
Engineering: Suddenly Sexy for College Grads - raju
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/nov2008/tc20081113_488542.htm
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potatolicious
Bah, we don't need these people. I'm not being bitter, I'm honestly not. I
will be graduating soon (a few months), and I have seen many of these
engineers-turned-bankers first-hand. We don't need them; the engineering
profession wouldn't benefit from having them.

There are two types of people who go to college for engineering: those who
truly love coding, circuit design, mechanical design, etc, and those who do it
for lack of a better thing to do.

The first type are the ones who stay up late hacking, read up on the news, and
keep themselves on the bleeding edge. They're the ones who know what they're
doing.

The second type invariably just does the coursework needed to pass and get his
degree. He's usually incompetent when it comes to his field of study, because
his brain is filled with thoughts of paychecks and bonuses, not technical
problems.

We don't need them. And I'm sure when the tech industry takes a tumble next
time they'll all be gone again, to whatever field promises to be lucrative.

~~~
Dilpil
God I hate the second type.

The second type is the type that attempts to turn every class into an orgy of
pure memorization, trying to shoehorn every type of problem into a rote
formula, while avoiding anything resembling understanding of the material.

~~~
potatolicious
I find the second type to usually be solid when it comes to theory, but
utterly hopeless when it comes to implementation. They can draw you UML
diagrams (so long as you don't stray too far from the coursework), but when it
comes down to putting down code, they're lost.

The thing that bugs me about these people is not so much that they're
incompetent, but they are so because they have no passions. I have a passion
for code, other people have a passion for cooking, or writing, or whatever.
All of the people I've met in engineering who aren't into it, also aren't into
anything else, and I have a lot of trouble imagining how a person can exist in
that state. I see so many people who are absolutely _driven_ by the things
they love, and somehow these people are just sitting around, not interested in
anything except taking home a fat paycheck (to spend on what?)

~~~
azanar
It depends on what you define as theory, though. Things like analysis and
extending algorithms, and understanding the concept of recursion, fall well
into the realm of theory. People I've dealt with of the second type go
completely off-course with this, too.

I've found they do ok when it comes to questions like "Define and give me an
example of a ______", but become utterly lost when given a question such as
"Design and implement in pseudocode a set of data structures/classes/etc. to
accomplish vaguely-defined task x." As soon as you call upon them to apply
their knowledge of theory to something they haven't memorized, they become
completely lost. Maybe I'm just worrying over the semantics of the word theory
too much.

I agree about how the lack of passion can be unbelievably annoying. Though,
it's encouraging you've seen so many driven people, see them as a positive. I
wish more people had that same attitude.

~~~
potatolicious
I agree, and I suppose by "theory" I mean anything that isn't code (even
pseudocode). I've met many "type 2s" who can give you a great database and
object model for whatever you feed them, but would be utterly lost if ever
asked to translate into code.

And God help them if you describe a bug to them and ask them where they'd
begin looking.

In the end it boils down to not _doing_. To be good at anything you need
practice and experience, not just rote knowledge. Type 2s do not have this,
since nobody holds a gun up to their head and makes them code till the early
morn.

------
aneesh
It's interesting that he made the argument about smart people developing
exotic financial instruments not having much societal benefit. The same
argument could probably be made of most (but not all) tech startups. The next
facebook widget, or cool web-app is hardly going solve our environmental &
health problems.

~~~
justindz
I've heard this criticism frequently of late. Very few Facebook widgets are
going to improve the human condition (Scrabulous aside, of course). I wonder
if the problem is related to such businesses requiring more emphasis on
physical products, interfaces to external groups and labor and other things
which turn off start-ups or raise the cost barrier. I don't know, but it's
worth thinking about what the extra barrier might be and how to knock it down.
I would bet the answer is not a lack of compassion, but something to do with
the general requirements. The barrier couldn't be lower, these days, for a
Facebook app but of course a good challenge is one that leaves a huge distance
behind you to the next competitor.

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maurycy
Isn't it well known correlation? Better economy translates to sexier MBA.
Worser economy means sexier engineering.

------
aswanson
_Early in his college career, Tyler Bosmeny assumed that after graduating, he
would do what hundreds of other self-respecting Harvard University
engineering, math, and science students do: take a job on Wall Street._

It's funny how it seems to be common knowledge in the elite schools that a
technical career is to be avoided by people majoring in technical subjects.
Perhaps that one piece of knowledge makes the exhorbitant cost of admission
worth it. The joke is on the unwashed technical proletariat, after all.

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sh1mmer
I wonder where the media get these random stats from. "We asked 3 engineering
students and 2 of them said they would consider an engineering job over a
banking job" I'd be surprised if anyone could plot a graduating trend in such
a short period of time since the media started causing a buzz about the
"financial crisis".

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mattmaroon
Wow I wish people would stop using "sexy" in ways that make no sense.

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river_styx
Awesome, now I've got the skills to be scoring all the hot chicks!

