Welcome to the 62EX AFSC discussion blog. The purpose of this blog is to foster discussion between future AF officers interested in this career feild and current officers in 62EX. The views expressed in this blog are solely the opinions of the individual authors and not of the USAF nor the DoD. There are six different kinds of Developmental Engineers (Aero, Astro, EE, Mech Eng, Project, and Computer Systems), this blog has officers representing each of those with posts pertinent to each.
Monday, January 29, 2007
Best & Worst of Engineering
What is the best thing about being an engineer in the Air Force?
What is the worst thing about being an engineer in the Air Force?
The best thing about being an engineer in the Air Force is getting to work with Test Pilots & cutting edge technology in the Space arena.
The worst thing about being an engineer in the Air Force is that you don't always get to do the engineering because much of it is contracted out. It is also very difficult to get out of engineering to do any other programs because the Air Force usually sees itself in a "technical shortage" so they won't let you change career fields. That's good if you like engineering, but not good if you want to do other things.
I would concur with the previous statment mostly. The odds of you doing significant real engineering outside of laboratory or Air Logistics Centers are slim. However, you will do alot of technical management which means you must balance the performance of a weapon system versus it's costs and schedule limitations. Also you may not do the actual work but you may be asked to sign off on contractor engineering as being correct.
It is a hard career field to leave due to the comparative shortage of engineers. however there are many career braodening opportunites from advanced degrees to tours as an intel or maintanence officer. The sky is the limit as long as you try and ask.
What about the Battlelabs? I've never been in one, but I thought the concept was to have a small lab of AF engineers who would answer immediate needs of the warfighter. I've dealt with at least one Battlelab that seems to be more hands-on. Either of you know more about the AF Battlelabs?
ALC engineers also seem to do more hands-on engineering than most. The technical management aspect of AF engineering seems to be primarily in program offices, in my experience.
This is by no means a comprehensive list, but here are some random thoughts from a 62EH (Mechanical):
The Best: * Variety! There are no two 62 jobs in the AF that are exactly alike. In fact you'd be hard pressed to find two similar jobs. Every new assignment you will be doing something completely different. This can be challenging; getting to know a new job every time, but it's much more exciting than doing the same thing at a different base.
For example, if you are a personnel officer, you will do pretty much the same thing where ever you go, you'll be managing human resources, filling out the same forms, just for different people. As an engineer you could work on F-16 flight control actuators at Hill AFB while your buddy accross the street oversees testing of the AGM-65 Maverick Missile.
* Experience. Not everyone who enters the AF will make it a career. For those that do not, experience as an AF engineer can be a great avenue for future employment outside the AF. The world will always need engineers, and the private sector looks highly on AF experience, especially if you're looking for work in the Defense industry.
* Limited Deployments. This can be good or bad, depending on your perspective, but in general, it is very rare for 62's to deploy. This paradigm may be changing as the AF seeks to spread out the burden of frequent deployments.
One exception is the Aircraft Battle Damage Repair (ABDR) program. ABDR Engineers are Mechanical (H) or Aerospace (A) engineers stationed at one of the three Air Logistics Centers (Hill AFB, UT/ Tinker AFB, OK/ and Warner Robbins AFB, GA), though any engineering AFSC can volunteer for the program. These engineers train with a team of enlisted troops to assist with combat flight operations. Their goal is to repair battle damaged aircraft during an air campaign to keep aircraft mission-capable. As far as I know, this is the only deployable position for 62's. Does anyone know of any others?
* Regular work hours. Most engineering jobs are a typical 9-5 type job, though in the military it's more like 0730-1630. There are very few surprises. This makes for a great family/personal life. Obviously this depends on your job, but you may have TDY's that take you away from home, but they're not usually very long, or unexpected.
* All the coolest people are doing it. It's true! I know, the pilots will tell you they are the coolest, but we just let them think that....
The Worst:
* Limited Assignment Locations. The AF has consolidated much of it's acquisition functions to a handful of CONUS bases, which limits the number of bases 62's get assigned to. If you joined the AF to "see the world", then this AFSC is probably not for you. This can also be a problem if you will be seeking join spouse assignments with your SO, especially if he or she has a different AFSC.
Though there are some onesie-twosies at many more locations, the biggest concentrations of 62's are at (in no particular order): Wright-Patterson, OH Eglin, FL Hanscomb, MA Arnold, TN Warner-Robbins, GA Tinker, OK Brooks, TX Hill, UT Kirtland, NM Peterson, CO USAF Academy, CO Edwards, CA Los Angeles, CA
* Contractors. This has been mentioned before, but often the contractors get to do all the "fun" stuff, while the AF types do more managerial tasks. If you like hard-core engineering, this can be frustrating. The ABDR program mentioned above is a good way to get into some actual hands-on number crunching.
* Limited interaction with enlisted troops. This depends a bit on your particular assigment, but in general, the engineering "world" is one of cubicles and civilians. If you really love the "esprit d' corps" of military life, you will be disappointed as an engineer. You may only have a handful of other "blue-suiters" in your unit.
* Limited leadership opportunities. Your first several jobs as an engineer will probably have you fulfilling the "worker-bee" role, whereas your classmate who becomes a maintenance officer may have 100 subordinates in her first year. Some engineers will go as many as three assignments before having any subordinates. On the other hand, engineers are often responsible for obscene amounts of money and people's lives. This can be both exciting and scary.
* Glass ceiling. Though this is by no means official AF policy, most engineers know that it is unlikely that they would ever be able to get higher than O-6 on the rank scale. In fact, many are happy if they can retire at O-5. This usually isn't a problem because most engineer types aren't in to that anyway. Several factors contribute to this such as a lack of leadership experience, civilian supervisors and OPR writers, and lack of deployments. I've been told that it's possible for a 62 to become a general officer, if you do all the right things and have some luck go your way, but the truth is it's tough.
Rockprodigy said: * All the coolest people are doing it. It's true! I know, the pilots will tell you they are the coolest, but we just let them think that....
Rockprodigy, great post...agree with practically everything. The glass ceiling is partially true. However two of my previous bosses where originally 62E's and became 63A's (program managers) and were 5 and 6 years early to Colonel respectivelly (that's 0-6 by 17 and 18 years of service vs the typical 23 years). Both should make General if they don't get out at 20 years to work in the Defense industry. Admittedly, most General Officers are pilots, but we are begining to seen a equal percentage of 62E/63A's make O-6 as pilots do. In fact in the last couple of years (believe it was 04) a higher percentage of Acquistion people made 0-6 than pilots -- though that is probably an anomaly. Making general is hard for anyone. AFPC showed that is 2004 we had almost 3800 colonels in the AF with just ~140 General officers (so only 4% of colonels make General - which is typically your 4% below the zone to Colonel folks). So making general will always take doing your job very well plus being the right place at the right time.
8 comments:
The best thing about being an engineer in the Air Force is getting to work with Test Pilots & cutting edge technology in the Space arena.
The worst thing about being an engineer in the Air Force is that you don't always get to do the engineering because much of it is contracted out. It is also very difficult to get out of engineering to do any other programs because the Air Force usually sees itself in a "technical shortage" so they won't let you change career fields. That's good if you like engineering, but not good if you want to do other things.
I would concur with the previous statment mostly. The odds of you doing significant real engineering outside of laboratory or Air Logistics Centers are slim. However, you will do alot of technical management which means you must balance the performance of a weapon system versus it's costs and schedule limitations. Also you may not do the actual work but you may be asked to sign off on contractor engineering as being correct.
It is a hard career field to leave due to the comparative shortage of engineers. however there are many career braodening opportunites from advanced degrees to tours as an intel or maintanence officer. The sky is the limit as long as you try and ask.
What about the Battlelabs? I've never been in one, but I thought the concept was to have a small lab of AF engineers who would answer immediate needs of the warfighter. I've dealt with at least one Battlelab that seems to be more hands-on. Either of you know more about the AF Battlelabs?
ALC engineers also seem to do more hands-on engineering than most. The technical management aspect of AF engineering seems to be primarily in program offices, in my experience.
This is by no means a comprehensive list, but here are some random thoughts from a 62EH (Mechanical):
The Best:
* Variety! There are no two 62 jobs in the AF that are exactly alike. In fact you'd be hard pressed to find two similar jobs. Every new assignment you will be doing something completely different. This can be challenging; getting to know a new job every time, but it's much more exciting than doing the same thing at a different base.
For example, if you are a personnel officer, you will do pretty much the same thing where ever you go, you'll be managing human resources, filling out the same forms, just for different people. As an engineer you could work on F-16 flight control actuators at Hill AFB while your buddy accross the street oversees testing of the AGM-65 Maverick Missile.
* Experience. Not everyone who enters the AF will make it a career. For those that do not, experience as an AF engineer can be a great avenue for future employment outside the AF. The world will always need engineers, and the private sector looks highly on AF experience, especially if you're looking for work in the Defense industry.
* Limited Deployments. This can be good or bad, depending on your perspective, but in general, it is very rare for 62's to deploy. This paradigm may be changing as the AF seeks to spread out the burden of frequent deployments.
One exception is the Aircraft Battle Damage Repair (ABDR) program. ABDR Engineers are Mechanical (H) or Aerospace (A) engineers stationed at one of the three Air Logistics Centers (Hill AFB, UT/ Tinker AFB, OK/ and Warner Robbins AFB, GA), though any engineering AFSC can volunteer for the program. These engineers train with a team of enlisted troops to assist with combat flight operations. Their goal is to repair battle damaged aircraft during an air campaign to keep aircraft mission-capable. As far as I know, this is the only deployable position for 62's. Does anyone know of any others?
* Regular work hours. Most engineering jobs are a typical 9-5 type job, though in the military it's more like 0730-1630. There are very few surprises. This makes for a great family/personal life. Obviously this depends on your job, but you may have TDY's that take you away from home, but they're not usually very long, or unexpected.
* All the coolest people are doing it. It's true! I know, the pilots will tell you they are the coolest, but we just let them think that....
The Worst:
* Limited Assignment Locations. The AF has consolidated much of it's acquisition functions to a handful of CONUS bases, which limits the number of bases 62's get assigned to. If you joined the AF to "see the world", then this AFSC is probably not for you. This can also be a problem if you will be seeking join spouse assignments with your SO, especially if he or she has a different AFSC.
Though there are some onesie-twosies at many more locations, the biggest concentrations of 62's are at (in no particular order):
Wright-Patterson, OH
Eglin, FL
Hanscomb, MA
Arnold, TN
Warner-Robbins, GA
Tinker, OK
Brooks, TX
Hill, UT
Kirtland, NM
Peterson, CO
USAF Academy, CO
Edwards, CA
Los Angeles, CA
* Contractors. This has been mentioned before, but often the contractors get to do all the "fun" stuff, while the AF types do more managerial tasks. If you like hard-core engineering, this can be frustrating. The ABDR program mentioned above is a good way to get into some actual hands-on number crunching.
* Limited interaction with enlisted troops. This depends a bit on your particular assigment, but in general, the engineering "world" is one of cubicles and civilians. If you really love the "esprit d' corps" of military life, you will be disappointed as an engineer. You may only have a handful of other "blue-suiters" in your unit.
* Limited leadership opportunities. Your first several jobs as an engineer will probably have you fulfilling the "worker-bee" role, whereas your classmate who becomes a maintenance officer may have 100 subordinates in her first year. Some engineers will go as many as three assignments before having any subordinates. On the other hand, engineers are often responsible for obscene amounts of money and people's lives. This can be both exciting and scary.
* Glass ceiling. Though this is by no means official AF policy, most engineers know that it is unlikely that they would ever be able to get higher than O-6 on the rank scale. In fact, many are happy if they can retire at O-5. This usually isn't a problem because most engineer types aren't in to that anyway. Several factors contribute to this such as a lack of leadership experience, civilian supervisors and OPR writers, and lack of deployments. I've been told that it's possible for a 62 to become a general officer, if you do all the right things and have some luck go your way, but the truth is it's tough.
Rockprodigy said: * All the coolest people are doing it. It's true! I know, the pilots will tell you they are the coolest, but we just let them think that....
Amen to that brother Rockprodigy! Exactly right.
Rockprodigy, great post...agree with practically everything. The glass ceiling is partially true. However two of my previous bosses where originally 62E's and became 63A's (program managers) and were 5 and 6 years early to Colonel respectivelly (that's 0-6 by 17 and 18 years of service vs the typical 23 years). Both should make General if they don't get out at 20 years to work in the Defense industry. Admittedly, most General Officers are pilots, but we are begining to seen a equal percentage of 62E/63A's make O-6 as pilots do. In fact in the last couple of years (believe it was 04) a higher percentage of Acquistion people made 0-6 than pilots -- though that is probably an anomaly. Making general is hard for anyone. AFPC showed that is 2004 we had almost 3800 colonels in the AF with just ~140 General officers (so only 4% of colonels make General - which is typically your 4% below the zone to Colonel folks). So making general will always take doing your job very well plus being the right place at the right time.
what are the TDY opportunities like? how often do they usually come about, how long is a typical one, and what sort of stuff do you go TDY for?
Hey ThatGuy,
Check out the comments to the TDY Opportunities question.
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