The Engineers' Tribune - Q1 2025

Freedom and Ants

Welcome to the first issue of The Engineers’ Tribune! We’re thrilled to have you join us on this journey. In our inaugural edition, we’re sharing two articles that reflect on some of the challenges we’ve faced since graduating—and the lessons we’ve learned along the way. The first article delves into the often-overlooked struggles of transitioning into industry, while the second examines the tension between the practical benefits of engineering and its evolving value proposition in the business world. We hope these pieces spark conversation and resonate with your own experiences.

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The Challenges of Directionless Freedom

Written by Joe F.

Graduating from college marks an exciting yet uncertain phase of life. For years, your goals have been shaped by external structures like grades, projects, and academic milestones. Without these clear-cut objectives, navigating personal and professional aspirations can feel daunting. The transition to independence can be exhilarating but also overwhelming (and sometimes underwhelming) as you grapple with the vastness of possibilities.

I have personally struggled to find a balance between chasing the next goal and enjoying the life I've built. When you finally reach a goal, it can even result in feelings of emptiness and directionlessness. After all, the journey often holds greater value than the destination. School revolves around objective, definable goals, but personal and professional aspirations frequently thrive on being more abstract.

As you venture into this new chapter, you're likely to face challenges you've never encountered before. Suddenly, the world feels bigger and less predictable. The structure that once guided your days has disappeared, and with it comes the freedom to shape your life—but also the responsibility to figure out what that means. It's a thrilling yet intimidating realization, and many of us aren't prepared for the ambiguity that accompanies it.

Structural Discontinuity and Systemic Challenges

The transition from academia to the workplace is rarely seamless. A mixed-methods study by Richards et al. (Journal of Vocational Behavior) followed 1,247 early-career STEM professionals and identified three key hurdles:

1. Misalignment between academic and professional evaluation systems

2. Limited transferability of academic skills

3. Psychological stress from reduced structural guidance

Their findings were likely surprising to an outsider, but closely matched anecdotal evidence I’ve heard from peers: 73% of graduates reported significant anxiety during their first two years, with neurodivergent professionals and individuals from underrepresented backgrounds struggling the most. These challenges underscore the need for a more integrated approach to preparing students for the realities of the professional world.

Meanwhile, Masten and Reed (American Psychologist) explored how neuroplasticity¹ enables career adaptation. Their work revealed that cognitive flexibility can transform uncertainty into growth, leading to:

• 40% higher job satisfaction

• 35% greater likelihood of innovation

• Reduced stress-related health issues

This research highlights a critical intersection between cognitive science and career readiness: transitions aren’t just logistical—they’re deeply neurological. Equipping students with adaptive skills before they graduate could make a tangible difference in how they perceive and handle uncertainty.

Systemic gaps further complicate this process. According to Jones and Ramirez (Inside Higher Ed), graduates feel unprepared due to a lack of mentorship, unclear career pathways, and insufficient early-career guidance. Longitudinal research by Smith et al. (Journal of Adult Development) confirms the importance of aligning professional goals with personal values, while Maria Clark (Navigating Life Transitions: Tools for Success) highlights reflective practices like journaling as tools for navigating professional uncertainty.

Resilience is key. Positive psychology research underscores that skills like reframing challenges, building support networks, and practicing emotional intelligence significantly improve career outcomes. Professionals who actively develop these skills report:

• 47% higher job retention rates

• Increased cross-disciplinary collaboration

• Enhanced problem-solving capacity

Connecting the Dots

These studies converge on a powerful conclusion: the college-to-professional transition is not just an adjustment of skills but a recalibration of mindsets. While technical expertise remains essential, its value diminishes without the psychological tools to adapt to ambiguity and change. This suggests a need to reimagine how institutions prepare students—not just academically but holistically.

Universities could integrate career adaptation frameworks directly into their curricula. For example:

• Embedding cognitive flexibility exercises in coursework to simulate real-world problem-solving

• Offering structured mentorship programs that bridge academic and professional contexts

• Designing workshops or courses on resilience and reflective practices to help students build emotional intelligence and career self-efficacy

The implications are profound. By aligning educational practices with what we now understand about neuroplasticity, resilience, and personal values, institutions can empower graduates to approach their careers not with anxiety but with confidence and adaptability. This shift could reduce early-career attrition rates, improve innovation outcomes, and create a generation of professionals who are both technically proficient and psychologically resilient.

On a personal level, these findings resonate deeply with my own career experience. Transitioning between roles often felt less like a straight path and more like a series of recalibrations. The research underscores a simple yet profound truth: professional growth thrives in uncertainty when met with intentional adaptation. More importantly, it invites us to consider how we might better support those beginning this journey, equipping them with the tools to navigate the uncharted terrain of their careers.

Emerging Trends in Professional Development

The world of STEM is more exciting and dynamic than ever before. Gone are the days of rigid career paths and predictable trajectories. Instead, we're entering an era of incredible possibility where the most valuable skill is your ability to adapt, learn, and reimagine your potential.

Current research paints a picture of successful STEM professionals:

• They're interdisciplinary thinkers who can connect dots across different fields

• They embrace technological disruption as an opportunity, not a threat

• They view continuous learning as an adventure, not a chore

• They understand that emotional intelligence is just as critical as technical skills

• They see collaboration as the new competitive advantage

Final Perspective

Remember that winding path you're on right now? It's not a problem to be solved, but a journey to be experienced. Each uncertain moment is actually a doorway to something unexpected and potentially amazing.

Your STEM background hasn't just given you technical skills—it's given you a powerful toolkit for navigating complexity. You know how to ask questions, break down complex problems, and approach challenges with curiosity and resilience.

So embrace the ambiguity. Let your curiosity be bigger than your fear. Your path might not be linear, but it will be uniquely yours.

Works Cited

Clark, Maria. Navigating Life Transitions: Tools for Success. HarperCollins, 2021.

Jones, Patricia, and Ricardo Ramirez. "Preparing for the Real World: A Survey of Institutional Support." Inside Higher Ed, vol. 34, no. 2, 2022, pp. 20–25.

Masten, Ann S., and Michael J. Reed. "Title of Article (if known)." American Psychologist, 2021.

Richards, Jane, et al. "Title of Article (if known)." Journal of Vocational Behavior, 2022.

Smith, Rebecca, et al. "The Longitudinal Effects of Goal Shifts on Fulfillment and Well-Being." Journal of Adult Development, vol. 18, no. 3, 2023, pp. 40–50.

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An Engineer’s Life

Written by LC Oman, PE, Civil-structural design engineer

Have you ever felt as though you’ve been sold a bill of false goods, or felt foolish for doing what appeared to be the right thing to do at the time? It can certainly sometimes feel that way during a modern career in design engineering.

While I’ve never seen the Pixar movie, A Bug’s Life, I can assume that it ends with the oppressive grasshopper regime being rightly overthrown by the collective effort of a highly motivated population of comparatively meager ants. In An Engineer’s Life, however, when, say, the firm you work for is owned by private equity - and the obscure, nameless, powers that be need you to continue cranking out engineering design drawings (given the talented, quantitative ants that you are) faster than they can spell *LBO or **DCF - it can often seem as though well-intentioned folks (e.g. most design professionals) rarely come out on top in the end. That is, sure, go ahead and fool yourself into thinking that being a competent, well-intentioned designer will allow you to legitimately climb a corporate ladder, but while you have your head down busied by code-books, CAD, and calculations, finance professionals are walking behind you towards an elevator, taking them to the top where they get to decide whether your knowledge-base is worth buying or selling.

Now, don’t get me wrong - I have no interest in proliferating wealth for wealth’s sake, nor prestige and power, nor needing to look at an industry from the top-down instead of the bottom-up. Not only that, but I’m sure for many, their engineering salary is just fine for what they need out of life, especially if this population of designers may have been able to graduate without significant (private nor federal) student debt, thus allowing these folks to avoid a nearly 4-figure monthly payment decimating their cash flows. Even better, given there’s a great many number of folks increasingly uninterested in having children, or those who are throwing the prospect of homeownership to the wayside, (i.e. see Appendix A – L.A. wildfires are the latest disaster sparking moral qualms with having children in the wake of worsening climate crises, and Appendix B - U.S. Housing Affordability Crisis), it very well reasonably may be the case that one might not feel the need to increase salary prospects or climb further in their organization, as where they are now will suit their needs for their intended long-term futures. Or, better still – and I genuinely hope this is the case for everyone’s sake – maybe one thoroughly enjoys operating in the weeds of project design everyday, and toiling to find multi-disciplinary solutions to complex problems is consistently what gets them out of bed in the morning, which really is wonderful and ought to be applauded.

Yet, even if all of the above holds true, it still seems logical that a quantitative career with high educational barriers to entry and an intrinsic dedication to facilitating the welfare of the public ought to deliver upon a comfortable standard of living for a typical nuclear family – even in an age where it is simply a fact that most are working harder than previous generations to achieve worse outcomes (largely through no fault of the individual). Naturally, this is compounded further by the fact that I don’t think I would be going out on too far of a limb to say that in practice, the “multi-faceted problem solving” may not always be all it may have been initially branded to be in educational spaces.

That is, apparently I got a master’s degree in structural engineering just so I could be a fancy tool for, say, a client who doesn’t actually know what they want in their own facility until they see it modeled in Revit at the 90% design stage, or so that I might serve as “boots-on-the ground” in some pretty objectively nasty, dangerous site visits in basement boiler rooms, corroded crawl spaces, and vermin-infested attics, all under the generous guise of “collecting site data” (seriously – did Mike Rowe ever do a segment with engineers on Dirty Jobs?). This, of course, doesn’t even touch upon the fact that there is often pushback to employing the engineering knowledge that you worked so hard to obtain, like when you tell a client or contractor (for their own safety or benefit) that they ought to not do something, leaving you with a profound sense of existential powerlessness when it gets done anyway (e.g. me: “hey, don’t use this aggregate for the concrete mix, it’s going to cause cracking and eventually corrosion via Alkali-Silica Reactivity,”….contractor: “yeah, we already poured the mat foundation”). Worse still, it seems the very technological advancements in CAD or analytical software meant to make an engineer’s life easier in bringing a client’s vision to life can often be the very culprits relied upon to deliver more projects in faster timelines than ever before thought possible, to the extent where this effect culminates in the often-circulating LinkedIn article, “Why have engineering design drawings declined in quality in the last 15 years?” I don’t think you need a strong technical background to arrive at the conclusion that those two trends might be related; an unethical business model that works well for fast-fashion maybe isn’t the best one to apply to engineering blueprints.

Of course, the above anecdotes may vary by magnitude in sector and engineering discipline; it is not lost on me that this very well may just be a “me” problem given my specific circumstances, especially given the fact that every job has various difficulties associated with it, and most are much harder and more thankless than my own. Instead, this diatribe is merely intended to be demonstrative of the fact that all of the toil that goes into obtaining an engineering role may no longer be worth its toll, as you’re spending most of your day not necessarily doing “engineering,” but Revit-modeling, explaining to clients what they actually want, being pressured to make concessions to other stakeholders to not raise waves on a high-profit-margin project, etc. – all while perhaps not getting paid a salary where the ends justify the means. Surely, there are those who might maintain that in an age of abrupt and widespread tech layoffs, this daily disgruntlement is the price you pay for the long-term stability offered by a technical design engineering role (i.e. so long as you avoid becoming too expensive as a non-billable mid-level manager to keep around, and A.I. doesn’t come for your project-setup CAD technician). Contrarily though, even given this alleged stability, it again seems reasonable that in a society that necessitates high-quality engineers to maintain and proliferate the welfare of the public, it might be in our collective best interest to make the daily life of being an engineer more enticing, simply better, and with salaries and benefits that are more on-par with other high-value professionals (I’m sure teachers and accountants might have the same gripe).

Shocking absolutely no one, this discussion has some roots in - or is at least nuanced further by - the fact that, for example, presidential candidates in the US 2024 election like Kamala Harris identified worsening ongoing cost-of-living crises, the consequences of which may mean a dwindling number of talented, intelligent folks are likely to stay the long-term course as design engineers, when jumping ship to other professions may be more worth their while (or now even simply necessary to achieve financial goals). That is, after building a worthy enough technical resume in a decade or so, why would a licensed designer not leverage this knowledge-base and jump ship to other paths which might afford them better financial prospects or added flexibility if they can find these opportunities? After all, as the saying goes, “if you can’t beat them, joint them.” No one should be more concerned with this existing AEC (architecture, engineering, and construction) industry exodus trend than the financial grasshoppers incentivized to keep the talented ants where they are, such that their investments can remain profitable via the competency of its members. I would venture so far as to say that if others have a vested interest in keeping me on a hamster wheel – make the hamster wheel a better place to be; it’s cheaper to pay me more now rather than to have no one good left to pay.

In summary, there is obvious worth to the engineering problem solving mindset and being able to dig into the weeds of a problem to be able to arrive at pragmatic solutions. It can just be frustrating to have worked so hard for so long just to arrive somewhere that you’re not actually sure you wanted to be, or reasonably irritating when your abundance mindset is constantly threatened by so many external forces wishing to bring you back down to scarcity. Of course, these frustrations can coexist with a gratefulness for the stability offered by the profession, and these frustrations should not solely be taken out unjustly on individual “financial grasshoppers” who definitely have their own stories and are just trying to carve out their own corner of the lawn for their own families. In this way, then, maybe these grievances are less so with engineering as a discipline of practice, and moreso are associated with unfettered, irresponsible capitalistic practices, and grappling with one’s own prior choices in life which are influenced by a wide array of eclectic factors.

Even so, though, the above may not change the legitimacy of some of the points raised herein, such as that it might behoove society to make being an engineer more of a worthwhile undertaking, as the industry exodus trend may worsen over time if no action is taken. What might some corrective action consist of? To start, I’d propose changing existing client-fee structures so designers get paid more in the end, which would likely first involve educating stakeholders to manage their expectations. That is, to minimize societal disruption, if the pyramid needs to remain inverted such that the people doing all the work still have the least influence, fine, but the very least we can do is shorten the pyramid’s height to strengthen the illusion that any greater action taken by those on the bottom would be unnecessary. Otherwise, the ants might rightfully start talking to one another.

Naturally, this is just the beginning of a conversation, as it did not even begin to address engineering office culture in a post-pandemic society, or more importantly, the nuanced, violent ways in which large swaths of design engineers (e.g. women and POC) may be even further unjustly and disproportionately challenged in the industry via their intersectional identities. It just feels as though we’ve been having the same conversations for a while now, if wage models, from, say, 1980, haven’t been revisited in half a century. Therefore, in my eyes, it is not groundbreaking to say that those tasked with the liability of ensuring public welfare through multi-disciplinary infrastructure ought to be compensated on par with other high value professionals, or that it might be worth collectively looking at some of the trends identified herein in greater detail now so as to avoid a bigger problem in the future; the sustainability of the profession may be at stake.

*LBO = liquidated buyout

**DCF = Discounted cash flow

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Closing Note

Time is one of our most precious assets, and we are humbled to have you spending some with us today. If you enjoyed these articles, share them with your network, and don’t forget to subscribe to stay updated on our latest publications.