starting life after college, any advice?

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This year I will be graduating from a southern military college with a degree in mechanical engineering, my GPA is kinda in the gutters and I will do what I can this year to bring it up. I also have a bunch of extracurriculars to hopefully compensate for where my grades lack (I was never any good in a classroom environment). I gotta be honest I am really nervous that I will be stuck with an awful job that I hate even if the pay is good. I love automotive engineering and want a job designing racecars but it always seems like nobody is hiring. Any pointers y'all have would be greatly appreciated!
 

Roober

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Let's see...

1. A job is like a woman, one foot is always out of the door
2. Always keep your resume up to date
3. Get proficient at as many skills as possible
4. Calculate your hourly rate, not your salary. For example, a $60,000 salary where you work 50 hours a week pays $23/hr. A $40,000 salary where you work 20 hours a week earns $38/hr.
5. Increase your hourly rate as high as possible
6. You don't owe your employer's jack $hit, only the work they assigned to you.
7. Do the highest quality work in the shortest punt of time
8. Don't bother getting serious with a woman until you own property and are completely self sufficient
 

Suave88

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This year I will be graduating from a southern military college with a degree in mechanical engineering, my GPA is kinda in the gutters and I will do what I can this year to bring it up. I also have a bunch of extracurriculars to hopefully compensate for where my grades lack (I was never any good in a classroom environment). I gotta be honest I am really nervous that I will be stuck with an awful job that I hate even if the pay is good. I love automotive engineering and want a job designing racecars but it always seems like nobody is hiring. Any pointers y'all have would be greatly appreciated!
You can't just walk after birth. You must crawl first. So get into the automotive industry before getting into the racecar design. Move to Michigan, where the automotive design industry I hope it is still exits. Start off as a 3D modeler, designer, drafter. Learn Catia V5 and V6. Then, move up the ladder. You want to become a design engineer or project engineer before you become a project manager, then, director of engineering.
 
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Let's see...

1. A job is like a woman, one foot is always out of the door
2. Always keep your resume up to date
3. Get proficient at as many skills as possible
4. Calculate your hourly rate, not your salary. For example, a $60,000 salary where you work 50 hours a week pays $23/hr. A $40,000 salary where you work 20 hours a week earns $38/hr.
5. Increase your hourly rate as high as possible
6. You don't owe your employer's jack $hit, only the work they assigned to you.
7. Do the highest quality work in the shortest punt of time
8. Don't bother getting serious with a woman until you own property and are completely self sufficient
thank you for the advice, definitely puts things into another prospective. When you say jobs are like women then I assume that it's just as easy to get oneitis for a particular good looking job? I want to work for a company called factory five, they build kit racecars and it looks like a dream job. the only issue is that they are not hiring right now, should I push for them to hire me? put them on a backburner for now? or just forget them completely? thank you in advance, I really trust this place more than other more mainstream sites
 
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You can't just walk after birth. You must crawl first. So get into the automotive industry before getting into the racecar design. Move to Michigan, where the automotive design industry I hope it is still exits. Start off as a 3D modeler, designer, drafter. Learn Catia V5 and V6. Then, move up the ladder. You want to become a design engineer or project engineer before you become a project manager, then, director of engineering.
gotcha, I have a contact to ford's svt. I know I should have utilized it a while back but its through a close friend of mine and I have always had an apprehension with mixing my personal life with business.
 
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9. For your overall happiness, the boss is more important than the job. A crap job with a great boss is a pleasure. A great job with a shyte boss is torture. When you meet the manager/boss during the interview, honestly ask yourself, "Would I want to work for this person?"
That makes sense, i've done some research on the president of the company and he seems like a cool, no bull**** guy. Now all I need to do for there is convince him that he needs to hire me...
 

Mike32ct

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That makes sense, i've done some research on the president of the company and he seems like a cool, no bull**** guy. Now all I need to do for there is convince him that he needs to hire me...
Absolutely. It's worth a shot.

I'm not saying the job doesn't matter. Of course it does. But at an interview, see if you have a good "gut" feeling about a potential boss or a bad feeling. It's a factor to consider.
 

mrgoodstuff

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This year I will be graduating from a southern military college with a degree in mechanical engineering, my GPA is kinda in the gutters and I will do what I can this year to bring it up. I also have a bunch of extracurriculars to hopefully compensate for where my grades lack (I was never any good in a classroom environment). I gotta be honest I am really nervous that I will be stuck with an awful job that I hate even if the pay is good. I love automotive engineering and want a job designing racecars but it always seems like nobody is hiring. Any pointers y'all have would be greatly appreciated!
Tutors. The key to getting good grades acquiring the information and never falling behind. Use good tutors to keep you up to speed and understanding all of the materials.
 

Roober

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thank you for the advice, definitely puts things into another prospective. When you say jobs are like women then I assume that it's just as easy to get oneitis for a particular good looking job? I want to work for a company called factory five, they build kit racecars and it looks like a dream job. the only issue is that they are not hiring right now, should I push for them to hire me? put them on a backburner for now? or just forget them completely? thank you in advance, I really trust this place more than other more mainstream sites
Indeed. Don't get oneitis. There are many great companies out there. I always wanted to work for Google. Well, I worked there a year and quit. For everything that is good about it there is plenty of bad, and culturally, it's not a good fit for me. But even while there, I always sought better paying, more flexible opportunities.

I also got them to pay for various software programs for graphic and video design, which allowed me to skill stack. While only there a year, I mastered one program, and learned 2 more. Now at my new company, I am requesting Adobe suite so I can learn about photo and video editing. It helps the products I produce for them, while simultaneously adding to my skillset and my worth to the company.

Once youre comfortable and ambitious, you should aim to work for yourself. In my opinion, that should always be the endgame...
 
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1) don't focus on the women, focus on your career, I have much better access to higher SMV females in the middle of my 30's than when I was 22 or 27
2) don't be focused on the fact that you had so-so grades - I was at the bottom of the graduates list in terms of grades (however I did graduate from top univ in my country); it means nothing when it comes to efficiency in work really (because it is more related to your ability to resolve issues as they come and cannot be memorised - I have so-so memory but borderline very high IQ and EQ and simply put I do often much better in work than more academically succesful during univ-years friends
3) work is not about hard-work only, it's equally about being people-person, giving no-problem vibe and liking people and evading people that consider you are an obstacle - if you exceel at soft skills and exceel at work, you will quickly raise in any business structure when compared with others
4) if you have some significant weakness that won't fly under the radar of others easily (e.g. you are really obese or ugly) either c.rack some jokes about if ppl will try to pick on it OR work on yourself to eliminate entirely OR both (crack jokes until you won't have to), people are bunch of poor mannered and rather evil phukerz that like to pick on others when they can (company policies, matter of well manners, being good and bad - all aside) it's just like that; if there's a 'clique' of friends in the place you begin work it's better to make fun of such weakness and give it a good laugh instead of trying to 'hope' that no one will notice it - tbh everybody will notice it so just don't even try - by acting like that you take the hate magnet from their hands and weaponise your weakness for your own purpose - instead of noticing you are fat they will notice you can laugh from yourself and won't pick on you (just don't do it too often/don't be a clown - one of two jokes and they will let it go)
5) act egoless in job - be ok person at the beginning in a new place you enter - your supervisor is always right even if he/ahe is wrong (most of the low and mid level managers were chosen for such positions because of connections or suck.ing up long enough/obedience/not being too bright/being 'safe choice', so more often than not they don't (and never really did) exceel really in their work - they had proper mixture of qualities and were safe enough choice for the position - so don't be a smartass and try to prove them they are wrong, because if you are right, they won't forgive you making it well known and obvious, they also don't like troublemakers because they always evaded problems themselves (like snakes) thus the way to go at the beginning is being efficient yes person and doing everything to find either better opportunity elsewhere ASAP or fuel your own purpose OR being promoted ASAP to evade the poor quality low level managers you will inevitably be forced to deal with at the beginning of your work
6) you should aim for having your own business when in 30's - working for myself was one of the best decisions I could make - I work more but I don't have formal supervisor of any sort, I have clients - it's different sort of relationship - if someone talks bs you can point it out w/o worrying about your future too much (unless that's your only client and you want to be too frank lol)
7) don't trust women in your workplace, don't try to date them, workplace is for work and females in workplace flirt for other purposes than forming relationship you dream of; so simply don't
8) if you can do something good for somebody in work and it's a low cost/time effort, do it. That's how you gain allies.
9) don't look for friends in work; it never really works or survives, ppl from work are not worth effort of that sort - if you are better than them at work, they won't forgive you anyway, no matter how much you will try to make them like you - some of my 'friends' simply hated me being better than them at work or work-related subjects
10) trust your intuition ALWAYS, if you feel that something is wrong it means either something is wrong, might be wrong or is maybe wrong (with huge dose of probability), its a warning side and requires preparation or action of some sort - don't be the guy that listens to the "don't worry about it" advice - be prepared
11) if that's your photo in the profile picture - congrats, you are handsome young man with future ahead of you - now take down this photo - you never know who reads your messages

Good luck
Thank you, I'm in a similar situation, my college (the citadel) is decently prestigious and I have a good amount of connections through it. one other major question I have is how to convince a company to hire me when they are not hiring, I am sure that in the post-carona world expansion and hiring new team members is not gonna be at the top of everybody's list. Although owning my own business is definitely a goal of mine I still want to have a job right out of graduation just to get some starting capital
 

lostintime

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Don't be too big of an egotistical ***** to start at the very bottom rung (i.e. hourly wage, no degree required) to get your foot into the door in the industry you want to work in. Don't expect people to treat you some special kind of way just because you're a college grad.
 

EyeBRollin

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Let's see...

1. A job is like a woman, one foot is always out of the door
2. Always keep your resume up to date
3. Get proficient at as many skills as possible
4. Calculate your hourly rate, not your salary. For example, a $60,000 salary where you work 50 hours a week pays $23/hr. A $40,000 salary where you work 20 hours a week earns $38/hr.
5. Increase your hourly rate as high as possible
6. You don't owe your employer's jack $hit, only the work they assigned to you.
7. Do the highest quality work in the shortest punt of time
8. Don't bother getting serious with a woman until you own property and are completely self sufficient
This is sound advice all the way around.

As for the OP, my comments:

-GPA only matters for your first job out of college. Don’t sweat it too much.

-Employers want to know what value you will bring to them. That’s how you sell yourself in a job interview. Most people go on and on about pointless school accomplishments. All companies what to know is how you will make them money

- For race car designing, try outlining a 10 year plan to set yourself toward that. Research the prerequisite experience required.

-make a roadmap to eventual self employment. You’ll want a full time job to keep you stable until your true passion can replace that income.

You’ll be fine OP. Good luck!
 
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