What are the challenges of being an engineer?

Challenges are going to be part of all our lives, and while I can’t say what challenges you yourself may face, I will say that with every challenge comes an opportunity as long as we flip it on its head.

When I was in middle school my guidance counselor told me that the pre-engineering courses I wanted to take were for boys, and I should consider the art courses instead. I looked at her and said “challenge accepted!” I used this as an opportunity to prove her wrong. Maybe this wasn’t the best motivation for me but it certainly worked!

Over my career I’ve run into so many fun problem solving challenges, and I’ve always tried to flip it and look at it as an amazing opportunity instead. When something is difficult or challenges us, the success is so much more rewarding.

I feel that by becoming an engineer, we become more attuned to accepting and conquering challenges, whether it's someone who thinks we can’t do something, or a difficult project with complex moving pieced, or even helping my kids build the biggest LEGO set ever, I always like to think “challenge accepted!”

CHALLENGE! That is a milestone or achievement for an engineer. Having a problem set in front of you and devising a solution. Many times there are several remedies to that challenge, some more effective than others.

As a female engineer, whether working independently or in a team; even in today's work environment you will be hit with some form of challenge for respect. That being said, "respect is earned, not given". Although college may prepare you in theory, there is nothing like experience in a real world situation.

• Challenge 1: Find a mentor in your work environment.
• Challenge 2: Volunteer for projects. Even if your role is tedious information gathering or documenting. This is an earning of respect opportunity. Ask questions. Understand the Why. What. Where. When.
• Challenge 3: Manage diversity prejudice's. Navigating a work environment that has a history of white male dominance can sometimes be a conundrum. Is the person being malicious towards you? Or do they really mean well and just reacting on ingrained prejudice. This is a situational challenge. Not advocating for you to be silent, but if you feel comfortable engage the individual in a conversation about your feelings. (maybe via your mentor)

Other challenges that any engineer may run into within the industry they are working in is:

• Technology: keeping up with the administrative systems within a company and collaboration systems is most times an On-the-Job training environment. Take the initiative for self training and again working with a mentor. Depending on your industry, keeping up with specific technical fields may be a requirement which could require out of work hours research as a new engineer.
• Innovation: In some engineering fields it can be easy to fall into the, "it has always been done that way" state of mind. Yet better products are developed everyday.
• Example: Water Main Break in Baltimore -- Old Cast Iron Pipes deteriorating. Engineers had to come up with a way to provide immediate temporary service (cost effective) and provide long term solutions with alternatives that would bring the system up to current day expectations.
• Example: Expansion of Wireless Technologies and new products are being developed everyday. Wireless teams are continually upgrading networks and looking for a flexible product to outperform the competition as well as deliver in a greater coverage area. Testing in controlled areas to determine if long range deployment would be optimal for their network.

Some of the key challenges include being one of few women and having very difficult technical challenges to work through. These same challenges can be considered opportunities!

Being one of a few women automatically makes you more visible, so when you are doing great work, people will notice. You will be able to be part of changing natural bias that is present in most teams. This will help not only you, but the women who come after you.

Difficult technical challenges are exciting! There will be times when you will solve a problem that no one has ever solved before. If you are considering engineering, you probably like to solve problems. Behind every problem, lies a solution. You literally get to be a solution that provides value to a customer and to a company. I personally find this highly rewarding.

I'm not sure anyone can tell you exactly what challenges you (individually) should expect to run into by being a girl in engineering. As many women in tech, at some points (in particular at the beginning of my career) I did face bias and stereotyping.

For example, a manager once tried to convince me that an internship I was after was more appropriate for boys. I'm sure some girls would have seen it as a serious challenge, but I didn't. I simply brushed off the negative comments, and went on to win the internship.

If you like the idea of studying engineering, don't let fear of the obstacles you'll face stop you! Being an engineer has been a lot of fun for me, leading to incredibly fun jobs and projects that many men tell me they wish they could have worked on.

I'm optimistic that for girls starting their career now, the amount of disparaging comments and discriminatory treatment you'll face will be much smaller than what I faced three decades ago. And if that eventually happens to you, it doesn't have to be a big deal: find humor in the situation. You can learn more about my "laugh and carry on" approach in this article, written for girls like you.