Hi all,
I am a fresh graduate from
NUS Mechanical Engineering this year May/July. The reason why I studied Mechanical Engineering in the first place was because I was not sure what I wanted to do in the future and people said that Engineering was the broadest discipline, and Mechanical Engineering was the broadest engineering discipline also.
But after graduating, I found that this is not really the case. I have not had much luck in getting interviews in non-mechanical engineering fields, even fields like mechatronics and industrial automation seem to prefer EEE grads over Mech.
Personally, I feel myself more interested in IT-related stuff like desktop support/servers/IP/LAN (not programming) and have tried to apply to this kind of entry jobs where the job description states it is open to all degrees. But as most of them are diploma/nitec level, some of them told me that I am overqualified for the position and they don't want to consider me at all even when I said that I do not mind the pay at all.
So, I am not sure what I should do if I still really want to do IT. Do I really need to take up any further diplomas/degrees/certs to get into the IT line? Or maybe I should just stay in the engineering field? I don't really have much interest in M&E stuff like thermodynamics/fluid mechanics, my interests are more towards mechatronics and automation stuff which is covered by EEE grads.
Lastly, I haven't got an offer at all after 4-5 months. (I've been applying to both engineering fields and IT diploma entry level jobs) Is this normal ? Some people say it's normal but when you see everyone around you getting jobs one by one, it is a bit demoralizing. I've been to 7-8 interviews already, mostly SMEs and know where is my weakness and trying to improve on it (some interviewers are very frank and say that I am too soft-spoken and don't show enough confidence). Also, my grades are not good either, I was in a direct honors program but my GPA was not good enough, my GPA is only less than 3.
My dilemma is that when I apply for degree level jobs, I lose out to my peers based on my grades and interview skills, and when I do not mind the pay and apply for diploma level jobs, they think that I am over-qualified (most of them would rather prefer diploma holders with experience), or am I thinking too much ?