How to Be a Team Player without Ruining Your Engineering Career
By: Leslie Stevens-Huffman You’ve probably heard the expression there’s no “I” in team. But must your personal goals always take a backseat to the priorities of your engineering team? The short answer is: no. While being on a team requires give and take, with some forethought and finesse, it’s possible to advance your contracting career… Read more »
Chemistry Lesson: Using Science to Select Culturally Compatible Contractors
By: Leslie Stevens-Huffman Although managers usually select contractors for their engineering experience, research shows that cultural fit influences a professional’s ability to maximize their accumulated talents and skills even on a short-term basis. A study by Leadership IQ Why New Hires Fail revealed that 46 percent of new hires fail within 18 months, and that… Read more »
Defining the Ideal Resume for Contract Engineers
By: Leslie Stevens-Huffman Once you get some contract experience under your belt, you’ll probably find that a chronological resume is not the best way to present your capabilities to an engineering manager. The traditional format – which starts with your most recent project and works backwards – could draw attention to occasional gaps in your… Read more »
Four Interview Mistakes That Turn Off Top Contractors
By: Leslie Stevens-Huffman You expect contract engineers to be on their best behavior when they interview, but you may not realize that the expectations go both ways. A negative experience can tarnish your firm’s reputation and drive away top prospects. Worse yet, the problem may be bigger than you think. Twenty-six percent of workers have… Read more »
Encore! Five Tips for Landing Repeat Assignments
By: Leslie Stevens-Huffman Obtaining your first contract engineering assignment may take some effort. But once you get your foot in the door, you may never have a better opportunity to enhance your income and reputation. If engineering managers offer you additional assignments, you can sidestep competitors, decrease interview and idle time, and improve your negotiating… Read more »
Encore! Five Tips for Landing Repeat Assignments
By: Leslie Stevens-Huffman Obtaining your first contract engineering assignment may take some effort. But once you get your foot in the door, you may never have a better opportunity to enhance your income and reputation. If engineering managers offer you additional assignments, you can sidestep competitors, decrease interview and idle time, and improve your negotiating… Read more »
Trends with Benefits: Five Engineering Workplace Trends for 2014
By: Leslie Stevens-Huffman Most engineering organizations view their people as their most valuable asset. That’s why highly effective engineering managers monitor workplace changes and adapt their strategies, policies and hiring practices toward the shifting demographics, preferences and work styles of engineering professionals. We’ve scoured numerous articles, research reports and studies to come up with the… Read more »
Reset – How to Overcome Mistakes During a Job Interview
By: Leslie Stevens-Huffman It can happen to anyone. You mistakenly call the engineering manager by the wrong name, lose your train of thought mid-sentence or provide the wrong answer to a technical question during an interview. Relax, even veteran engineers usually bumble a question or two. The key is how you recover from a misstatement,… Read more »
Five Myths about Co-Employment
By: Leslie Stevens-Huffman The topic of co-employment often arises when engineering firms utilize experienced contractors to meet project deadlines. Managers sometimes perceive that contract professionals pose excessive risks and threats since the co-employment topic is so misunderstood. Or as Stephen Clancy, director, Contingent Workforce Strategies and Research for Staffing Industry Analysts recently wrote in Challenging… Read more »
How to Create a Personal Brand to Promote Your Engineering Skills
Separate yourself from the competition by conveying a compelling professional identity By: Leslie Stevens-Huffman Being successful isn’t always enough. You may need to bundle your assets and present them in a way that captures the attention of busy engineering managers. In a prior article, we talked about why engineering contractors need a brand. To quote… Read more »