General questions about the medical device industry
I have a group of friends with MS degrees in engineering who have been hired on as associate engineers at medical device companies. These are positions that only require bachelor's degrees, but it is so difficult to get a foot in the door at some of these companies, and openings seem few and far between for the next level of engineer positions. I've searched this subreddit and the r/jobs subreddit about entry level positions and MS degrees, but I am curious if anyone here is seeing the same thing happen where they are.
Is this just the nature of supply and demand for this field? I know a lot of people who went to graduate school to increase their chances of landing a job in the medical device industry, so I imagine associate level positions get an overload of applicants with MS degrees.
I'll be finishing my master's degree in a year (BME) and I'm getting nervous about the job hunt already. Thankfully I have experience with a part-time internship at a small medical device company (unpaid, but the experience is worth it) that has lasted the first year I've been in school (and will continue the second year), but I've seen people with previous industry experience struggle to get a job. I'm already networking my butt off and have people who say they will refer me to their hiring manager when the time comes, but I can't help but think about all of the other people who are doing the same thing. In addition to the friends I know who landed jobs, I know people who have been on the job hunt for 6 months without any luck. I'd like a position as an R&D engineer, but is it worth it to apply to other positions (manufacturing, human factors, etc.) to try and get into a company? I'm in the midwest and not tied to anything here, so I'll be applying across the country by next year.
Any advice, input, pointers, would be great. I've read a lot of the BME threads here and in r/jobs about the difficulty of landing a job, so I thought I'd try and collect any additional advice someone has to offer.