Engineers for Administrative Jobs

I am an engineer by education and have been an engineer by profession before jumping into the pool of aspirants who write exams to crack administrative jobs.

 

I have written exams like IIT-JEE, AIEEE, State Engineering Test, CAT, GRE, IB-ACIO, SSC, RBI Grade B, MNRE Scientist B, State Group-I Services, and UPSC Civil Services.

 

I have in my network people from different backgrounds like engineers, doctors, commerce graduates, CAs, Lawyers.  And the network belongs to all classes - Upper, Middle, and Poor; Rural and Urban.  And been in the field of competitive exam preparation for 6 years. I do have an overall view about the questions we are here to discuss: What is right and wrong for an engineer?

 

Why an engineer should stick with his/her core domain?

India needs more engineers than ever.  MBA grads in India are paid more, however, the world over engineers are valued more than MBA graduates.  And with new entrepreneurs and businesses being built in India, Engineers are in more demand.  Many startups too, prefer to take engineers with diverse experiences than a generic MBA graduate who is much more useful to run a business when it's made.

 

Why an engineer should not stick with his/her core domain?

When you are considering switching domains.  It is important to consider your skillset- a set of skills that you rely on more often than not to do daily work and create value. If they are not your analytical and technical skills like domain knowledge, skill to use tools- software, drive to build better things.  Then you should consider switching your domain based on assessment of following skills-

Important skillset for engineers to have when considering UPSC Civil Services?

1. 1. Expression - to write answers
   2. Comprehension - to have an overview of the subject under study and to be able to dwell deeply into a subject to provide substantive evidence to support your arguments
   3. Analytical Mindset - to crack and perform well in the competitive atmosphere
   4. Discipline- To sit for hours together to gain competency over 1 of 1000 topics you will likely study
   5. Smartness- i.e. ability to apply mind given any situation and act with reason.  This is a very important trait that is available to engineers because of the ability to think from first principles however given the interaction remains with people there is a need for empathetic touch to intelligence and smartness.

 

Important skillset for engineers to have when considering RBI Grade B?

1. Analytical Mindset - Very important to perform well within sectional timing set for exam

2. Strategic Mindset - Being able to drive your effort based on feedback is important for RBI Grade B because of the short timeframe available between exams.

3. Conceptual Thinking - Finance and other technical subjects dominate this exam. Hence, conceptual clarity and the ability to comprehend them in everyday language is a very important trait to clear this exam.

 

Important skillset for engineers to have when considering IB-ACIO, SSC Exams?

1. Ability to do routine tasks - This is an important trait when it comes to practicing similar problems because doing so helps to find better and faster ways of solving problems in very less time which is important for SSC and IB ACIO kinds of jobs.

 

Important skillset for engineers to have when considering CAT or GRE?

1. Analytical Mindset - Because of the toughness of these exams and because of the more logical nature of English and quantitative aptitude in these tests, being analytical which is the core of any engineer gives them an edge in such exams.

 

Engineers form a large part of aspirants who appear for almost all competitive exams except the ones which require specialized education in the field. And they have been successful in doing the job.  But it is a big waste of time and effort if you want to change field later in life unless it is driven by your self-interest.  Hence, engineers more than anyone should do a thorough self-assessment before choosing a goal. If more years are spent in preparation, then they very well can face an identity crisis when who they are as a person doesn't sync with their education and their profession.