I’ve got a lot of experience in shock, vibration, and acoustics analysis/test/design for aerospace applications. Missiles, jet engines, aircraft, etc. This industry is starting to feel like middle class welfare, and I want to see what options I have in tech. Looking around I’ve seen jobs like mechanical/hardware engineering for, say, speaker/acoustic design or shock/vibration mitigation of consumer electronics, and I think those may be a fit. Question really is, anyone who works in a field like this or knows people who do, what backgrounds do those engineers have? Are there plenty of aerospace/defense transplants? And further, any advice on how to “break in” to the industry from where I am? What types of job titles/keywords should I look for? I’ve consistently been a top, top performer at every aerospace company I’ve worked at. I’m starting to come to terms with the fact that, if you’re the smartest person in the room, you’re in the wrong room. TC: 108K YOE: 7 years / BSME #tech #aviation
Big tech (Apple, Meta Reality Labs, Google Hardware, Amazon Lab126, etc) stereotypically has generalists (from usually top engineering schools) on the product design mechanical engineering side. Meaning they generally want someone familiar with how to design for a drop event, talk PCB design with the EEs, injection molding tool design with your Asian counterparts, and tit for tat trade fundamentals with whatever physicists or specialist design the specific function you’re working on. All in one person. This is why in general it’s difficult for someone not having that breadth, specifically aerospace where your development cycle is in years to decades, to get a big tech mechanical. However the more specialized the group is, the less this is true. For example, there’s many more transplants from aerospace into the reliability groups, to do things like test for shock and vibe. So your luck will be better for the support groups over the core design ones, but you never know until you try!
I started as an aerospace engineer, but quickly pivoted into roles where I was dealing more with math, and now I work in AIML. I think if you start interviewing, you can get into a position where you at least know what those companies are looking for, and how to position yourself to get the experience you need to appeal to them.