I agree with the previous posts that someone planning to go into management should have experience in the more entry-level jobs and go up the ladder, step by step. This way, the manager can relate to those under management and understand specific aspects or struggles of the job. Between a management role vs engineer/scientist role, I would choose the latter, since I believe I currently do not have the skill sets required to be a manager, but do have the skill sets to be an engineer/scientist. As for climbing up the ladder to a more managerial role, I believe that my views may change and I may prefer the role in the future, but for now, I see myself in the engineer/scientist job. Additionally, it depends on the company or work environment that someone works in, since a managerial position at one company may be worse than the same position at another, and the same applies for the engineer/science position. From learning more about management, one can better understand how the larger system works, which makes one work more effectively.
I would definitely go to the managerial role, only because when I look at where I want to be years down the line, it would be in a more managerial than hands-on, engineering role. I would think that to get to that role I should have to get the hands on experience on a few projects before I manage other people. That being said, I would have to take the managerial position just to give justice to my future self who would wonder how much further up the chain could I be if I had taken the head start earlier? I would hope to get a lot of training to prepare me for the role since I haven't done the work that my employees will be doing.
I do agree working as a Engineer for the first 3-5 years and then move to the management side .Before going to the management side working in the mix gives us the good insides and teaches us different aspects and challenges involved on the ground and makes us familiar with the ground reality .It changes the thinking and makes us more practical to be a manager .I feel that before entering the management side of the job one should have an hands on experience ,which will make him more confident while taking important decisions.
After 10-13 years from now I will be a manager, I still do not have the skills and knowledge to be one. I will work as engineer and I would love to search through all possible jobs to see where my passion would lead me.
Different from what many people here have said, I currently want to remain in an R&D/engineering role for as long as possible. To me the process of taking a problem and creating a solution is one of the most rewarding feelings. Both my Master’s and PhD theses will revolve around creating a new medical device. The parts that I have enjoyed the most are the bits where I’ve had to come up with a solution to different problems that have arisen along the way. In the beginning I was given a budget and a time frame to complete the work in. From there I have worked through the whole project methodically to create the device and am now in the early stages of collecting data. Whilst I do enjoy interacting with people, I have always been a lead by doing kind of person as opposed to a tell people what to do kind of person. SO for me i Think staying in a technical or engineering role for a while would fit me better.
Bigger roles come with bigger responsibilities, and that's common in every field. In my opinion, I see myself working as an engineer in any technical area/ Research and development to let myself absorb and learn things that I don't have experience in and that way I build up my knowledge for few years to become one day a manager. To be able to manage people who report to you, you have to know enough knowledge to help them.
I would like to be in a technical leadership position. I have worked for many year as an engineer.
At this point I would like to gain more visibility into product development. So I would like manage production of a product. But not really managing people in a administrative way.
I like creating the work break down structure for a project so I guess I would like to manage a project.
Still I am not a big fan of creating schedules and managing resources.
I know this sounds confusing. The reason is I like the technical work but I also like the global view of product development and the opportunity to affect policy related to organization structures.
So I find it hard to pick just one.
Personally, I'd like to be an engineer first like everyone who has posted so I can apply the technical skills I learned in classes. However, I would like to stay as an engineer as long as I could, but while moving up engineering titles. I like being hands-on with my work and understanding everything that is going within a project. Managers also know what is going on with projects, but they do not have the same hands on experience that the team members do. I do not see myself moving up in management because I'm not interested in moving up in a company and potentially leading multiple projects. However, things may change in the future depending on where life leads me, and where I can apply my experience.
Managers develop plans and schedules for reaching technical goals, such as new product development. Engineers focus on the job at hand, the focus of managers is on the team they are given to accomplish a task... An engineer relies on this technical skills, whereas a manager relies on the skills on the members of this team and gets the work done through motivation. Managers direct, plans, and coordinates activities, as well as spends time supervising employees. Engineers are responsible for developing the overall concepts of new products and solving problems that may prevent its completion.
In my personal opinion, I believe that I would succeed as an engineer due to the fact that I have always been an hands-on individual.Throughout my high school career, I preferred more hand-on projects as it became a way for me to express myself through different tasks. On the other hand, I would not like to be a manager as I do not believe I have all the necessary qualities. However, as an engineer role I have the ability to be the person to create inventions that I can see will make a difference in other people's lives. This interests me far more than just being a manager as I can be involved in different hands-on projects.
I would be an engineer for a few years to gain the technical experience necessary to understand the ins and outs of the industry. However, my true goal is to work with people so I would want to move into a higher level managerial position so I can work with other engineers and help accomplish company-related goals. I find a lot of value in working with people and accomplishing tasks together while assisting them to perform the highest quality work possible. In this sense, I would want to be a manager more than I would want to be an engineer, but in order to become a manager some experience as an engineer is needed.
Some people have goals of becoming a manager, I preferably would like to enhance my technical skills as an engineer to move on toward more prototyping and innovation. Management is more business based, and I am a big fan of keeping my hands on. As the other students have said, managers have a lot more administrative responsibilities, but as an engineer, especially if you have goals to start your own company, you follow one person: yourself. In other words, I enjoy being an engineer, but my stop wouldn’t be manager, my goal is to go beyond that and move toward business technology.
Like many of you who have already discussed your ideal career plans on this thread, I would also like to start my professional career as an engineer and work my way into management as my career progresses. I did not foresee myself enjoying the management side of engineering when I first started college as a biomedical engineering major, but after many group projects and this course in particular, I enjoyed it so much that I am pursuing a master's in Engineering Management next year. Although I prefer the management side when it comes to projects, I still enjoy the technical side and think it is very important to start off in that engineering role, like some of you mentioned, in order to be able to relate to the members of your team when you ultimately become a manager. Beginning your career as an engineer and working your way up to management seems to be the most effective route to success for those of us who enjoy both the engineering and management sides of project management.
Engineer and Manager are two very different terms considering the role which they play in a project. The engineer plays a technical role in a project most of the time while the manager plays more of an administrative role in the project. As a new graduate from a college most of the students get hired as GET( Graduate Engineer Trainee) and subsequently they get promoted until the managerial position where they have to manage teams. A manager generally can be hired directly with the proper background or can be made from a level 1 engineer as they gain experience over time. Both have importance of their own in completion of the project. One question which arises to my mind whenever I find such terms in a professional environment is that what makes a good manager or a good engineer are the roles interchangeable? Can a company hire a project personnel who can perform both the roles simultaneously? Is it ethical?
For the path after college, the GET or EIT depending on where you are may be specific for that role. Other places will have different levels of engineering that you can start in and you can keep moving up into different engineering roles. Not everyone I know who becomes a principal engineer will want to transition into managerial roles as they enjoy working in the technical side.
A good engineer and a good manager may be the same person as in the case of my manager currently. I don't think ethics play a role in this as there are technical managers and non-technical managers that work in the same organization. This is based on the understanding of both the manager and their director has for the expectations for that role and the time allocation for the work involved. It is all dependent on what they see as their role as a manager as well as what their reporting leader expects from them.
