at this experience in much the same way. When you go into your first real job interview, the interviewer will ask you why you left this conveniently located internship after only a few days. It's not going to look very good when you tell her you left and moved away because they used you as "cheap labor" and you wanted more money.
It isn't conveniently located, and I don't think that anyone will question "I was told I was hired as an engineer and they used me for manual labor instead."
On June 23 2011 12:58 thedirtyleg wrote:
All that being said, I'm sure you'll blossom professionally no matter what decision you make here. The line of work you're pursuing is way beyond what my brain is capable of, so it might very well be true that working an unrelated line job is beneath you. My point is that even if it is beneath you, you're an intern, and interns are supposed to do things that are beneath people (sometimes even themselves). At least you're not running around fetching cappuccinos for your boss.
My tax law professor used to go on in-class rants every time he got emails from students with titles at the bottom of their email signatures. He would start yelling, "You're students! Clerks! I don't care if you're president of this or editor of that. You haven't done anything yet. When you do accomplish something, then you can give yourself a title. Until then, work hard and keep your head down." That pretty much explains where I'm coming from on this topic I guess.
On June 23 2011 13:48 Riku wrote: In fact, one of the comments that I received is that I am more highly qualified for engineering than some of the full time engineers that work at the current company.
It may be that they have you do it for so long despite it not taking that long to learn it, so that when you are working in a higher up positiuon than this, you have an appreciation for the people down below and don't trash talk them as just grunts. They may not be educated as well as you, but they damn well work just as hard.
On June 23 2011 13:48 Riku wrote: In fact, one of the comments that I received is that I am more highly qualified for engineering than some of the full time engineers that work at the current company.
Really, do you have a degree?
Almost, I've finished all of the required classes other than advanced technical classes that I take. However, a number of the people they have working on engineering aren't engineers and, from what I've seen, don't really know much about engineering.
On June 23 2011 14:00 Dhalphir wrote: It may be that they have you do it for so long despite it not taking that long to learn it, so that when you are working in a higher up positiuon than this, you have an appreciation for the people down below and don't trash talk them as just grunts. They may not be educated as well as you, but they damn well work just as hard.
I have lots of respect for the workers and love them to death. However, I'm going going to be working here for 8 weeks, so I don't see why they'd waste 2 of those weeks when my project would probably take 10.
To be honest, you sound like you have no idea how the real world works.
1) Everyone starts low. Coffee runs, photocopying bitch, mindless paper pusher - some one has to do them, and it's usually the intern or the newest guy.
2) This is because contrary to what fresh graduates or penultimate year university students think, they usually know jack all, and managers are not stupid enough to let people who have no idea what they are doing to mess up, since they have to clean up after you when you screw up.
3) Sure, you may have some sort of theory based knowledge, but the real world is about experience. That's why work experience is an important part in your CV. You will learn so much via experience then you ever will from studying. Even if you think you won't learn anything, you will. (unless you aren't looking to learn).
4) For example, in your case, you may know how the assembly line works in a day. However, do you know what is the most frequent problem that occurs with the machine that causes downtimes of more then 30 mins? Do you know what causes it, and can alter your designs at a R&D level to minimise this risk, since the company can't afford to buy new machines? Can you establish relationships with people down there working in the factories to obtain timely, accurate feedback if you are sitting in your office from day 1?
5) 2 weeks is nothing. People do assembly work for their entire lives. People do much worse work in order for a chance to gain a foothold into the industry. There are people out there who would take this opportunity with both hands and never let go.
6) Given your past record of quitting internships, I'd say you need to grow up and stop thinking so snobbishly. Take advices from the people in this thread (because it sounds like you aren't taking it). If you think like this for the rest of your life, you won't get very far.
You realize that most entry positions/internships are just placeholders for the future of your career with tthat company. It has so little to do with anything that you will actually be doing. Even schooling is like this...So many of the things we learn are complete and utter waste of time but we must do it to gain the diploma, it isn't necessary for the actual job you want to do.
So don't be at all surprised if at ANY job in ANY field you start off with the shitty grunt work that has nothing to do with what you're trying to get at.
lol i can understand 2 weeks of doing something completely retarded might seem like a waste of time. Why not tough it out just to see if you can do it? I mean if they're still fucking you over after that then it would make sense to take off, but if it's purely for orientation then that's okay. It really does happen everywhere, and I completely agree with the process. It's a good way to weed out the stuck up quitter type people. I know there definitely couldn't be anyone doing my current job that had the mentality of quitting after having to do assembly line work for 2 weeks.
Remember the first time you dived into the pool? Felt like shit right? You were helpless...it was painful.. head turning blue......could barely see the light...
Welcome to the real world.
J/K man but honestly I would continue the internship as two weeks is really nothing. In the grand scheme of things, if you go on with the two weeks, you might get the job you want.If you quit, you will never know how your future in that company could have panned out after two weeks (plus interns always get the bottom of the barrel stuff so I wouldn't worry about it)
I would never choose internship because its close to my home, you actually should do that in a companie you would like to / can work to earn the real money after studies. Thats how in germany you do it, you know them, they know you and so you can sell you for the best price.
On June 23 2011 13:48 Riku wrote: For the work itself, I understand many people are telling me to suck it up and realize how the rest of the nation earns a living. Great, I respect the rest of the nation for those efforts and I've spent the last three years of college working to assure I'll never have to do that work.
Wrong. That's what people did decades ago. Today, a college degree will give you opportunities, not assurance that you get those opportunities no matter how hard you try.
It's orientation, suck it up, it's probably the way they do things. 2 weeks shouldn't kill you and if it still sucks after that at least you know something you won't be doing in the future.
I have yet to see a fresh graduate have anywhere near the skill/knowledge/efficiency of an experienced engineer, or even an experienced tech (most have no fucking clue what world they live in when it comes to doing practical stuff and still have the audacity to ask for huge pay just because they got a piece of paper). In this business experience is most of the time >>>> degree, there's plenty to learn, even from low level jobs. Current company had the fresh hardware engineers do soldering/bare board debugging for their initiation, works well not having to rely on a tech being around when you do prototyping at midnight.
it's two weeks dude, assuming you started on monday, and you work 4 days a week, so yea... and don't be so prissy about getting so many offers, do you know what youth unemployment is in the US right now, it's really high
I quit an internship when I wasn't happy and even though it felt like shit ( It was a small start up) it just wasn't the right fit for me. I had to do marketing and cold calling people even though my field of study is economics. The pay was decent, about 1,2k a month but I hated it and didn't learn anything. If you have a different opportunity, there is no shame in jumping ship to take it.
this feeling of "honor" and sucking it up is counterproductive. Even though I agree that sticking it out can be good if you see some progress in the future in this case it sounds like a dead end.
my advice: tell them that you want to do some challenging work and if they don't react, quit. your time is too valuable to be stuck in a dead end
I think most don't call for sucking it up for the entire summer but at least until the "orientation" is over. The problem here is if the company she works for is retarded and just gives internships to get cheap labour so she'd be stuck doing menial jobs for the summer while losing the option to switch in time. But that's her decision to make, mostly depends on said company's reputation and possibly chatting to people that have worked/work there.
Don't assume that just because you're a bit better educated than the other workers at the company that you're instantly going to leapfrog them in salary, responsibility and respect. This goes for after graduation as well. You start at the bottom.
On June 23 2011 11:17 Kennigit wrote: No, you should suck it up - if you really know the machines that well, call you manager show him/her you know it like the back of your hand and be on your merry way. Theres actually a reasonable chance that they say "cool. keep doing it". It's orientation, and a lot of organizations do it so that you have an appreciation of what is going on "on ground level". Military officers have to go through the same shit training and conditioning as a private new recruit - if you have a shit time with these systems now, when you get into a position that you can affect change you will be concious of the fact that dealing with them sucks.
If you don't respect their system, and it's not worth the pay then quit. Don't quit because the orientation is 2 weeks - it's nothing.
On June 23 2011 14:32 PhatCop wrote: To be honest, you sound like you have no idea how the real world works.
1) Everyone starts low. Coffee runs, photocopying bitch, mindless paper pusher - some one has to do them, and it's usually the intern or the newest guy.
2) This is because contrary to what fresh graduates or penultimate year university students think, they usually know jack all, and managers are not stupid enough to let people who have no idea what they are doing to mess up, since they have to clean up after you when you screw up.
3) Sure, you may have some sort of theory based knowledge, but the real world is about experience. That's why work experience is an important part in your CV. You will learn so much via experience then you ever will from studying. Even if you think you won't learn anything, you will. (unless you aren't looking to learn).
4) For example, in your case, you may know how the assembly line works in a day. However, do you know what is the most frequent problem that occurs with the machine that causes downtimes of more then 30 mins? Do you know what causes it, and can alter your designs at a R&D level to minimise this risk, since the company can't afford to buy new machines? Can you establish relationships with people down there working in the factories to obtain timely, accurate feedback if you are sitting in your office from day 1?
5) 2 weeks is nothing. People do assembly work for their entire lives. People do much worse work in order for a chance to gain a foothold into the industry. There are people out there who would take this opportunity with both hands and never let go.
6) Given your past record of quitting internships, I'd say you need to grow up and stop thinking so snobbishly. Take advices from the people in this thread (because it sounds like you aren't taking it). If you think like this for the rest of your life, you won't get very far.
I started writing up a reply and then I found that this comment says what I was going to say.
I went through a phase in first and second year where I thought "I'm an engineering student!" Then I realized I didn't know shit about engineering yet and worked my summers assembling cars on night shift.
sounds like you aren't used to having to tough it out to me... two weeks? just get it over with it'll be good for you to actually know what it's like to do such a bad job. You'll appreciate what ever you do next a hell of a lot more lol.
I agree that you should just tough it out for a couple weeks, but it is kind of dirty that they would hire you without telling you that this was part of the job. For a full-time employee then whatever it's two weeks, but for an 8-week internship spending 2 weeks doing unrelated shit seems pretty much like a waste of time.
On June 23 2011 13:48 Riku wrote: Alright, as for moving away, I don't want to do it because I've spent the past two years away from home without visiting for more than a week at a time. Since this is my last chance ever to spend significant time with my parents and cats, I was hoping to work from home this summer. Trust me, I don't mind living on my own, but, as an only child, I feel like I should give my parents as much time as I can when I'm not my usual 1,200 miles away.
I'm a chem eng grad student and worked two internships when I was in undergrad. Both of them were over 900 miles away from home. I know what you mean when you want to stick around family and this alone would give me the motivation to tough it out (especially since grad school is 1000 miles from home!).
What concerns me is an internship is about LEARNING. It's supposed to be beneficial to me. Right now? Sure, I learned about the machines, but I learned basically all I could on the first day. Now I'm not being cheap labor (as I'm hired as a contractor, being paid less, etc). I am being forced to do assembly work that teaches me nothing, get paid less than the other workers, and still have to deal with a longer commute than anyone else who works there.
Let's look at an internship from a company perspective: The engineers are typically overworked and have a number of projects they can't reach. Solution: hire another engineer to pick up the slack, or hire an intern every summer to complete the projects. Economically, hiring the intern is the better option because they're cheaper, ambitious, and usually don't have tremendous family obligations. I don't know what you were expecting, but all you're describing sounds like an internship to me!
You're complaining about having to work the line, but I don't think you realize how much you're gaining from this. Yes, a smart person can pick up on the machine and know it inside and out in (at most) a week. Stop focusing on this aspect. Look around you. See everyone else working? This is sending a message to the floor workers that you are no different from them, gives you a taste of the REAL movers and shakers of a plant, and allows you to foster relationships with them. One of the biggest lessons I learned from my first internship was that the engineers knew nothing compared to those who worked the floor. Whenever an engineer changes something it affects the floor workers. Whenever something breaks down the floor workers are on site and start troubleshooting. The floor workers are by and large the best consultants you have regarding the entire process. If you can't see things from their perspective then you'll never accomplish anything as an engineer.
I'm actually jealous of the experience they're offering you. I would have learned the process a lot quicker working the floor at my internships (two weeks working versus a full month of tracing pipes, chemical lines, and drawing flow charts). And who's to say the "real" engineering work would be any good? At my first internship I spent FIVE WEEKS manually entering 4 months worth of process data into a database. Why? Because the managers and engineers didn't enforce it! This is the real world, not your vision of it. It's only temporary, so take in the experience - for better or worse!
Every internship requires a bit of self-sacrifice. It is through that you establish yourself as a dedicated employee within your office and you can rise steadily and receive the benefits that come with loyalty and a reputation for hard work. Your hours kind of suck but you do get 3 days off per week, which is pretty good. It also allows you to live at home, which has its benefits.
The other thing I don't get is the complaining about the assembly line work. Most jobs like to start off young employees at different positions so they can see everything the company does and have an understanding of the processes and what everyone goes through. You should also use this opportunity to see if the work you're doing has any effect on the problem you'll have to solve. Maybe it's a process error?
I'm also a Mechanical Engineer but I personally love grunt work and being on the operating floor. It gives me the chance to be around the machines I find so fascinating and also do some meaningless, repetitive task that requires no thinking but gives me an easy and satisfying result.
You haven't even been there that long. Just stick it out and take pleasure in the things you have to do. The reward will come later on.
That's the nature of internships. A lot of times they make you do useless stuff (and often times, with no pay, be happy you got a paying one!).
What you actually do is irrelevant. You will actually learn engineering when you get a full time job, not from school, not from internships. Suck it up so you can have something to put on your resume when you apply for a real job, that's pretty much the whole point.
You seem to have a disgusting sense of entitlement...good luck in your career, you are going to need it if shit like this gets your panties in a bunch. Internships suck, but did you really expect them to just hand you a cushy engineering job right out of school? Oh no, a few weeks of manual labor! Compare that to what doctors go through before they start practicing and I think you will see that you are being unreasonable.
On June 24 2011 05:39 Lemonwalrus wrote: You seem to have a disgusting sense of entitlement...good luck in your career, you are going to need it if shit like this gets your panties in a bunch. Internships suck, but did you really expect them to just hand you a cushy engineering job right out of school? Oh no, a few weeks of manual labor! Compare that to what doctors go through before they start practicing and I think you will see that you are being unreasonable.
I was lied to and misinformed about the job. I am upset about being mislead, not because I feel self-entitled. And, admittedly, I probably wouldn't have taken the job if I was aware of this, but isn't that my choice?
Knowing the manufacturing process and all the steps involved will make you better able to adjust the design for these materials while still keeping such things as cost of manufacture and man-hours needed to create something in mind. Suck it up, this WILL make you better able to do your job, this will put things in perspective, this will make you care about the company rather than just the science, this will make you feel like you are part of the community, this will make you better able to communicate with the lowly manufacturers should they ever give you that unspeakable task.
On June 24 2011 05:52 Riku wrote: I was lied to and misinformed about the job.
But the way you describe the situation, it's pretty clear that they intend the first two weeks to be preparation for the engineering work to follow. I think that interpreting this as some kind of malicious falsehood about what they'd be having you do seems more to spring from your frustration about being asked to do something you dislike than to reflect the situation accurately.
The cost to them of having you spend two weeks doing that work is almost certainly more than the benefit, since you're spending only 20 hours at each job station. Also, were they asking you to do it for an extended period, I would absolutely agree with your take on the matter, but they're not.
Edit: My advice to you in private message, which I'll repeat here, was to stick it out for two weeks and see if they're serious about that timeframe for this type of work. You're nearly done with week one at this point, right? So it's only four more workdays?
On June 23 2011 11:56 dazed wrote: I'm surprised at all these responses that say to suck it up. If the job ain't making you happy, its simply not worth it. Life is so short and spending half the day being miserable isn't living.
It doesn't matter what you do, how much it matters to you, or how much you enjoy it. It doesn't matter whether you work for yourself or someone else. No matter what, you'll have to do things you don't enjoy doing, sometimes for days, months, or years. There comes a time in every job, even the best jobs, where you simply have to do something that's somewhere between irritating or painful to get the work done.
Everywhere I've ever worked, there have been people who found ways to avoid things they didn't like to do. Sometimes this manifests itself as not wanting to learn a new way to do something because a person dislikes the unfamiliar feeling of doing something they don't know how to do. Sometimes this is simply a matter of leaving "grunt work" as slack for others to pick up just to make sure it gets done. Sometimes it even turns into leaving critical aspects of work undone, which can start to affect the effectiveness of a team.
In this instance, Riku's right to say that spending the entire summer assembling widgets isn't what she signed up to do, and if that's in fact what they're asking her to do, she won't get what she hopes to out of the job.
However, to quit a job because they have asked her to spend a limited, closed-ended period of eight ten-hour days (if I'm counting right) doing work that they feel is an important experience for an engineer at their company to have had, because she finds it repetitive and frustrating, would be a rash decision. There's a substantial possibility that it may simply be to see how willing she is to do whatever she's asked.
All I can say is, if two unpleasant weeks, standing alone, are enough to make you quit even a summer job, sooner or later you're going to have to find a new relationship to unpleasant work, because there will be more, and a lot of it, if you hope to succeed at anything at all.
Parting thought: If anyone here thinks that a hard-working professional Starcraft player like IdrA always loves that eighth consecutive hour of practice as much as the first, you're probably severely misled. Satisfaction in the long-term goal just about always requires deferring satisfaction for the short-term, at least from time to time.
Edit: Riku, I wont make any more posts in this thread. Sorry to belabor the point, and I hope things work out regardless of what you decide to do.
On June 23 2011 11:10 Riku wrote: but I figure if I'm an engineer and I can't figure out a machine in an hour (let alone the 20 hours they want me to put in at each station), that I shouldn't have been hired in the first place.
This line really rubs me the wrong way. No professional engineer would ever speak like this. That and you aren't an engineer - you're an engineering student.
Anyways, being in the field is great. Not only do you get to see the equipment first hand, you get to speak to the operators and learn about issues with the equipment.
"Oh sometimes this part doesn't fit properly so we have to grind it down." Why is that? What can be done to fix that problem?
"These things are junk - the sensors needs to be recalibrated monthly." What is causing that problem?
I think it's a cool approach your company is taking. When I first started, I went to the field as much as possible. Sometimes people were running other projects and I just went to watch them for a day so I could learn what they were doing. I still try to go to the field as much as I can.
It's amazing how much knowledge you get when you have actually seen and touched the equipment that you're later designing on paper. I have friends who design systems and have no idea what the equipment they are sizing actually looks like. It's just a box on a P&ID.
I can't really convince you because the tone of your OP seems to be that engineers are in the ivory tower while the plebes assemble machines below. Those are the engineers that end up at EPCs sizing pumps and copy pasting processes all their lives. The ones who have actually gone to the field and gotten their hands dirty are the ones that notice "that design looks good on paper but it won't fit through the building door, we need to install it in two pieces."
Look at it in the scope of your whole career, two weeks is really nothing. If you like that other internship better, go for it, but not for this reason. I got a job once repairing and installing gasoline pumps because the new systems were Windows based so they wanted someone with IT experience on the team, that's where I came in. I was really pissed off because they promised me all this stuff about sending me to trade schools and such only I took the job and had to spend the first 6 weeks in the warehouse being a grunt. Well I almost quit but I am really glad I didn't, it turned into one of the more enjoyable jobs I have had and the time in the warehouse helped me earn the respect of the guys there. It's also nice to have that kind of stuff on a resume, yes I am smart and I'm also a hard worker and I can pretty much do anything I want. That is what I can take to an interview, diversity is nice.
i agree with chill's latest post 100%, the sense of entitlement that a lot of engineering students display is amazingly pathetic
it's 80 hours plus at most 20 hours of commute to do shit you don't want to do, so it's at most 100 hours of your life, when you've already stated that spending time with your parents and cats are an important facet of the summer, i seriously pity any company that hires you if that's your attitude.
Also i fail to remotely see how you were lied to and misled, i'm sure they told you there would be a 2 week orientation, or an 80 hour orientation, or something like that.
On June 24 2011 07:17 Coramoor wrote: i agree with chill's latest post 100%, the sense of entitlement that a lot of engineering students display is amazingly pathetic
it's 80 hours plus at most 20 hours of commute to do shit you don't want to do, so it's at most 100 hours of your life, when you've already stated that spending time with your parents and cats are an important facet of the summer, i seriously pity any company that hires you if that's your attitude.
Also i fail to remotely see how you were lied to and misled, i'm sure they told you there would be a 2 week orientation, or an 80 hour orientation, or something like that.
No, they didn't tell me anything about an orientation or anything whatsoever about me doing anything but engineering. Though they did tell me lots and lots about the project that I get to work on... eventually.
*Shrug*
I just wrote a 10 page report and e-mailed it to my boss. I'm not a slacker, I just want to fix the problems without wasting time.
On June 23 2011 14:32 PhatCop wrote: To be honest, you sound like you have no idea how the real world works.
1) Everyone starts low. Coffee runs, photocopying bitch, mindless paper pusher - some one has to do them, and it's usually the intern or the newest guy.
2) This is because contrary to what fresh graduates or penultimate year university students think, they usually know jack all, and managers are not stupid enough to let people who have no idea what they are doing to mess up, since they have to clean up after you when you screw up.
3) Sure, you may have some sort of theory based knowledge, but the real world is about experience. That's why work experience is an important part in your CV. You will learn so much via experience then you ever will from studying. Even if you think you won't learn anything, you will. (unless you aren't looking to learn).
4) For example, in your case, you may know how the assembly line works in a day. However, do you know what is the most frequent problem that occurs with the machine that causes downtimes of more then 30 mins? Do you know what causes it, and can alter your designs at a R&D level to minimise this risk, since the company can't afford to buy new machines? Can you establish relationships with people down there working in the factories to obtain timely, accurate feedback if you are sitting in your office from day 1?
5) 2 weeks is nothing. People do assembly work for their entire lives. People do much worse work in order for a chance to gain a foothold into the industry. There are people out there who would take this opportunity with both hands and never let go.
6) Given your past record of quitting internships, I'd say you need to grow up and stop thinking so snobbishly. Take advices from the people in this thread (because it sounds like you aren't taking it). If you think like this for the rest of your life, you won't get very far.
I started writing up a reply and then I found that this comment says what I was going to say.
I went through a phase in first and second year where I thought "I'm an engineering student!" Then I realized I didn't know shit about engineering yet and worked my summers assembling cars on night shift.
Most of the people who have hired me have been extremely impressed with my skills from day one. They might start me off doing inventory or sorting files, but within a week, they often have me building mission-critical systems.
But then again, I'm like 20 and already have like 4+ years of work experience, plus I go to an Ivy league school, so I probably have some unfair advantages :\
I guess having employable skills and coming from a brand-name school are quite useful talents toi have! Maybe work on brushing up your resume so that this doesn't happen in your next internship or fulltime job?
On June 23 2011 14:32 PhatCop wrote: To be honest, you sound like you have no idea how the real world works.
1) Everyone starts low. Coffee runs, photocopying bitch, mindless paper pusher - some one has to do them, and it's usually the intern or the newest guy.
2) This is because contrary to what fresh graduates or penultimate year university students think, they usually know jack all, and managers are not stupid enough to let people who have no idea what they are doing to mess up, since they have to clean up after you when you screw up.
3) Sure, you may have some sort of theory based knowledge, but the real world is about experience. That's why work experience is an important part in your CV. You will learn so much via experience then you ever will from studying. Even if you think you won't learn anything, you will. (unless you aren't looking to learn).
4) For example, in your case, you may know how the assembly line works in a day. However, do you know what is the most frequent problem that occurs with the machine that causes downtimes of more then 30 mins? Do you know what causes it, and can alter your designs at a R&D level to minimise this risk, since the company can't afford to buy new machines? Can you establish relationships with people down there working in the factories to obtain timely, accurate feedback if you are sitting in your office from day 1?
5) 2 weeks is nothing. People do assembly work for their entire lives. People do much worse work in order for a chance to gain a foothold into the industry. There are people out there who would take this opportunity with both hands and never let go.
6) Given your past record of quitting internships, I'd say you need to grow up and stop thinking so snobbishly. Take advices from the people in this thread (because it sounds like you aren't taking it). If you think like this for the rest of your life, you won't get very far.
I started writing up a reply and then I found that this comment says what I was going to say.
I went through a phase in first and second year where I thought "I'm an engineering student!" Then I realized I didn't know shit about engineering yet and worked my summers assembling cars on night shift.
Most of the people who have hired me have been extremely impressed with my skills from day one. They might start me off doing inventory or sorting files, but within a week, they often have me building mission-critical systems.
But then again, I'm like 20 and already have like 4+ years of work experience, plus I go to an Ivy league school, so I probably have some unfair advantages :\
I guess having employable skills and coming from a brand-name school are quite useful talents toi have! Maybe work on brushing up your resume so that this doesn't happen in your next internship or fulltime job?
On June 24 2011 12:36 Smix wrote: and that is how you become gummiggit
lol hi smix Kennigit is my hero, as all the mods/staff probably know! I wake up every morning and think WWKD? I think the OP would be a lot more successful if she simply thought to herself WWKD? Is this shit hardcore enough for me? If not, fuck that shit, jump out of an airplane and get a better job.
On June 24 2011 12:38 heyoka wrote: You're "like 20"? You go to an ivy league school and don't know how old you are?
Man, once you're like 12, all the years sort of just run together. I mean age is just a number isn't it? Like that crazy 16 year old marrying that old dude from Lost.
On June 24 2011 12:33 baller wrote: ...
don't be so humble man
tell us about ur strengths
All my favorite posters are coming out of the woodwork. I love blogs and being so helpful! You're welcome OP!
On June 24 2011 07:17 Coramoor wrote: i agree with chill's latest post 100%, the sense of entitlement that a lot of engineering students display is amazingly pathetic
it's 80 hours plus at most 20 hours of commute to do shit you don't want to do, so it's at most 100 hours of your life, when you've already stated that spending time with your parents and cats are an important facet of the summer, i seriously pity any company that hires you if that's your attitude.
Also i fail to remotely see how you were lied to and misled, i'm sure they told you there would be a 2 week orientation, or an 80 hour orientation, or something like that.
I just wrote a 10 page report and e-mailed it to my boss. I'm not a slacker, I just want to fix the problems without wasting time.
You don't mean you mailed him a 10 page report about your working situation... right?
On June 24 2011 07:17 Coramoor wrote: i agree with chill's latest post 100%, the sense of entitlement that a lot of engineering students display is amazingly pathetic
it's 80 hours plus at most 20 hours of commute to do shit you don't want to do, so it's at most 100 hours of your life, when you've already stated that spending time with your parents and cats are an important facet of the summer, i seriously pity any company that hires you if that's your attitude.
Also i fail to remotely see how you were lied to and misled, i'm sure they told you there would be a 2 week orientation, or an 80 hour orientation, or something like that.
I just wrote a 10 page report and e-mailed it to my boss. I'm not a slacker, I just want to fix the problems without wasting time.
You don't mean you mailed him a 10 page report about your working situation... right?
She means that as part of his job he was required to write a 8 page report. He went above and beyond the call of duty and wrote an extra 2 fucking pages to prove "Hell, I'm the best damn intern you ever gonna see, so you better start putting me to good use."
On June 24 2011 14:37 Coramoor wrote: can we stop using the word he, when this is a girl we are talking about, it just seems plain rude at this point
Sorry. I think I was the only person guilty of referring to the OP as a she, since I'm a bad poster and am largely oblivious to the world around me. I edited all my posts to reflect your well-thought-out request.
Oh wait, this is that hot cosplay girl from blizzcon!
Edit: I am soooo sorry for being such a dick I will now exit this thread with my head down.
Just because a job doesn't require a degree doesn't make the job any less worthwhile.
Is there no way to get the problems fixed without heading straight towards the upper management with a typed paper? Like, by talking to your immediate supervisor or other workers?
I don't get it.
Have more respect for the people that might eventually end up working under you. They're not somehow magically dumber than you because you happen to be an engineering student. They might not have had all the opportunities you have had, and they seem to be complaining much less than you.
On June 24 2011 12:36 Smix wrote: and that is how you become gummiggit
I like the fact that you're making this a meme. I approve whole-heartedly.
EDIT: To add on more to what I've said, it's not a matter of just sucking it up, really, the right response is to actually want to learn how everything works at the lowest levels of manufacturing. This is an opportunity you might not get as a higher level engineer or scientist, which is to actually physically work with the components.
I work in a company that employs over 1,000 engineers. One of the biggest problems is the engineers sitting in their ivory towers passing down theoretical solutions to practical problems because they do not interact with the people and machinery as much as they should.
Sure it sucks now but doing mundane shit like you are doing now will help you in future. For example, we are currently building a reactor ($200m dollar project) and there are hundreds of engineering fuckups, simple stuff like access to valves (too high / low / positioned with the spindle in towards a piperack etc) This crap is less likely to happen if an engineer does the hard yards on the plant instead of sitting in an office block because they can apply their theory to real world situations.
It's probably a little uncharitable to judge based on a blog post but I think you need to adjust your attitude a little. You are only just on the bottom rung and you need to accept you have a lot to learn. A bit of hard graft will be part of that learning process.
Edit: Holy shit. I just read the rest of your replies. You are an engineering student and you are passing judgement on how little the rest of your colleagues know? Thats massively arrogant.
Just read OP. Holy farking WOW As someone who works with engineers(not an engineer myself) on a daily basis..............you are really setting yourself up to be a worthless PoS later in life, and very possibly an unemployed PoS.
None of this would be an issue, as I was aware of it all before I accepted the position. However, as part of my "orientation" with the company, they have decided to have me work the assembly line for the first two weeks. This means I am not practicing engineering at all, I'm just acting as cheap labor as I do the same repetitive tasks that they could train any person off of the street to do in five minutes. I was informed this was to familiarize me with the machines, but I figure if I'm an engineer and I can't figure out a machine in an hour (let alone the 20 hours they want me to put in at each station), that I shouldn't have been hired in the first place.
This kind of "Im better than this" crap....You've been working there for a whole day now, and already you feel that what a company is paying you to do, and what is clearly just a "field experience" thing, is below your considerable talents, and makes you want to quit....it makes me want to smack some sense into you. Seriously? Grow the fark up, put in some dirty work, and do your best at it. This is one of the reasons there is a lot of unemployment, despite there being jobs open and many "qualified people" available. Everyone just acts like you, and refuses to even look at something that doesn't pay $100k a year and involve you designing nuclear fusion devices on a molecular scale, despite the fact that they have zero real world experience. Obviously I'm exaggerating slightly, but you get the point. I hope the modmins don't consider this too harsh, because it's something that you need to get shocked with. You are not better than anyone because you have a piece of paper. Get out, and prove you have work ethic, and the willingness to get your hands dirty to get the job done.
I'm an engineering student too. We are "better than this crap". We paid so much money and did the courses no one else did so we wouldn't be laborers. We find solutions to problems. The orientation will be worth it tho just stick it out. Think of it like initiation. The extra $5 an hour wont cover rent for having to move away.
As a Mechanical Engineering Tech, physical hands on experience is invaluable for an engineer. Employers want these things badly.
For example, there was the contest from Nasa to design a mining landrover for the moon (or mars), the guys that won didn't have the levels of education of the other teams, they just had more physical experience with similar machines then everyone else.
In my career so far, it's kind of frustrating to work with an engineer that can do the math like the other engineers, but then has no idea of how stuff actually gets done. I was also fairly lucky to be seated right next to the guy that had the most experience of anyone in the entire company, but had several heart attacks so he had to be "demoted" from the higher stress jobs.
But now I'm the Field Coordinator for a steel company on arguably the largest current construction job this side of Quebec. It's sometimes not about getting the experience you want, but getting the experience you need so you can get the experience you want.
On June 24 2011 21:58 ComaDose wrote: I'm an engineering student too. We are "better than this crap". We paid so much money and did the courses no one else did so we wouldn't be laborers. We find solutions to problems. The orientation will be worth it tho just stick it out. Think of it like initiation. The extra $5 an hour wont cover rent for having to move away.
That doesn't mean that you instantly know how to do anything real world. I am constantly having to revise engineer's drawings because half of them don't know how anything real world looks or works like. You shouldn't be common laborers, no, that's why you went to school. But that doesn't mean you should instantly have job solving real world problems, with no experience in the actual system or job you are performing, because you have no experience with it other than theoretical. I say real world, and maybe you don't understand, because you're still a student, and think the exercises/projects they have you do are "real world". Hint: they are not.
LOL oh wow. My sophomore internship lasted all summer, ran 5 days a week, was 70 miles away, and I spent the first 3 weeks entering carpet samples into a database, (I was hired as a programmer). After that I was essentially a secretary, running errands and doing menial office support tasks. With the commute I was out of the house about 13-14 hours a day. The pay was modest at best.
Welcome to the real work world.
After 3 months of essentially being a hired temp worker, I had made a good impression. The CEO even knew who I was, (and at one point even hired me to paint his warhammer army for him, lololo). Anyway, when I asked for a real job the following summer, all I had to do was call him up, and I got hired like 2 weeks later with half the office remembering me. EZ real summer job.
But yes, you have to do the shit work at first. You aren't above it, lol. Soooo many college kids think they're going to be writing code or designing robots on their first internship. It's adorable.
Shit work, coffee runs and all that fun stuff are just a part of cracking into the work force in any field. If you don't wanna do it, best believe there's about 200 other soon-to-be grads who will. And probably a lot more unemployed engineers who'd happily do it just to get back in there.
so yeah youd be kind of nuts to not do it unless you have something that is absolutely 100% better and it doesn't sound like it.
^^ This is all true. In my previous internships I've waded through sludge, been covered in dirt, grease, clay, and tasty paper stock, had to lift 100lb motors and move them, sweat my ass off on hot factory floors, crawled through tunnels - sewers actually, cleaned offices, and even cleaned toilets.
plus, if you quit, what would you be doing this summer? Lazing around at home, not getting valuable stuff for your resume?
I'd rather do what your internship is than work at a fast food place: working 10-12 hour days, 7 days a week, always standing, making shitty food for angry fat people. Especially horrible if you do what I did and work at a place where chili is the main product served, it gets everywhere and you reek of it by the time you are done
On June 24 2011 23:25 tomyoru wrote: plus, if you quit, what would you be doing this summer? Lazing around at home, not getting valuable stuff for your resume?
I'd rather do what your internship is than work at a fast food place: working 10-12 hour days, 7 days a week, always standing, making shitty food for angry fat people. Especially horrible if you do what I did and work at a place where chili is the main product served, it gets everywhere and you reek of it by the time you are done
Wow you didn't even read the OP. Also, nobody in fast food works "10-12 hour days, 7 days a week". In my experience you have a hard time even getting your 40 hours a week because they don't want to risk having you pay you overtime if you stay late for a 41st hour.
On June 24 2011 21:58 ComaDose wrote: I'm an engineering student too. We are "better than this crap". We paid so much money and did the courses no one else did so we wouldn't be laborers. We find solutions to problems. The orientation will be worth it tho just stick it out. Think of it like initiation. The extra $5 an hour wont cover rent for having to move away.
That doesn't mean that you instantly know how to do anything real world. I am constantly having to revise engineer's drawings because half of them don't know how anything real world looks or works like. You shouldn't be common laborers, no, that's why you went to school. But that doesn't mean you should instantly have job solving real world problems, with no experience in the actual system or job you are performing, because you have no experience with it other than theoretical. I say real world, and maybe you don't understand, because you're still a student, and think the exercises/projects they have you do are "real world". Hint: they are not.
Yeah one defiantly needs to know how to do those things. I should not have used "courses" to summarize learning oriented activities. There is a physical aspect to every project. I poorly conveyed my point that engineers should not be on a soldering line 9-5 till they retire. I was reacting to some posts having a "think your better than us" attitude. I make test boards 9-5 till September. Its not what i hope to make a career doing. but I'm not complaining either. I think of it like initiation. Just like i think you are recommending she do, which was also my recommendation too.
On June 24 2011 21:58 ComaDose wrote: I'm an engineering student too. We are "better than this crap". We paid so much money and did the courses no one else did so we wouldn't be laborers. We find solutions to problems. The orientation will be worth it tho just stick it out. Think of it like initiation. The extra $5 an hour wont cover rent for having to move away.
That doesn't mean that you instantly know how to do anything real world. I am constantly having to revise engineer's drawings because half of them don't know how anything real world looks or works like. You shouldn't be common laborers, no, that's why you went to school. But that doesn't mean you should instantly have job solving real world problems, with no experience in the actual system or job you are performing, because you have no experience with it other than theoretical. I say real world, and maybe you don't understand, because you're still a student, and think the exercises/projects they have you do are "real world". Hint: they are not.
Yeah one defiantly needs to know how to do those things. I should not have used "courses" to summarize learning oriented activities. There is a physical aspect to every project. I poorly conveyed my point that engineers should not be on a soldering line 9-5 till they retire. I was reacting to some posts having a "think your better than us" attitude. I make test boards 9-5 till September. Its not what i hope to make a career doing. but I'm not complaining either. I think of it like initiation. Just like i think you are recommending she do, which was also my recommendation too.
On June 23 2011 11:56 dazed wrote: I'm surprised at all these responses that say to suck it up. If the job ain't making you happy, its simply not worth it. Life is so short and spending half the day being miserable isn't living.
The old job seems like a great solution. Why are you so apprehensive about moving and living on your own? You can't live at home with your parents your whole life, might as well start now. The best thing to ever happen to me was moving out of my parents and being on my own.
Its an internship ie short term. I think he should suck it up too and after the two weeks see what its like. Short term pain long term gain
I think you should stick with it for at least the orientation period, if you're still stuck doing manual labour after the orientation period then you should start asking questions and seeing whether you will be transferred to more relevant work that actually makes use of your engineering skills.
On June 24 2011 07:17 Coramoor wrote: i agree with chill's latest post 100%, the sense of entitlement that a lot of engineering students display is amazingly pathetic
it's 80 hours plus at most 20 hours of commute to do shit you don't want to do, so it's at most 100 hours of your life, when you've already stated that spending time with your parents and cats are an important facet of the summer, i seriously pity any company that hires you if that's your attitude.
Also i fail to remotely see how you were lied to and misled, i'm sure they told you there would be a 2 week orientation, or an 80 hour orientation, or something like that.
I just wrote a 10 page report and e-mailed it to my boss. I'm not a slacker, I just want to fix the problems without wasting time.
You don't mean you mailed him a 10 page report about your working situation... right?
She means that as part of his job he was required to write a 8 page report. He went above and beyond the call of duty and wrote an extra 2 fucking pages to prove "Hell, I'm the best damn intern you ever gonna see, so you better start putting me to good use."
I was not required, asked to or even had a suggestion offered to me to write anything. I know what the project i'm going to be working on is about, so I used the information and data I collected during the first two days at my job, as well as significant background research I did on their methods to purpose an initial approach of the problem and a brief overview of possible issues causing it.
EPT
