Electrical engineers specialize in electrical systems and their components and are largely responsible for generation, transmission or distribution of electric supply. As an electrical engineer, one might also be required to design equipment that will aid manufacturing, transportation, construction and other such industries. This makes it a pre-requisite for electrical engineers to have project management skills.
Electrical engineers are usually a part of larger teams that are aiming to design and develop or improve a product or a service. Other team members are usually from other disciplines and it is necessary that the engineer grasps their suggestions and inculcates the solutions to issues in the product design. Addressing issues across different disciplines requires the ability to multitask and take decisions. Also, the product under development must be safe, reliable and as economical as possible. Usually, post the design stage, the engineer is also required to assist in manufacture, testing and then training employees to use the product.
An electrical engineer can work across different areas of the industry such as manufacturing, power generation and distribution, instrumentation, power electronics, control engineering etc. in sectors such as transportation, telecommunication and even defence. Irrespective of the nature of the industry, the basic job description of the electrical engineer remains the same. S/He must be technically competent to design the client desires, be responsible for the project from design to completion, be able to suggest and implement measures of cost reduction, co-ordinate meetings of designers and clients, design and conduct tests to check the functioning of the product, interpret test data, make required modifications to the product and test it again, if required. Once, the system is in place, the electrical engineer also maintains and services the equipment and monitors it for further improvements of the product.
As a result of the competition in the recruitment industry, a Bachelor’s degree is usually not the only criterion for recruiting an electrical engineer. Usually, companies offering good salaries, expect the candidate to have 5-10 years of working experience in the field along with people and project skills. Certain recruiters even prefer candidates who have some experience in programming and can write basic code in Perl, Python and other such programming languages. It never hurts to learn to a programming language in this time and age. Electrical engineers are a global requirement and for the right candidate the opportunities are unlimited.