New Engineer Switches Career to Become a Financial Advisor.

[hitnuggs]

I thought this might be interesting for the group so here it goes. I'm an engineer that manages a group of about 6 and we had just hired a fresh graduate about 4 months ago. She is incredibly sharp but she decided that engineering is not for her (I'm not biased at all ). Instead she is going to start her career as a financial advisor. She will be a personal assistant to a successful mentor and hopefully she will follow in her footsteps. I wish her luck but I didn't have the heart to mention that she is getting into sales. She was very excited about helping people achieve their financial goals. I wish her the best but I think she will be shocked that the majority of her success will include pushing product.


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[Meadbh]

When I hear stories like this I wonder whether this career move is prompted by a search for a culture that is perceived to be more female friendly. Notice that I said "perceived".

 

[NW-Bound]

My son told me of a coworker who left engineering soon after graduation to join a ministry. Strange things happen!

My daughter used to work with a guy who never worked as an engineer despite his ME degree. Perhaps he had trouble finding work as an engineer after graduation, but he was happy doing bookkeeping.

 

[cooch96]

One of our sharper young engineers quit after only five months. She basically told me working 55+ hours a week but getting paid forty wasn't her idea of a career. I didn't try to change her mind.

But she switched to work insurance! Told me she loves it so far, they have her doing risk assessment so she gets to poke her nose into a variety of businesses and, you know, asses risk. I don't think I could do it, I only seem to get satisfaction from seeing a physical product getting built.

 

[pb4uski]

....She was very excited about helping people achieve their financial goals. I wish her the best but I think she will be shocked that the majority of her success will include pushing product. ...

You might do her a favor and explain to her the difference between fee-only FAs and FAs who have to rely on peddling products to put food on the table.

...But she switched to work insurance! Told me she loves it so far, they have her doing risk assessment so she gets to poke her nose into a variety of businesses and, you know, asses risk. I don't think I could do it, I only seem to get satisfaction from seeing a physical product getting built.

At one point in my career I transitioned from financial management in real estate development to financial management in insurance. In real estate development we would take pictures of a site from the same spot at periodic intervals and have them in a slide projector (for those who remember what that is) and run then sequentially as a presentation. You could see the site being cleared, the foundation being dug and built, the steel being erected, and the curtain walls going up, etc.... it was pretty cool and the "result" of our collective work.

For insurance I liked to characterize it as we took in money, shuffled paper and paid out money... that's it.

 

[clifp]

I went from engineering to marketing after writing programs for only 3 years. I'd say the majority of my engineering friends were astounded and somewhat disgusted by the sell out.

There were more than a few jokes about the lobotomy that was needed to go into marketing.

I did point out there were actually women in marketing which helped justify the switch.

 

[mickeyd]

Instead she is going to start her career as a financial advisor. She will be
a personal assistant to a successful mentor and hopefully she will follow in her
footsteps. I wish her luck but I didn't have the heart to mention that she is
getting into sales. She was very excited about helping people achieve their
financial goals.

Financial advisor is a very generic term. Could be selling insurance. Could be training to be a stock broker. As I recall most folks that break into that line of work generally start out as a sales person. If you can make it in sales you can usually make it anywhere. But it's tough!

"Personal Assistant" makes it seem like a clerical (back office) job.

The bottom line is that if she realized she was not cut out to be an engineer, it's best to get out ASAP.

 

[rodi]

As a woman engineer I would say this is pretty common. A lot of newly graduated women engineers look around and see the old-boy network firmly in place. They see the lack of balance between work and home. They see more lucrative careers. And they make the switch.

I was active in SWE in college. Over half of my college peers changed from development engineering to program management, marketing, field support, the financial industry (a few brokers), etc. Perhaps that's why the percent of women engineering managers is so low relative to the percent graduating with engineering degrees.

I didn't change careers - but most of my peers who did were quite happy with their choices.

 

[hitnuggs]

As a woman engineer I would say this is pretty common. A lot of newly graduated women engineers look around and see the old-boy network firmly in place. They see the lack of balance between work and home. They see more lucrative careers. And they make the switch.

I was active in SWE in college. Over half of my college peers changed from development engineering to program management, marketing, field support, the financial industry (a few brokers), etc. Perhaps that's why the percent of women engineering managers is so low relative to the percent graduating with engineering degrees.

I didn't change careers - but most of my peers who did were quite happy with their choices.

I suspect that's what happened here. Her mentor is a woman and i think it is easier for her to see herself in a similar position 10 years from now. This is so frustrating because there is no easy answer. The It has to be beyond promoting women because my boss is a woman, my bosses boss is a woman and my bosses boss is a woman. The examples of successful women in this career were obvious and accessible. I guess at the end of the day each person is an individual and not a statistic. I don't want to read too much into it.


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[Texas Proud]

It is not uncommon for someone to go all the way through college and start their career only to change it to something different...

When I was in high school I did an intern at IBM... the guy that was in charge of the sales team had a chemical engineering degree... one time I asked him about it and he said that a college degree was just a ticket to get into the next level...

Another time when I was working there was a guy who had a law degree.... he would get a magazine from his college that was for all the people who got their law degree but did not practice law... it was a big number... I have been surprised learning that a number of national reporters that you see on TV have law degrees....

 

[samclem]

When I was in high school I did an intern at IBM...

Braggart!

Instead she is going to start her career as a financial advisor.

Oh, don't worry. I think you'll be seeing her again very soon.

 

[gauss]

It is not uncommon for someone to go all the way through college and start their career only to change it to something different...

What is particularly interesting is when they wait until after they have finished their PhD in Engineering or MD degree until they decide to make the change.

I have two friends in those situations.

Perhaps some kids are taught not to quit and this gets deeply engrained.

-gauss

 

[easysurfer]

I have a brother who followed this path. After graduating with an engineering degree and working for about a year, guess his path lied elsewhere and he got an MBA. He's retired now. I never new exactly what he did on his job. I think something like advising companies how to invest their 401Ks. But not sure.

I guess he did a Lou Gehrig in the baseball movie. He couldn't be uncle Otto and be the engineer that his parents wanted him to be, but instead chose what he really wanted to do.

 

[Texas Proud]

Braggart!

Nothing to brag about.... I went to customers and set up typewriters.... and in a pinch I would remove bad paper jams from copiers....

 

[Texas Proud]

What is particularly interesting is when they wait until after they have finished their PhD in Engineering or MD degree until they decide to make the change.

I have two friends in those situations.

Perhaps some kids are taught not to quit and this gets deeply engrained.

-gauss

Yea, kinda strange they would go all the way and then change....

I just missed the guy, but when I started to work in accounting... they said that this guy was there one day.... they told him what he was going to do and he said 'this is not what I want to do'... and quit... so, he had his accounting degree, had passed the CPA exam.... and then went back to college and became an MD....

 

[JoeWras]

It is no big deal, for both men and women.

I look at my engineering friends from college and less than 1/2 are in engineering today.

Heck, when I started at Megacorp #1 in the mid-80s, there was a whole group of us fresh faced engineering kids. Within 5 years, 1/4 of us were out of engineering.

 

[ERD50]

I ...

When I was in high school I did an intern at IBM... .

Braggart! ....

Nothing to brag about.... I went to customers and set up typewriters.... and in a pinch I would remove bad paper jams from copiers....

Texas, you missed the joke (I almost missed it)!

'I did an intern'.... versus 'I did an internship'... think 'presidential scandal', 'blue dress'.


-ERD50

 

[NW-Bound]

But Texas Proud is still right.

It's not something one wears as a badge of honor.

 

[samclem]

But Texas Proud is still right.

It's not something one wears as a badge of honor.

But he was still in high school--attaboy! Okay, okay, enough mileage from a crummy joke.

 

[rodi]

What is particularly interesting is when they wait until after they have finished their PhD in Engineering or MD degree until they decide to make the change.

I have two friends in those situations.

Perhaps some kids are taught not to quit and this gets deeply engrained.

-gauss

Yep - I worked with an engineer who had a law degree but never took the bar.

I was on a non-profit board with a woman who completed her medical residency and then stopped working as a doctor. When I met her she was an overachieving stay at home mom. But she stopped practicing medicine about 10 years before she had her son. She said she never enjoyed practicing medicine but at each stage she figured she had to complete the next level since she had so much invested... until she finished her residency.

 

[Texas Proud]

Texas, you missed the joke (I almost missed it)!

'I did an intern'.... versus 'I did an internship'... think 'presidential scandal', 'blue dress'.


-ERD50

But he was still in high school--attaboy! Okay, okay, enough mileage from a crummy joke.

OK... yep missed it completely

And I guess I should have put down just after high school... but I digress...

 

[redduck]

Texas, you missed the joke (I almost missed it)!

'I did an intern'.... versus 'I did an internship'... think 'presidential scandal', 'blue dress'.

-ERD50

Heck, I missed the joke twice. Finally understood it when ERD50 explained it, which included underlining and italicizing. (It was a good joke).

 

[kgtest]

One of the brightest software engineers I have met in my career graduated Cosmetology School...he is a guy. When I met him on the job, his superior had a hard time taking him seriously knowing that. 3 years later that guy is making a lot more $$ than the jokester superior he had in his past job.

I went from framing houses straight into software engineering. A lot of people who interview me for jobs find that path very interesting. I think there is a stigma that a construction worker is a rough and tough guy, but that doesn't mean he doesn't know how to engineer things, including software. I don't have any formal college degree, and I make more than most of the peers that graduated High School with me. I am a highly driven and motivated person.

My eldest sibling loves finance. She loves talking about the loans she approves and how much people are worth. I like being involved with creating software.

Different strokes for different folks. BTW, I don't regret getting out of construction one minute. I miss the outdoor work, but that's what trips to the Caribbean are for lol.

 

[ERhoosier]

What is particularly interesting is when they wait until after they have finished their PhD in Engineering or MD degree until they decide to make the change.

I have two friends in those situations.

Perhaps some kids are taught not to quit and this gets deeply engrained.

-gauss

Or perhaps schools are not teaching the realities of what actually WORKING in those fields entails.

 

[GalaxyBoy]

We had a young architect quit after a couple of years to become a physical therapist. An engineer quit after about a year to become a teacher. I think most everyone thought highly of them for following their passions.