3. Engineers who pursued careers outside of engineering, what do you do?

Engineers who pursued careers outside of engineering, what do you do?

I'm 3rd year in my civil degree. Totally going to major in something else after I get it, probs computer science or software engineering. Engineering isn't what I'd thought it'd be. I hate how so much of it is heavily empirical-based. More so in civil when you're dealing with things like soil and building materials like wood. There's so many variables/dynamics at play that you just gotta model an equation through experiment and come up with suitable factors the same way. Not to mention much of design is just looking through dozens of standards/codes and using the applicable formulas for resistances/etc. You get to a clause only to find out it's extremely limited in its application. I.e "Only use if simply supported, laterally-torsionally supported throughout, loaded at shear center, compact section, etc, Otherwise use rational method". Lol. May as well toss it in the trash bin with how useless it is in real life. Which is why I don't blame engineers that just use the same tried and true methods to design every thing they come across. Better safe than sorry. Just not as much innovation in the field as I thought (granted there's some, mostly in the realm of material science).

I also worked as a site coordinator during summers for a sub contractor and it was easily the most stressful experience in my life. Besides managing drill crews, I was the main liason between the GC, owner, engineering consultant, and my boss. I handled the plethora amount of paperwork involved, order/keep track of all material (steel, concrete), and managed any problems incurred. Any they happened. Every. Fucking. Day. Oh what's that? Survey mismarked some piles so you drilled into a city utility? Fuck yes. Another 15 hour work day boys. Time to get my teeth kicked in by the site super. Since I was green, I was taking shit from anybody. Engineering wanted everything done to spec. Actually quoted from site eng: "Yeah there's 10 cm water at the bottom of pile, you can't pour". My response "You realize it's gonna take us 35 minutes to get a crane here for a hose/pump setup right? By that time we're gonna be at a 50cm of water at least. We can't even use a bucket there's so little water down there" Eng response: "Nope. Can't pour. Won't sign on it".

Didn't pour it at all that day. Metre of water by the time we got it setup.

I kind of liked being in the Contractor's point of view though. Gave you a sense of fucking realism some of these pencil pushers don't have.

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