Seeking Engineering Insight Opportunities for Professional Growth

Jake-Thomas Bamber said:

I'm reaching out to see if anyone would be willing to invite me for insight days or offer opportunities to learn more about these areas within their job roles.

It is unfortunately very difficult to find these opportunities through a blanket request (although never say never - see last paragraph). It's not that people don't want to be helpful, it's just that a useful discussion takes a fair bit of time of effort, and there's lots and lots of people out there who would like similar discussions.

BUT it's human nature to want to go that extra mile for someone you've made a personal connection with. So it tends to work much better if you can make a connection with someone first and then ask - or to use an existing connection.  If you can find any face-to-face engineering events, including of course IET events, then it might be worth attending those and trying to strike up coffee break discussions. 99 out of 100 won't lead to anything, but the 100th might. Also try to make contact with any of your MOD cohorts who've since left, or anyone you met through college courses etc, they may well be happy to have a useful conversation. And of course any other friends and family.

As another angle (which of course you might already have thought of), it might be worth seeing if there are any recruitment fairs near you - just Google "careers fairs" or "jobs fairs" or "recruitment fairs", maybe try "event" in place of "fair", maybe including the word "engineering". Again, go in with sensible expectations: you might get a feel for the range of jobs out there and the type of qualifications and experience they are looking for, and there's just a chance you'll find one or two chatty companies who will be willing to spend a bit of time talking sensibly about this. You will need to work out which are the shiny suited recruiters, who actually know nothing about engineering and are just trying to collect CVs, so that you don't waste your time with them. 

When having these conversations, however you get there, be careful to do lots of listening. I've interviewed a lot of ex-forces personnel over the years, and employed a fair few, and it is very common for them to spend far too long telling me about various parts of their experience which were terribly important and valued in their forces role, and are of little interest in a civilian role. What you've asked here is a really good and sensible question, which could be put as "how do I found out what skills and experience are needed in civilian roles"  - keep asking that and listening to the answer. Your skills will be transferrable, but be honest that not of them will be, and there will be others that you will need to learn. 

On that note, you will probably find that civilian management skills are often very different to military management skills: to put it crudely, civilian employees can very often walk out and find another job if they don't like the way you tell them to do things. Potential employers will be really pleased that you have some management experience as many technicians have had absolutely zero, just be honest about the fact that you'll want to keep learning how to lead a team in a non-military environment. (It was hilarious when I had an ex-RN Commander and an ex-RN CPO both working for me, the Commander could not get his head around the fact that now they were in civvy street the CPO could simply turn round to him and say "no I'm not doing that"! *  The ex-CPO did do what I asked him to - mostly - but that was because I asked him very nicely...).

By the way, in all these discussions do not talk in military acronyms and terminology - the rest of us don't know what they mean. All of us get bad at this, I work broadly in railway signalling which is dreadful for having its own language, but I find the forces can be such an enclosed world that it can be easier than most to assume that everyone knows what you mean. However, again, you're going the right way about this - learn about the civilian world and its language before trying to move into it. 

And of course hopefully my opening paragraph will not put off anyone here who would like to help!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! There is a wealth of experience here, but to really help you it needs to be a conversation. 

Good luck!

Andy

( * Of course "no I'm not doing that" is a substitute for what he actually said, but what he actually said would break a number of forum rules...)

Jake-Thomas Bamber said:

I'm reaching out to see if anyone would be willing to invite me for insight days or offer opportunities to learn more about these areas within their job roles.

It is unfortunately very difficult to find these opportunities through a blanket request (although never say never - see last paragraph). It's not that people don't want to be helpful, it's just that a useful discussion takes a fair bit of time of effort, and there's lots and lots of people out there who would like similar discussions.

BUT it's human nature to want to go that extra mile for someone you've made a personal connection with. So it tends to work much better if you can make a connection with someone first and then ask - or to use an existing connection.  If you can find any face-to-face engineering events, including of course IET events, then it might be worth attending those and trying to strike up coffee break discussions. 99 out of 100 won't lead to anything, but the 100th might. Also try to make contact with any of your MOD cohorts who've since left, or anyone you met through college courses etc, they may well be happy to have a useful conversation. And of course any other friends and family.

As another angle (which of course you might already have thought of), it might be worth seeing if there are any recruitment fairs near you - just Google "careers fairs" or "jobs fairs" or "recruitment fairs", maybe try "event" in place of "fair", maybe including the word "engineering". Again, go in with sensible expectations: you might get a feel for the range of jobs out there and the type of qualifications and experience they are looking for, and there's just a chance you'll find one or two chatty companies who will be willing to spend a bit of time talking sensibly about this. You will need to work out which are the shiny suited recruiters, who actually know nothing about engineering and are just trying to collect CVs, so that you don't waste your time with them. 

When having these conversations, however you get there, be careful to do lots of listening. I've interviewed a lot of ex-forces personnel over the years, and employed a fair few, and it is very common for them to spend far too long telling me about various parts of their experience which were terribly important and valued in their forces role, and are of little interest in a civilian role. What you've asked here is a really good and sensible question, which could be put as "how do I found out what skills and experience are needed in civilian roles"  - keep asking that and listening to the answer. Your skills will be transferrable, but be honest that not of them will be, and there will be others that you will need to learn. 

On that note, you will probably find that civilian management skills are often very different to military management skills: to put it crudely, civilian employees can very often walk out and find another job if they don't like the way you tell them to do things. Potential employers will be really pleased that you have some management experience as many technicians have had absolutely zero, just be honest about the fact that you'll want to keep learning how to lead a team in a non-military environment. (It was hilarious when I had an ex-RN Commander and an ex-RN CPO both working for me, the Commander could not get his head around the fact that now they were in civvy street the CPO could simply turn round to him and say "no I'm not doing that"! *  The ex-CPO did do what I asked him to - mostly - but that was because I asked him very nicely...).

By the way, in all these discussions do not talk in military acronyms and terminology - the rest of us don't know what they mean. All of us get bad at this, I work broadly in railway signalling which is dreadful for having its own language, but I find the forces can be such an enclosed world that it can be easier than most to assume that everyone knows what you mean. However, again, you're going the right way about this - learn about the civilian world and its language before trying to move into it. 

And of course hopefully my opening paragraph will not put off anyone here who would like to help!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! There is a wealth of experience here, but to really help you it needs to be a conversation. 

Good luck!

Andy

( * Of course "no I'm not doing that" is a substitute for what he actually said, but what he actually said would break a number of forum rules...)