an_electrical_engineer
New member
Hi all, first post here, I hope I am posting to the right place.
I'm somewhat of a unique case, and I was hoping someone should shine some light on where I should go from here.
I'm an Electrical Engineering graduate with Bachelor's '21 and Masters '23 in Electrical Engineering. My undergraduate degree was a mix of standard EE topics and CS topics, and during my masters I specialized in logic design and physical chip design. I currently work at a large chip design company. I took the Computer Engineering PE exam and passed the exam while still in graduate school.
In California, because I have my masters degree, I was able to apply for a PE with only 1 year of experience, and last week I received my license number. I understand my current work, which is mainly logic design (Verilog, microarchitecture) and physical design (synth, fpga, place-and-route, dft) is not considered "PE" work. For this reason my current day job wouldn't have a problem with me venturing out as long as I get my current work done. Other than what I do for work, I'm proficient in system level and embedded coding (C/C++), simulation, networking, digital communications, and PCB design.
I have uncles that work in the power utility sector, and when I ask them if there's any field that I can utilize my current skillsets in conjunction with my PE license, they're out of their depth in terms of what's out there. I know with one year of work experience, I'm very green, but I'm very business and sales oriented and I am eager at the opportunity to tackle all the business aspects surrounding engineering work. My long term goal is to open an engineering consulting firm or sell/manufacture technical products and services. Since I know that I have a lack of experience, I believe the best course of action is to get some sort of part-time or contract role that I can learn in.
I'm not in a position to exit my current job, but I am more than open to part time work, but I'm not sure how to go about that. I was wondering if I can get any advice on what people think is the best course of action for me given my current situation, and if there is any way to leverage my current knowledge for highly specialized PE-adjacent work.
I'm somewhat of a unique case, and I was hoping someone should shine some light on where I should go from here.
I'm an Electrical Engineering graduate with Bachelor's '21 and Masters '23 in Electrical Engineering. My undergraduate degree was a mix of standard EE topics and CS topics, and during my masters I specialized in logic design and physical chip design. I currently work at a large chip design company. I took the Computer Engineering PE exam and passed the exam while still in graduate school.
In California, because I have my masters degree, I was able to apply for a PE with only 1 year of experience, and last week I received my license number. I understand my current work, which is mainly logic design (Verilog, microarchitecture) and physical design (synth, fpga, place-and-route, dft) is not considered "PE" work. For this reason my current day job wouldn't have a problem with me venturing out as long as I get my current work done. Other than what I do for work, I'm proficient in system level and embedded coding (C/C++), simulation, networking, digital communications, and PCB design.
I have uncles that work in the power utility sector, and when I ask them if there's any field that I can utilize my current skillsets in conjunction with my PE license, they're out of their depth in terms of what's out there. I know with one year of work experience, I'm very green, but I'm very business and sales oriented and I am eager at the opportunity to tackle all the business aspects surrounding engineering work. My long term goal is to open an engineering consulting firm or sell/manufacture technical products and services. Since I know that I have a lack of experience, I believe the best course of action is to get some sort of part-time or contract role that I can learn in.
I'm not in a position to exit my current job, but I am more than open to part time work, but I'm not sure how to go about that. I was wondering if I can get any advice on what people think is the best course of action for me given my current situation, and if there is any way to leverage my current knowledge for highly specialized PE-adjacent work.
