Young Engineers Australia
A quick update about some of the activities of Young Engineers Australia.
Last year I was fortunate enough to work with a great team of passionate engineers on the committee for the Young Engineers Australia branch in Victoria (YEA-V). We've been working hard to bring some great events to the community, and I thought I'd share a few of them with you.
We also ran a number of events to provide our members with networking and coaching expereinces, including our open mic night and charted stories series where our talented committee shared their experiences in becoming a chartered engineer and how it's improved their career.
A big thanks to all those who showed up to our open mic night to practice their public speaking!
§Finding Your Feet
A common theme I see with young professionals is that they lack the confidence to trust their own judgement. I think this is natural for anyone who is new to their career and findeing their way, it often gets called Imposter Syndrone but I think there's more to it than that.
When I first started at my current job one of my managers asked me what I wanted to do with my career, having worked in engineering for all of 5 seconds I had no idea what I wanted to do, this isn't imposter syndrone, I know that you start at the bottom and have to learn the ropes, I think what most graduates expereince is a lack of direction. So what can you do if you find yourself in a similar expereince? I think the best course of action is to fail, and fail often.You're probably never going to have a better safety net then when you first enter the workforce. Try out different things, learn different skills in areas you find interesting and some that you don't, you never know where inspiration hides.
I often see people recommend finding a mentor and that can also be useful, but I think a mentor is only helpful once you have an idea of what you want to do. So my recommendation is to find a mentor once you have a feeling of what you'd like to specialise in.
§One Final Thing
I was recently elected as the Co-Chair of the Victorian division of the YEA-V and I'm looking forward to working with the committee to bring some great events to the community.
We've got lots of great ideas for this year planned with some old favorites returning and some completely new events in works so watch this space to see what we do next!