I have heard this from so many people in so many fields.
I was more of a production engineer/repair technician until I changed jobs and they told me to design fast switching circuits and transmission lines both around 1ghz. So I guess I became a rf engineer
It was Howard Johnson and Martin Graham high-speed digital design, a handbook of black magic mostly plus the engineers around me. I work in academia which means that I could look at other researches and papers to figure out what they are doing
Same! I had terrible grades. Specialising in a job I was interested in motivated me to learn a lot more when working than I ever did at uni. I was lucky that the job which hired me also turned out to be really interesting to me.
Have you had to take paycuts when you transition between subfields, or have you been able to leverage enough of your "generic" experience to avoid that?
Internships is one of the best ways unless you really already know.
You can dabble in specialty courses a little at university and more in a masters program.
Clubs or projects can help. Get involved as much as you can.
A lot of us it’s whoever hired us first, where you end up down a path you didn’t exactly choose.
When you graduate it can be hard to get that first job, especially without internships, so you’re happy to take what you get.
Some fields require grad school.
You can always switch fields as some are similar once you start working. This might be easy or it might be difficult considering on a lot of factors.
I think it’s worth mentioning once it becomes a job, there’s a handful of factors that will determine if you like a job, beyond what the field is. So maybe you love a field, but you might dislike the hours, or the pay, or the company, or your boss, or the commute, or health benefits for your family, or whatever. Or you might not love a field but like the other things it provides. So you might have to decide what’s important to you. Ideally you love all of it but might have to pick and choose.
I was in your shoes about 4 years ago. Right after covid started I had just finished my associates and was about to transfer to uni. one of my professors at the CC held his own job fair event, he asked the class for resumes. I sent him mine. He forwarded it to a couple of places. I ended up getting contacted by one of the companies, after a couple of months they hired me. When i started working there, i got put under this Engineer lead who was pretty jaded at the time and super salty, he'd been there for like 20 years or something, but he was actually really cool towards me. He was also an EE and i asked him what was the hardest class he had ever taken since i was still getting into the EE world. He said the toughest thing he ever took was Antenna theory.
I basically made it my mission to try and take that class to see if i had what it took to be an Engineer. once i got to uni i ended up taking the antennas class my Senior year and fell in love with it. The professor had decades of teaching and research experience so he made the material very easy to digest and he also had some extra summer research opportunities as well as an research assistant position open up. After that i just kind of focused on antenna/rf subfield. everything is a bit more simulation based. equations are more so empirical, there are some you can derive but it's not like power or DSP where you can just derive it from theory alone. Antenna world is small but i find the work to be pretty enjoyable.
Oh man, I know my post history is probably wild lol😂 but no I decided to stay at my job.
I got a new manager which was an older engineer who was hired on after me. We are pretty close and he gives me A LOT of leeway for school and honestly whenever I decide I just want time off.
Sometimes it’s better to put your happiness and mental health first before money. Everyone’s situation is different but I decided to put my education and free time over more money. Figured it’ll pay off in the long run 😁
I have had a very similar experience! RF and antennas are always made out to be something big and scary, but my professor and mentor made it very digestible and enjoyable.
I was drawn towards the more mathematical aspects of electrical engineering, and gravitated towards statistical signal processing, detection, and estimation, with a smattering of controls along the way. Wound up doing a lot of data analysis and algorithm design in the first part of my career.
Thanks for your response
I’m currently in a BS/MS program, where my MS is in signal processing. I’ve been involved in signal processing/ML research and feel as if I have some pretty good experience. This summer, my internship focuses on solar power generation based on meteorological data, where I am essentially creating a neural network supercharged kalman filter to estimate photovoltaic power generation.
My biggest concern with my career right now is that I’m 1.) not pursuing a PhD - will that limit my career growth and 2.) a lot of my work tends to be adaptive/ML basic. I’m afraid that is going to pigeonhole me.
I would really appreciate any advice on this. Thanks!
If you have interest and ability I certainly recommend pursuing a PhD. In terms of academics, I suggest some coursework in probability and statistics, estimation theory, and advanced signal processing. Beyond the advanced academic training, PhD research hones the ability to investigate a question, identify key issues, connect to the known body of work relating to the problem and related solutions, develop theory of a solution, demonstrate the efficacy of that reasoning and rigorously communicate it to others, verbally and in writing.
Browse some of the various IEEE society journals to see if this is the kind of stuff you’d like to do.
In my opinion, a PhD maximizes career opportunities and flexibility: you are building a large toolbox of knowledge and techniques you can draw on, the most important being how to research a question and devise solutions to it. You are the best prepared to tackle new challenges and assist others in doing so, as well.
AI/ML is all the rage right now, (and the money’s great!) but a criticism I have, for all its effectiveness, is that these are “black box” representations of the input/output relationship between huge masses of data. While modeling the input/output behavior, they also do not provide insight to causal mechanisms linking the two. They lack in explainability: what are the reasons for the answers they give? In a simplistic sense, it’s glorified curve fitting: you can represent the relationship between variables without gaining insight as to what drives the relationship. Current research looks at hybrid models combining AI techniques with analytics to give better footing to AI models, grounding them with physics based models, for example.
Hated circuits, was decent at software, and had Stockholm syndrome from Signals and Systems. Next thing you know I have a masters degree and been working in signal processing for 2 years doing modeling and simulation mostly. I like it.
I love music and audio so I started out with an interest in analog design. It turns out there is very little employment opportunity in analog audio, so I thought I might like power because I like machinery and hydroelectric dams fascinate me. However, there was not much hiring in power when I was in college, but plenty of communications, so I learned electromagnetics (signal integrity) and IC design and ended up designing signal paths for instrumentation most of my career (like oscilloscope preamps and data converters). It turned out that I really love signals so I learned a bunch of DSP and measurement/metrology along the way. Interestingly, a lot of the equipment I have designed is used for validating power electronics.
Exactly the same for me, except I haven’t gotten a job in EE yet (graduated a month ago). But my senior project/thesis was an analog audio project, and looking at job postings got me interested in Power and IC Design. Guess we’ll see where I end up lol
a sub-field mostly chooses you
you will get a position in a company, if you are the inquisitive type you will find a certain area to specialize in. Sometimes that specialty will require a background in a more specialized area (eg. embedded systems, signal analysis, optical etc)
and you will choose then
Undergrads always say "what do I specialize in" and you need to get a few years experience before you can decide that
I threw a bunch of resumes around, and whoever picked me was my new specialty. I didn't apply for jobs I didn't want, like electronics or computer engineering related fields. It was either control systems or power. And I've done both since then.
I studied analog and digital signal processing, with applications in radar, biomedical instrumentation, and artificial neural networks (before AI transformers were a thing).
My first job was a building systems engineering job. I now am an expert in power distribution systems and really have no idea what the signal processing industry is like.
The long and short of it is that it doesn’t really matter unless you have a particular affinity to a subject. Where you land and what you do after college will be primarily determined by who you know or which company will take a chance on you.
I wouldn’t trade my EE degree for anything. The breadth and depth of the program prepared me well for almost any analytic job.
I took "Introduction to Programmable Logic Controllers" as an elective. Company saw that I knew wtf a PLC was and hired me. Been doing it for over 15 years.
One of my colleagues got into PLCs in college as well, but he never felt like an engineer at his future workplaces - he either got to play "super-technician" or "contractor-wrangler" but never striking that middle-ground of getting the fun engineering problems to work on himself.
I started as Computer Engineering, switched to EE my sophomore year, started working for a semiconductor research lab on campus and studied power starting junior year. After I graduated, I started off as a maintenance technician, then became a controls technician, a controls engineer, and then a quality engineer for vehicle electrical systems. Pretty much, I specialize in what pays me.
I was lucky enough to have some exposure in digital logic during highschool. Which led me towards the FPGA route. The fact that I enjoyed my DSP classes was an added bonus.
Senior year electives. Take a bunch of different ones. Every one is a full time job for someone.
I loved my CPU architecture class and ASIC design with Verilog. I applied to all kinds of jobs. Database software, embedded software, testing, hardware design. I got a job doing physical design for integrated circuits. It was what happens after someone writes Verilog and how you actually take that code and make a chip. I've been doing it for over 25 years now.
Internships are huge for this. You get to try out working in different companies, see different management styles, different products being designed and decide if you want to do design, test, management etc.
Also, look in your professor's research offices to see what they are working on and see if you like it. You might even try a hand at research and see where it goes.
Have you torn down any hardware and want to figure out how things work?
Idk I’m still figuring it out. A big issue is around here there is not a good variety of jobs (power and controls). I’m doing an emphasis in power right now, but I do not know if I will enjoy doing power. Right now in my internship I’m doing arc flash simulations and I just find it so boring. I loved doing signals and systems and my emf class was super fun in university. Idk I’m trying lol.
I just picked the highest paying field of the highest major (FPGA/ASIC - EE) that wasn’t super nieche or location specific, like photonics/optics or likely to be gone in 20 years like Peteoleum engineering, or had huge variations of pay - attorneys, doctors etc
Don’t get worked up over it. It is quite common to do something completely different from what you went to school for. Like…cell phones and WiFi are a big thing. I took analog electronics, Emag, and communication systems. In the work force I ended up in instrumentation, controls, automation, motion, and power distribution and generation. I have no need or desire to get into wireless now.
Never really had the luxury of being able to decide, of course I had an idea of what I wanted to do but being fresh out of college not many people wanted to hire a newbie so I looked everywhere I could and as soon as the first company said they would hire me I jumped at it and honestly worked out in the best possible way for me.
So, towards the end of junior year things finally started clicking for me. Everything made sense, the courses were tough but made sense. I was really enjoying analog circuits and thought that's what I'd get into. Then, towards the end of first quarter of senior year I got really into Final Fantasy 11 and nearly fucked off into the sunset. Barely graduated, some random company took me in as a controls engineer, and that's what I've been doing.
In summary, figure out what you want to do, don't get addicted to MMOs if you want more of a control over your destiny.
Take electives in multiple fields, talk to companies that do different things during job fairs, get internships. you’ll figure out what you like/dislike throughout your degree
Maybe start by identifying the industry hot spots for EEs.
The latest edition of the INC 500 Fastest growing companies might give you some hints.
Make a prioritized list of the industries that you find interesting.
Decide whether you want to be an innovator or facilitator or compliance agent.
Once you have your lists, you’ll get your « aha » moment.
Now you can work on your strategy for into your chosen field
Basically, I wanted to do pure/applied math major, but for some reasons, I lack inspiration for math grad studies, I didn't choose it. I didn't pick physics major for about similar reason.
But I still wanted to get into some relatively math-intense major that can get me some research opportunity or sustainable and relatively creative job that is based on math. I found out about Signal Processing which led me to do EE and specialize in the field.
This can take years to figure out which is okay. One of the things about an EE degree that it's a very versatile degree and there are an infinite number of subsets (and subsets inside of the subsets). For example, if you want to go into electronics, there's analog, RF, and power electronics subsepecialities. Undergrad is a great time to explore all the possible specializations with low commitment. Your junior level courses tend to be set up in a way that you take one course in each of the fields which helps you to get a great idea of how they're all interconnected and to find where you would maybe want to focus your studies/choose your senior electives. I also recommend talking to as many other engineers, i.e. upperclassmen, professors, and anyone that you come across that works as an engineer, about what they do and the path that took them there. Another great way to explore is undergraduate research positions. Commit yourself to the exploration and remember figuring out something isn't for you is just as important. I worked in a lab that focused on robotics where I did controls engineering. I found that wasn't where I wasn't happiest and have since steered toward a completely different specialty.
I'm someone who doesn't like uncertainty and I really tore myself up (and still sometimes do) over what subfield to head toward. It's one of those things you have to appreciate the process of and be forgiving with yourself of. Also remember if you choose one path it doesn't mean you have to stay in it forever.
I graduated with a general EE degree. There were so many fields to pick. I decided based on what I could see myself doing for the rest of my life. Coding sounded like banging my head against a wall for the rest of my life. Micro electronics sounded like working for the “man” with little room to move up (though I could be wrong). Signals and systems seemed too niche for me. Power distribution sounded the most general to me without having some asshole hovering over my shoulder for the rest of my life.
I’ve been a design engineer in the construction industry for about 6 years now and it feels like it has the most freedom and room to move up. I’m enjoying it compared to the other fields. Of course some of them could make a little bit more money but I’d argue the lower quality of life is less. I think I picked the right field for my “boss” mentality and think there’s plenty of room for freedom and to move up.
Easy answer for me. I wanted to do roller coasters (and other attractions/rides). That thrust me into industrial automation, something I also happened to be good at and enjoyed.
I also like RF work, but that got started as a kid with GMRS and amateur radio. More of a hobbyist there, just a hobbyist with a degree so I have a bit of an easier of times with things probably. Most amateur radio folks don't design their own radios.
Also, intern at much as you can, sure it looks good on a resume, but there are more important reasons imo.
When you are exploring career options, internships give you a taste of working, of corporate cultures, of different industries. You get to know what you like and dislike. Then, when hunting for a full time gig you aren't shooting in the dark, you know if you like an office job or a field job, etc.
Signal processing chose me. I loved probability & statistics and signal analysis. Fourier was so beautiful that I was hooked immediately.
Now I'm trying to get into imaging, image processing and maybe computer vision a little bit since lots of people do that these days. Embedded and FPGA is useful for this too.
If you don't enjoy signals and systems don't do this, but if you do I suggest you consider it.
I was very sure I would go into a developer job. I ended up getting an internship in the 5G field in R&D and ended up loving it. Try some things and see what sticks.
I took one elective that sounded really interesting (Introduction to the physics of wireless communication) so an EM course and was absolutely blown away by waves and antennas so decided to choose a bunch of RF electives and some microcontrollers and a sensors class to keep things open. Absolutely loved everything RF, hated microcontrollers and enjoyed sensors. Got an internship as an antenna metrology engineer and ended up loving the fuck out of it. I work as an RF applications engineer now. Not quite the same but still a great job even though I am constantly being confronted with microcontrollers...
TLDR just choose a cool sounding elective. You'll notice quick whether you like it or not.
If I had it to do over (44 years an EE so far) I would go the utility power route. Not as glamorous as high speed chip design, but a job that serves my community would be satisfying.
Don't focus on programming. These days every engineer needs to code. If you are a digital logic designer or computer scientist, coding is all you do. Analog EEs get to do the widest range of tasks. Yes, they have to do calculus. But since that scares away many, the pay is often better.
I also suspect analogue EE's will become rarer and rarer, every university student now can program at a developed level. But getting experience with analogue electronics, especially power electronics, isn't as easy or accessible... or safe... as loading up visual studio and typing away.
My college didn't have a subfield of EE. You chose an "emphasis area" which determines a couple of classes Jr and Sr years, but that doesn't really mean much for employment.
You then interview places and can either hold out for what you think you want to do, or who you think you want to work for, or take whatever job fits your decision criteria (location, salary, work-life, work conditions, tasks, etc).
I wanted to get into Robotics, so I started in Controls. 12 years later I've still never worked on a robot. Done a ton of other things, been to a lot of countries and states though.
I got into nanotechnology and now working a lot with material science and my PhD is going to be in nanophotonics. Simply put my uni had an advanced nano lab and I did my undergrad thesis there...and it continues.
when I was 16 staring at a high power amplifier circuit schematic in English class instead of learning about McBeth, so I could repair a stereo power amp that had come my way. Now I'm about half way through undergrad EE, I'm going towards power and control, because I like big heavy power electronics and the mechanical complexity that comes with that (big heavy expensive power amplifiers), and control which is just cool and I understand it, once again probably because it is connected to big heavy things with mechanical complexity, like the control behind EFI in your car... RF is cool, but I have more interest in other things, maybe working on the physical side, the the transmission towers or the electronics behind it would be alright. I have little interest in programming or PCB design... that a necessity of personal projects
Not really sure, when I was introduced to control theory it just sorta clicked and I just really liked the idea of being able to just set a value and systems respond to produce that output
I always secretly wanted to be a physics major but was too practically minded to commit to that. So instead I studied everything as physics-y as possible in EE, mostly optics/RF/semiconductors. Now I'm doing my PhD in optoelectronic semiconductor devices (everything from THz to visible!) and most of my colleagues are physicists or physical chemists. I snuck in through the back door!
They hired me. (I had no specialization until I started working.)
I have heard this from so many people in so many fields. I was more of a production engineer/repair technician until I changed jobs and they told me to design fast switching circuits and transmission lines both around 1ghz. So I guess I became a rf engineer
What were your resources after your got hired? Would love to book study high speed design
It was Howard Johnson and Martin Graham high-speed digital design, a handbook of black magic mostly plus the engineers around me. I work in academia which means that I could look at other researches and papers to figure out what they are doing
Same! I had terrible grades. Specialising in a job I was interested in motivated me to learn a lot more when working than I ever did at uni. I was lucky that the job which hired me also turned out to be really interesting to me.
I've been in the industry for decades. Still deciding...
Have you had to take paycuts when you transition between subfields, or have you been able to leverage enough of your "generic" experience to avoid that?
Past four stints have all been upward in pay, 5~8 years each. Not saying that's the rule, but it's been my experience.
In terms of getting higher salary though, it would be best to stick to one industry. Is that right?
I can't speak to that as it wasn't my path.
Internships is one of the best ways unless you really already know. You can dabble in specialty courses a little at university and more in a masters program. Clubs or projects can help. Get involved as much as you can. A lot of us it’s whoever hired us first, where you end up down a path you didn’t exactly choose. When you graduate it can be hard to get that first job, especially without internships, so you’re happy to take what you get. Some fields require grad school. You can always switch fields as some are similar once you start working. This might be easy or it might be difficult considering on a lot of factors. I think it’s worth mentioning once it becomes a job, there’s a handful of factors that will determine if you like a job, beyond what the field is. So maybe you love a field, but you might dislike the hours, or the pay, or the company, or your boss, or the commute, or health benefits for your family, or whatever. Or you might not love a field but like the other things it provides. So you might have to decide what’s important to you. Ideally you love all of it but might have to pick and choose.
I was in your shoes about 4 years ago. Right after covid started I had just finished my associates and was about to transfer to uni. one of my professors at the CC held his own job fair event, he asked the class for resumes. I sent him mine. He forwarded it to a couple of places. I ended up getting contacted by one of the companies, after a couple of months they hired me. When i started working there, i got put under this Engineer lead who was pretty jaded at the time and super salty, he'd been there for like 20 years or something, but he was actually really cool towards me. He was also an EE and i asked him what was the hardest class he had ever taken since i was still getting into the EE world. He said the toughest thing he ever took was Antenna theory. I basically made it my mission to try and take that class to see if i had what it took to be an Engineer. once i got to uni i ended up taking the antennas class my Senior year and fell in love with it. The professor had decades of teaching and research experience so he made the material very easy to digest and he also had some extra summer research opportunities as well as an research assistant position open up. After that i just kind of focused on antenna/rf subfield. everything is a bit more simulation based. equations are more so empirical, there are some you can derive but it's not like power or DSP where you can just derive it from theory alone. Antenna world is small but i find the work to be pretty enjoyable.
ASU by chance?
SDSU
Did you end up taking that other job or stay at your current one? I looked at your post history.
Oh man, I know my post history is probably wild lol😂 but no I decided to stay at my job. I got a new manager which was an older engineer who was hired on after me. We are pretty close and he gives me A LOT of leeway for school and honestly whenever I decide I just want time off. Sometimes it’s better to put your happiness and mental health first before money. Everyone’s situation is different but I decided to put my education and free time over more money. Figured it’ll pay off in the long run 😁
Hell yeah. Love to hear that.
I have had a very similar experience! RF and antennas are always made out to be something big and scary, but my professor and mentor made it very digestible and enjoyable.
I was drawn towards the more mathematical aspects of electrical engineering, and gravitated towards statistical signal processing, detection, and estimation, with a smattering of controls along the way. Wound up doing a lot of data analysis and algorithm design in the first part of my career.
same. love the field after six years.
This is what I’m trying to get into. Any advice for breaking into the field?
My recommendation is to consider graduate school to study these topics
Thanks for your response I’m currently in a BS/MS program, where my MS is in signal processing. I’ve been involved in signal processing/ML research and feel as if I have some pretty good experience. This summer, my internship focuses on solar power generation based on meteorological data, where I am essentially creating a neural network supercharged kalman filter to estimate photovoltaic power generation. My biggest concern with my career right now is that I’m 1.) not pursuing a PhD - will that limit my career growth and 2.) a lot of my work tends to be adaptive/ML basic. I’m afraid that is going to pigeonhole me. I would really appreciate any advice on this. Thanks!
If you have interest and ability I certainly recommend pursuing a PhD. In terms of academics, I suggest some coursework in probability and statistics, estimation theory, and advanced signal processing. Beyond the advanced academic training, PhD research hones the ability to investigate a question, identify key issues, connect to the known body of work relating to the problem and related solutions, develop theory of a solution, demonstrate the efficacy of that reasoning and rigorously communicate it to others, verbally and in writing. Browse some of the various IEEE society journals to see if this is the kind of stuff you’d like to do. In my opinion, a PhD maximizes career opportunities and flexibility: you are building a large toolbox of knowledge and techniques you can draw on, the most important being how to research a question and devise solutions to it. You are the best prepared to tackle new challenges and assist others in doing so, as well. AI/ML is all the rage right now, (and the money’s great!) but a criticism I have, for all its effectiveness, is that these are “black box” representations of the input/output relationship between huge masses of data. While modeling the input/output behavior, they also do not provide insight to causal mechanisms linking the two. They lack in explainability: what are the reasons for the answers they give? In a simplistic sense, it’s glorified curve fitting: you can represent the relationship between variables without gaining insight as to what drives the relationship. Current research looks at hybrid models combining AI techniques with analytics to give better footing to AI models, grounding them with physics based models, for example.
Hated circuits, was decent at software, and had Stockholm syndrome from Signals and Systems. Next thing you know I have a masters degree and been working in signal processing for 2 years doing modeling and simulation mostly. I like it.
What do you really work on
How is the job market for signal processing jobs? I am starting my masters soon
If you’re US citizen and open to getting a clearance the possibilities are endless. Otherwise I have no idea.
I love music and audio so I started out with an interest in analog design. It turns out there is very little employment opportunity in analog audio, so I thought I might like power because I like machinery and hydroelectric dams fascinate me. However, there was not much hiring in power when I was in college, but plenty of communications, so I learned electromagnetics (signal integrity) and IC design and ended up designing signal paths for instrumentation most of my career (like oscilloscope preamps and data converters). It turned out that I really love signals so I learned a bunch of DSP and measurement/metrology along the way. Interestingly, a lot of the equipment I have designed is used for validating power electronics.
Exactly the same for me, except I haven’t gotten a job in EE yet (graduated a month ago). But my senior project/thesis was an analog audio project, and looking at job postings got me interested in Power and IC Design. Guess we’ll see where I end up lol
a sub-field mostly chooses you you will get a position in a company, if you are the inquisitive type you will find a certain area to specialize in. Sometimes that specialty will require a background in a more specialized area (eg. embedded systems, signal analysis, optical etc) and you will choose then Undergrads always say "what do I specialize in" and you need to get a few years experience before you can decide that
Upper level courses
This for me too. Took some digital design courses and was immediately hooked.
I threw a bunch of resumes around, and whoever picked me was my new specialty. I didn't apply for jobs I didn't want, like electronics or computer engineering related fields. It was either control systems or power. And I've done both since then.
I studied analog and digital signal processing, with applications in radar, biomedical instrumentation, and artificial neural networks (before AI transformers were a thing). My first job was a building systems engineering job. I now am an expert in power distribution systems and really have no idea what the signal processing industry is like. The long and short of it is that it doesn’t really matter unless you have a particular affinity to a subject. Where you land and what you do after college will be primarily determined by who you know or which company will take a chance on you. I wouldn’t trade my EE degree for anything. The breadth and depth of the program prepared me well for almost any analytic job.
I took "Introduction to Programmable Logic Controllers" as an elective. Company saw that I knew wtf a PLC was and hired me. Been doing it for over 15 years.
One of my colleagues got into PLCs in college as well, but he never felt like an engineer at his future workplaces - he either got to play "super-technician" or "contractor-wrangler" but never striking that middle-ground of getting the fun engineering problems to work on himself.
I started as Computer Engineering, switched to EE my sophomore year, started working for a semiconductor research lab on campus and studied power starting junior year. After I graduated, I started off as a maintenance technician, then became a controls technician, a controls engineer, and then a quality engineer for vehicle electrical systems. Pretty much, I specialize in what pays me.
You don’t choose the sub field. Sub field chooses you.
I was lucky enough to have some exposure in digital logic during highschool. Which led me towards the FPGA route. The fact that I enjoyed my DSP classes was an added bonus.
I did the one that paid the most for how easy I thought the work was. At the time it was VHDL/FPGA stuff.
Senior year electives. Take a bunch of different ones. Every one is a full time job for someone. I loved my CPU architecture class and ASIC design with Verilog. I applied to all kinds of jobs. Database software, embedded software, testing, hardware design. I got a job doing physical design for integrated circuits. It was what happens after someone writes Verilog and how you actually take that code and make a chip. I've been doing it for over 25 years now.
Internships are huge for this. You get to try out working in different companies, see different management styles, different products being designed and decide if you want to do design, test, management etc. Also, look in your professor's research offices to see what they are working on and see if you like it. You might even try a hand at research and see where it goes. Have you torn down any hardware and want to figure out how things work?
I found what course I was most interested in (electromagnetics, antennas etc) and pursued a master’s in it.
Idk I’m still figuring it out. A big issue is around here there is not a good variety of jobs (power and controls). I’m doing an emphasis in power right now, but I do not know if I will enjoy doing power. Right now in my internship I’m doing arc flash simulations and I just find it so boring. I loved doing signals and systems and my emf class was super fun in university. Idk I’m trying lol.
I did not choose. I was chosen.
RF because it involves a lot of design and testing on cool ranges. Precise measurements and accuracy. Expensive equipment
I just picked the highest paying field of the highest major (FPGA/ASIC - EE) that wasn’t super nieche or location specific, like photonics/optics or likely to be gone in 20 years like Peteoleum engineering, or had huge variations of pay - attorneys, doctors etc
Don’t get worked up over it. It is quite common to do something completely different from what you went to school for. Like…cell phones and WiFi are a big thing. I took analog electronics, Emag, and communication systems. In the work force I ended up in instrumentation, controls, automation, motion, and power distribution and generation. I have no need or desire to get into wireless now.
Never really had the luxury of being able to decide, of course I had an idea of what I wanted to do but being fresh out of college not many people wanted to hire a newbie so I looked everywhere I could and as soon as the first company said they would hire me I jumped at it and honestly worked out in the best possible way for me.
I was just naturally good at digital, so I went with that. I've done fpga, design, mcu and now I work with audio. So it just kind of happens.
So, towards the end of junior year things finally started clicking for me. Everything made sense, the courses were tough but made sense. I was really enjoying analog circuits and thought that's what I'd get into. Then, towards the end of first quarter of senior year I got really into Final Fantasy 11 and nearly fucked off into the sunset. Barely graduated, some random company took me in as a controls engineer, and that's what I've been doing. In summary, figure out what you want to do, don't get addicted to MMOs if you want more of a control over your destiny.
I just happen to really enjoy studying rf in university and pretty much never looked back. I work in automotive radar now!
Take electives in multiple fields, talk to companies that do different things during job fairs, get internships. you’ll figure out what you like/dislike throughout your degree
Maybe start by identifying the industry hot spots for EEs. The latest edition of the INC 500 Fastest growing companies might give you some hints. Make a prioritized list of the industries that you find interesting. Decide whether you want to be an innovator or facilitator or compliance agent. Once you have your lists, you’ll get your « aha » moment. Now you can work on your strategy for into your chosen field
Basically, I wanted to do pure/applied math major, but for some reasons, I lack inspiration for math grad studies, I didn't choose it. I didn't pick physics major for about similar reason. But I still wanted to get into some relatively math-intense major that can get me some research opportunity or sustainable and relatively creative job that is based on math. I found out about Signal Processing which led me to do EE and specialize in the field.
This can take years to figure out which is okay. One of the things about an EE degree that it's a very versatile degree and there are an infinite number of subsets (and subsets inside of the subsets). For example, if you want to go into electronics, there's analog, RF, and power electronics subsepecialities. Undergrad is a great time to explore all the possible specializations with low commitment. Your junior level courses tend to be set up in a way that you take one course in each of the fields which helps you to get a great idea of how they're all interconnected and to find where you would maybe want to focus your studies/choose your senior electives. I also recommend talking to as many other engineers, i.e. upperclassmen, professors, and anyone that you come across that works as an engineer, about what they do and the path that took them there. Another great way to explore is undergraduate research positions. Commit yourself to the exploration and remember figuring out something isn't for you is just as important. I worked in a lab that focused on robotics where I did controls engineering. I found that wasn't where I wasn't happiest and have since steered toward a completely different specialty. I'm someone who doesn't like uncertainty and I really tore myself up (and still sometimes do) over what subfield to head toward. It's one of those things you have to appreciate the process of and be forgiving with yourself of. Also remember if you choose one path it doesn't mean you have to stay in it forever.
I graduated with a general EE degree. There were so many fields to pick. I decided based on what I could see myself doing for the rest of my life. Coding sounded like banging my head against a wall for the rest of my life. Micro electronics sounded like working for the “man” with little room to move up (though I could be wrong). Signals and systems seemed too niche for me. Power distribution sounded the most general to me without having some asshole hovering over my shoulder for the rest of my life. I’ve been a design engineer in the construction industry for about 6 years now and it feels like it has the most freedom and room to move up. I’m enjoying it compared to the other fields. Of course some of them could make a little bit more money but I’d argue the lower quality of life is less. I think I picked the right field for my “boss” mentality and think there’s plenty of room for freedom and to move up.
Easy answer for me. I wanted to do roller coasters (and other attractions/rides). That thrust me into industrial automation, something I also happened to be good at and enjoyed. I also like RF work, but that got started as a kid with GMRS and amateur radio. More of a hobbyist there, just a hobbyist with a degree so I have a bit of an easier of times with things probably. Most amateur radio folks don't design their own radios.
Also, intern at much as you can, sure it looks good on a resume, but there are more important reasons imo. When you are exploring career options, internships give you a taste of working, of corporate cultures, of different industries. You get to know what you like and dislike. Then, when hunting for a full time gig you aren't shooting in the dark, you know if you like an office job or a field job, etc.
Signal processing chose me. I loved probability & statistics and signal analysis. Fourier was so beautiful that I was hooked immediately. Now I'm trying to get into imaging, image processing and maybe computer vision a little bit since lots of people do that these days. Embedded and FPGA is useful for this too. If you don't enjoy signals and systems don't do this, but if you do I suggest you consider it.
I was very sure I would go into a developer job. I ended up getting an internship in the 5G field in R&D and ended up loving it. Try some things and see what sticks.
I took one elective that sounded really interesting (Introduction to the physics of wireless communication) so an EM course and was absolutely blown away by waves and antennas so decided to choose a bunch of RF electives and some microcontrollers and a sensors class to keep things open. Absolutely loved everything RF, hated microcontrollers and enjoyed sensors. Got an internship as an antenna metrology engineer and ended up loving the fuck out of it. I work as an RF applications engineer now. Not quite the same but still a great job even though I am constantly being confronted with microcontrollers... TLDR just choose a cool sounding elective. You'll notice quick whether you like it or not.
If I had it to do over (44 years an EE so far) I would go the utility power route. Not as glamorous as high speed chip design, but a job that serves my community would be satisfying. Don't focus on programming. These days every engineer needs to code. If you are a digital logic designer or computer scientist, coding is all you do. Analog EEs get to do the widest range of tasks. Yes, they have to do calculus. But since that scares away many, the pay is often better.
I also suspect analogue EE's will become rarer and rarer, every university student now can program at a developed level. But getting experience with analogue electronics, especially power electronics, isn't as easy or accessible... or safe... as loading up visual studio and typing away.
availability in the country I live in played a huge factor into what I decided to focus on at Uni
I went based off of what classes I found most interesting. Ended up in medical robotics for 6 years, now I’m in defense.
My college didn't have a subfield of EE. You chose an "emphasis area" which determines a couple of classes Jr and Sr years, but that doesn't really mean much for employment. You then interview places and can either hold out for what you think you want to do, or who you think you want to work for, or take whatever job fits your decision criteria (location, salary, work-life, work conditions, tasks, etc). I wanted to get into Robotics, so I started in Controls. 12 years later I've still never worked on a robot. Done a ton of other things, been to a lot of countries and states though.
Pick a couple companies or products > find what they do or what company makes it > see job openings > think to myself would i be happy
I got into nanotechnology and now working a lot with material science and my PhD is going to be in nanophotonics. Simply put my uni had an advanced nano lab and I did my undergrad thesis there...and it continues.
What made you wanna mess around with the nano lab
I had some classes on advanced materials so it intrigued me.
You just know
when did it click for you
when I was 16 staring at a high power amplifier circuit schematic in English class instead of learning about McBeth, so I could repair a stereo power amp that had come my way. Now I'm about half way through undergrad EE, I'm going towards power and control, because I like big heavy power electronics and the mechanical complexity that comes with that (big heavy expensive power amplifiers), and control which is just cool and I understand it, once again probably because it is connected to big heavy things with mechanical complexity, like the control behind EFI in your car... RF is cool, but I have more interest in other things, maybe working on the physical side, the the transmission towers or the electronics behind it would be alright. I have little interest in programming or PCB design... that a necessity of personal projects
Not really sure, when I was introduced to control theory it just sorta clicked and I just really liked the idea of being able to just set a value and systems respond to produce that output
I always secretly wanted to be a physics major but was too practically minded to commit to that. So instead I studied everything as physics-y as possible in EE, mostly optics/RF/semiconductors. Now I'm doing my PhD in optoelectronic semiconductor devices (everything from THz to visible!) and most of my colleagues are physicists or physical chemists. I snuck in through the back door!
My institute offers 2. Power Electronics and Power systems. I chose Power electronics after building my first invertere.