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Advice / Recommendations for Career Transition into Engineering.

James S

Hi all!

I have a First Class MEng in Engineering Mathematics from University of Bristol and ~4 years of experience as a Data Engineer at several different clients. I now want to transition away from screen-based work into a more applied, technical role where my mathematical background is used in a real-world setting.

I am definitively not looking for work that primarily involves being sat at a desk in an office or from home (such as pure software/data positions).

Instead, I’m particularly interested in roles that involve:
- Physical on-site, field, or operational exposure (not fully remote) with opportunity to travel
- Regular in-person collaboration and stakeholder interaction
- Environments such as engineering, infrastructure, energy, defence, transport, or technical consulting
- Applied problem-solving and quantitative analysis
- Engineering or systems-level thinking

If you’re aware of any opportunities aligned with the above, can put me in contact with anyone who can advise, or have any advice of your own, I would very much appreciate it and would very much be open to a conversation.

Thank you for your time.

  • 0

    I must admit I'm struggling to think of any jobs that require an on-site mathematician.

  • 0

    I agree with Simon - I think you will struggle to meet all of those, so you may need to prioritise them.

    You are more likely to find higher levels of on-site activities in the Civil Engineering industry. But even there, you will end up desk bound for periods as the assurance evidence still needs to be prepared. Most of the civil engineering companies I know take on apprentices and civil engineering graduates.

    Possibly there may be some verification/validation test type roles, although a lot of testing (in an electronics at least) is generally automated. The issue here is that these sorts of companies are few and far between and these sorts of tasks have generally been outsourced to other countries.

    Even if you joined a consultancy company, you might be on the clients site, but the client may have you preparing documentation (and probably will). A position in a consultancy company might be the closest fit for you here.

    You will eventually end up desk bound like the rest of us, because ultimately as you progress you end up doing the project management, planning and processes (sorry). Although again, it depends what opportunities and direction you take. Some of our senior technical experts definitely escape from their desks and get to do travel, stakeholder interaction and collaboration.

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