> You might call me an unlikely candidate to lead an engine program from scratch, but I was hired by ABL in 2018 to do just that. My background was in commercial aircraft interiors, web development, semiconductor fab fluid components, and SpaceX Falcon 9 hydraulic systems.
I don't mean this as an insult, but why did they hire you? It's obvious now that you were a great choice, but from your background story I wouldn't have guessed that to be true.
Seems like from the blogpost that the writer and the founder were part of the same cohort at SpaceX. I would hazard a guess that they became friends, and had planned to do this together, and he joined ("hired") as soon as feasible for him (or the founder gained enough traction to pull him away from SpaceX).
Oh and as an additional comment: Propulsion Engineers are a niche, specialized branch of mechanical engineers. They are the ones who usually design engines.
The writer probably was referring to the fact that he was just a regular mechanical engineer and not a Propulsion Engineer.
I don't mean this as an insult, but why did they hire you? It's obvious now that you were a great choice, but from your background story I wouldn't have guessed that to be true.