- Plan Your Education
- Explore Education Options
- Prepare for College
- Pay for College
- Apply to College
- How to Choose a Major
- Education Search Tools
Employer Quotes
The quotes below are from employers in this industry: Engineering
They are talking about this topic: Experience & Credentials
The quotes below are about this issue:
Internships and other forms of practical experience are highly sought after in new hires.
| "It depends on the position. For us, for a mechanical technician or maintenance technician, even if they've got some experience and no schooling, we would take a look at them. Or with no experience and some schooling. We're not seeing a lot of two-year degrees. That's kind of what we want for those entry-level positions, but we just aren't seeing the applicants with those two-year degrees." | Central |
| "Some of the shortfall might be just some of the hands-on experience—more mechanical in our production facilities." | Central |
| "If we find an engineer that has the skills and some work experience, they're very easy to place." | Central |
| "Anything from welding to mechanical experience, fixing things, just general repairs. In our facility, you're not going to have outside experience that prepares you to know how to fix our machines. They're unique to our industry. We want someone who's a quick learner and mechanically inclined, that's what we're looking for. Because then we have to do all the training on the machines." | Central |
| "A comment to me was, 'Well, I've talked to some electrical engineers, but they've never been exposed to anything like three-phase motor or any of those kinds of things coming out of their school.' I don't know how valid that comment is, but that comment was made. So, there is somewhat of a disconnect, I think." | Metro |
| "One change that we see in our engineering program—I don't know if anyone is familiar with how they approach the engineering training other than just coursework—there is some coursework, but it is very project-based. And we just recently hired a December 2011 grad out of the first class, and we've got two more coming from the May 2012 class in mechanical. I really like that they had practical experience on these projects, and a number of these projects were with our existing clients. Those folks haven't started working yet, so I can't report back as to how effective they are, but that was very appealing, at least in my group, to see engineers who have basically operated as consultants through their courses. They've worked on about four pretty major projects where they had to go in and listen, see what the problem was to the client, come back to a team, and solve the problem. And they were multi-discipline teams. They needed some electrical and some mechanical, and then produce a product for them." | Metro |
| "Maybe not the whole program being project-based courses, but having those opportunities for students to have some real-life experiences." | Metro |
| "One thing that has been different with the candidates that we're seeing currently versus four or five years ago is the number of internships that they are doing. I think it is less. They tend to have less practical experience. They can have a very good GPA but no internship. Some of them have good excuses, but then you have this person that has four internships every summer, and it is the same economy and he or she is still able to be that. So, we still try to find people with that kind of practical experience, but we also understand that it doesn't always happen. If they were able to have a research opportunity through school or they were able to do something outside of schoolwork...but I think the economy had an impact on the availability of those internships." | Metro |
| "They are given some more leadership opportunities through these design projects, and I think that is an area where—here at our company—we're looking not only for the technical skills, but also the people skills, and then leadership. Many people need to be able to lead projects, so the opportunity for leadership skills in either project teams in school or some extracurricular organizations is important for us." | Metro |
| "I think what looks really great is an outstanding academic record, some nice practical experience, and training in the areas that we're working in. It is sort of simple really. Yeah, practical experience. I think the internships are great, or if they manage to get some work experience somewhere along the line that has to do with the work that we're doing. That is excellent." | Metro |
| "We do look for people that have had internships potentially with large companies, and maybe have traveled. We also get to choose from international students. Students that have those skills and understand other cultures are a great asset to us." | Metro |
| "The strongest candidates by far, if they're young and early in their career, are those that have served internships. That is the most important thing, having some type of related work experience to go with the degree." | Northeast |
| "It is just getting a candidate with that specific knowledge, and then the skill sets that match the salary." | Northwest |
| "What involvement did they have while they were going to school? Did they treasure their engineering club? What kind of activities were they involved in? I like to see that on their resumes." | Northwest |
| "Maybe [MnSCU college] ought to buy a farm here and have everybody out there fixing stuff." | Northwest |
| "We hear that a lot about farming—that if it is a manufacturing-related position, they'll sometimes take a farmer without any experience whatsoever and train them over a candidate that maybe has six months over them and is an engineer. So, how do you implement that into a college career?" | Northwest |
| "I think if an engineer maybe didn't do as well on his GPA, but he grew up on a farm, he will go up on our list just because farmers usually know how to apply things. With a 3.5 GPA and a farmer background, you're hired. If they grew up on a farm, they just know how to apply things. They think a little differently, and that would just be a plus." | Northwest |
| "If a candidate is coming from a different industry, and they're going to take six months to a year to really add value and get up to speed, you have to be really careful with that. In fact, that is a deal breaker." | Northwest |
| "If somebody came to us fresh out of college as a mechanical engineer, and they could come into our facilities and know what we're doing as an industry and what the requirements are, that would definitely be helpful. But there are so many industries out there, so it would be difficult for educators to cater to each industry. We understand that." | Northwest |
| "When we have hired people right out of college, they have been very well prepared in general. And then we can kind of mold them. But sometimes we need someone to just hit the ground running. When I'm looking for experience, I'm looking specifically in our industry [packaging], and that is what's so difficult." | Northwest |
| "I would hire someone who had an internship over someone who didn't just because I know they have some experience." | Northwest |
| "I think we've got three interns in Mankato this year, all from [MnSCU college]. We've put about eight interns in a year to the company. It's a good way for us to test drive them, and for them to test drive us." | Southwest |
| "I think in our industry internships are pretty common. In fact, I can't even imagine hiring a graduate that hasn't had an internship. Because there's enough people out there who have." | Southwest |
| "That's something that I've been looking for in even in the new graduates. If they've had a little bit of shop experience in the past, it's a very big plus when you're going into a manufacturing environment like we have." | Southwest |
| "As a manufacturer, the one thing I would like to see in an engineer coming out of school is a little more background in actually working on the machines. When I came out of school as a mechanical engineer, we had a couple of days where you're actually running a mill or a lathe or something. And then you get to work, and you design these great parts, and you pass them on to manufacturing and they're like, 'There's no way we can make that.'" | Southwest |
| "For our industry, unless they have experience to go along with that advanced degree, they've just narrowed their field of where they can be hired. They're going to expect more pay, and therefore it's going to cost more. And we would rather wait; we want to make sure that they're the right candidate." | Southwest |
| "Some of the things that were said before about having some experience, like for mechanical engineers or electrical engineers, having some actual experience in the field with machinery or experience on-site with different tolerance requirements. One thing that we're noticing is that, for the industries we serve, the requirements are just getting tougher and tougher in terms of quality requirements and things like that. So, yeah, that experience in the field is really going to be more and more important. It's one thing—from an engineering standpoint—to be able to lay something out. It's another thing to actually be able to manufacture it. And that correlation is really important." | Southwest |