Electrical Design Courses & Regulations Recommendations (London, UK)

Adrian


I would not be to sure that you are to old to study and be a designer. I was the senior electrical designer for a company and tried to recruit an electrical designer to replace me. The company paid big money to a recruitment consultant to provide qualified and experienced people. We also advertised on this web site for the same. I was able to offer a very good pay package to a suitable candidate and even more if they could do mechanical design.


I was provided with many impressive CVs with people having glowing accounts of themselves. The selection process was an interview asking questions on how to carry out a design and do some simple calculations. I interviewed a number of applicants. Now the CVs all said they had an outstanding knowledge of BS 7671 and other standards plus experience of design. After the introduction the 1st question was "we have a design just come in to the office for 3 blocks of flats sitting above a basement car park what standards are we going to apply? Then I get a load of waffle about the importance of standards and the need to be compliant but no list of standards. I press a bit harder and ask for a list of standards to be applied and more waffle. I am expecting BS 7671, BS 5839, BS 5266, BS 9991 and 9999 and BS 8519 to trip off the tongue for an experienced designer to trip off the tongue. Most of them could not even state BS 7671 or the 18th Edition with prompting. So lets try another question there is a 1MVA transformer in the basement of this building what sort of prospective fault current would this deliver? Again more waffle and B*****t. At that point interview terminated and out of the door as we are not paying £50K plus a package for B******ters.


A couple half managed some of the questions and I thought they could be recruited at a junior level and worked on to develop in to a designer so got to stage 2 of the interview which was an Amtech test which they all said in reply to the adverts they were experts. They were presented with a lap top with Amtech already booted up with a sheet of A4 with some basic design information to input. Again totaley clueless with one even managing to switch the computer off!


One old boy cruised the interview and punched all the information in to the Amtech with ease. I was in very poor health but I recruited him but he only lasted 2 weeks due to his health which was a shame.


We tried outsourcing the work to consulantancies as I could not meet the demands of the work coming in to the office. It took me more time to correct their designs than it would to do them myself from scratch. In the end we were outsourcing the work to the Philappines , send it before leaving the office and it was there the next morning due to the time difference. Good work needing much intervention.


So if you are very good at design and can prove it there is good jobs out there for you!

Adrian


I would not be to sure that you are to old to study and be a designer. I was the senior electrical designer for a company and tried to recruit an electrical designer to replace me. The company paid big money to a recruitment consultant to provide qualified and experienced people. We also advertised on this web site for the same. I was able to offer a very good pay package to a suitable candidate and even more if they could do mechanical design.


I was provided with many impressive CVs with people having glowing accounts of themselves. The selection process was an interview asking questions on how to carry out a design and do some simple calculations. I interviewed a number of applicants. Now the CVs all said they had an outstanding knowledge of BS 7671 and other standards plus experience of design. After the introduction the 1st question was "we have a design just come in to the office for 3 blocks of flats sitting above a basement car park what standards are we going to apply? Then I get a load of waffle about the importance of standards and the need to be compliant but no list of standards. I press a bit harder and ask for a list of standards to be applied and more waffle. I am expecting BS 7671, BS 5839, BS 5266, BS 9991 and 9999 and BS 8519 to trip off the tongue for an experienced designer to trip off the tongue. Most of them could not even state BS 7671 or the 18th Edition with prompting. So lets try another question there is a 1MVA transformer in the basement of this building what sort of prospective fault current would this deliver? Again more waffle and B*****t. At that point interview terminated and out of the door as we are not paying £50K plus a package for B******ters.


A couple half managed some of the questions and I thought they could be recruited at a junior level and worked on to develop in to a designer so got to stage 2 of the interview which was an Amtech test which they all said in reply to the adverts they were experts. They were presented with a lap top with Amtech already booted up with a sheet of A4 with some basic design information to input. Again totaley clueless with one even managing to switch the computer off!


One old boy cruised the interview and punched all the information in to the Amtech with ease. I was in very poor health but I recruited him but he only lasted 2 weeks due to his health which was a shame.


We tried outsourcing the work to consulantancies as I could not meet the demands of the work coming in to the office. It took me more time to correct their designs than it would to do them myself from scratch. In the end we were outsourcing the work to the Philappines , send it before leaving the office and it was there the next morning due to the time difference. Good work needing much intervention.


So if you are very good at design and can prove it there is good jobs out there for you!