As the changes in must-haves for job hunters continues to grow and change, many find themselves listing “company culture” as a must-have on their career wishlist. After a long and tiresome job search, the last thing you want to do is find out that the company you said “yes” to is ultimately not a good fit. Job recruitment and the selection process is slowly gravitating towards hiring based on core values (cultural fit) rather than technical competencies. According to an article published on 7Geese, “One of the reasons for this shift may be attributed to Gen Y entering the workforce and staying at a job for about two years or so, prioritizing meaningful work over pay as well as working for a company that is aligned with their own values.”

An effective workplace culture typically has a motivated and happy staff. So, how do you go about finding a company that has a positive culture? Start by asking yourself what you want from that company (aside from the job itself). Then, upon getting an interview, ask the hiring manager some of the same questions, as the interview is as much about you getting to know the company as it is about the company getting to know you. Here are a few suggestions: 

• Ask them to describe the company culture in three words. What are they, and why?
• What’s the working environment like? What’s the best part?
• What are the most common complaints from employees who work here? (When asking this question, proceed with caution. While it will allow you to know some of the quirks* of the job, you don’t want to seem like you’re mining for negative responses.)
• What do you love about working here? Get a little more personal and ask your interviewer what brings them to work each day. Save this question for last, as it will end the interview positively and will build a connection with your interviewer.

When it comes to company culture, don’t settle. You won’t want to make the most of a job where you don’t fit. Engineering Search Partners has experience placing job candidates in Atlanta engineering careers that prove to be a great fit. We even go beyond the hire, making sure that the hiring process is seamless for both the new employee and the hiring manager. Contact us today so we can help place you with your next dream job.

A few weeks back, we stumbled onto this amazing video called Henri’s Boogie, where piano aficionado Henri Herbert gave an impromptu performance in a crowded London train station. If you haven’t seen the video, it’s definitely a must-see!

After re-watching the video, we couldn’t help but think about how many talented people go unnoticed every day. In our fast-paced world, it’s easy to overlook natural talent, as evident in the video clip of Henri. How did we get to this point? Henri, like anyone with a natural talent for a particular skill, is sitting in the center of masses of people, with his talent going unnoticed.

Finding Engineering Talent is Our Specialty

For us, finding those diamond-in-the-rough employees is the ultimate payoff. We specialize in helping engineering firms locate and hire the strongest candidates in the market. Finding and evaluating top talent that we can then place with their ideal job is what drives us. Ultimately, we want to help people put their natural talents to good use!

What Sets Us Apart?

Engineering Search Partners provides a competitive advantage to our clients with 25 years of engineering consulting experience in industry-specific practice areas. With an 85% success rate, our 4-step recruiting process encompasses four key components that enables firms find the right candidate for their needs.

If you’re interested in finding your “1 in a million” candidate, trust Engineering Search Partners to help you discover what many people may be overlooking. Contact us today to get started.

Henri’s Boogie video courtesy of Youtube.

Last month, 11 categories in the 2014 Global Best Projects Awards by Engineering News-Record were honored at the ENR+Dodge 2014 Global Construction Summit held in New York City. These projects were selected as examples of the challenges, risks and rewards of designing and building internationally. The judges examined projects in many markets, looking at safety, innovations, challenges and design and construction quality. They also placed special emphasis on the diversity of the projects as well as the project teams and teamwork.

There were four judges, industry veterans carefully chosen based on their knowledge and leadership:

• Ahmad Abdelrazaq, Senior EVP at Samsung C&T Corp
• Geno Armstrong, International Sector Lead, Engineering and Construction at KPMG
• Avery Louise Bang, CEO, Bridges to Prosperity
• James B. Porter, Jr, Founder and President, Sustainable Operations Solutions

The Project Winners

Halley VI Antarctic Research Station was selected unanimously as the Project of the Year and Best Education/Research project. Here are the rest of the winning projects:

Bridges, Tunnels – Dragon Bridge – Da Nang, Vietnam

Cultural – Canadian Museum for Human Rights – Winnipeg, Canada

Government Buildings – Governor George Deukmejian Courthouse – Long Beach, Calif.

Green Project – Center for Sustainable Landscapes – Pittsburgh, Penn.

Manufacturing – Superabsorbent Polymers Project – Jubail, Saudi Arabia

Office – The Place, London

Power/Industrial – Al Khairat Gas Turbine Power Plant, Karbala, Iraq

Renovation Restoration – Repairs to 10,000 Quake Damaged Houses, Port-au-Prince, Haiti

Residential, Hospitality – Curundu Urban Renovation Rebuilds Community, Panama City, Panama

Retail, Mixed-Use Developments – Shams Abu Dhabi Gateway Towers, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates

Water, Wastewater – Panama Wastewater Treatment Plant, Panama City, Panama

We are excited to see how these winning projects open up new doors for the engineering industry and what the future holds for the engineering sector.

Photo via FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Your digital footprint, also known as the online trail you leave on various forms of digital communication, is very important when it comes to presenting yourself to potential employers. How does yours represent you? Will it have a positive or negative effect on your reputation? When searching for your next job, recruiters and hiring managers will seek out your profiles online to help them determine if you’re a good candidate. You can put your best online foot forward with the help of these suggestions from Engineering Search Partners.

The best way to track your digital footprint is by first typing your name into a Google search. What do you see? If you need to up your Internet ante, here are four ways you can start managing your digital footprint.

• Make sure your online and offline personas match. If you’re passionate about forensic engineering or environmental science, make sure your profiles accurately depict those facts. Comb through your Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Google+ pages to create pages congruous to your goals – which are maintaining a specific appearance online.
• Be sure your LinkedIn profile is complete, up to date, and compelling. Tell your story in such a way that people are engaged and want to learn more about you and what you do. Participate regularly in the Linkedin Professional Group that you feel helps you to develop relationships with your peers.
• If you are comfortable  “marketing yourself” then expand your web presence and if you don’t already have a website, consider getting one with a URL that has your first name and last name. This step will help your site show up higher in search engines when a potential employer searches for your name. Set your LinkedIn URL (as well as other social networks) to be linkedin.com/firstandlastname to help buoy those search results even more.
• Become a credible resource in your desired field. Participate in online discussions and digital communities that are related to the field you want to be found for. Additionally, if your new website has a blog, start blogging on topics that are related to your desired field.

Managing your digital footprint is no longer an option when it comes to searching for a job – it’s essential. By taking these steps, you’re on your way to putting your best foot forward, digitally speaking. Once you’re ready to find your dream engineering job, contact us to help you find the perfect fit.

Photo via FreeDigitalPhotos.net

The May issue of Structures Magazine, a print and online publication for structural engineers, featured an article about masonry and a record-breaking project in Tucson, Arizona. The tallest post-tensioned masonry building in the United States was completed last year in Sentinel Plaza, an Independent Senior Housing Development. The building is six stories high with 139,000 square feet and 143 individual units.

Four exterior wall systems were evaluated and considered for this project, including masonry, concrete, steel studs, and insulated concrete forms (ICF). The general contractor, W. E. O’Neil, suggested post-tensioned masonry as an alternate system for several reasons: durability, ease of construction, and similar insulating characteristics. Throughout the building’s construction, all lines of communication ran through the architect, so that all consultants would remain coordinated. Thanks to the thorough coordination effort during the design process, field coordination issues were kept to a minimum. With this practice in place, the award-winning Armory Park project was successfully completed ahead of schedule.

Below is a video via the City of Tucson Youtube channel interviewing a future resident:

To read the full article, you can visit Structures Magazine’s website or download it in a PDF format.

Engineering Search Partners had the immense pleasure of attending the Oil & Gas Offshore Technology Conference in Houston last week. The biggest take away from the conference? There is a worker shortage in the oil & gas industry and many firms are looking to hire recruiters to help meet that shortage. This week on our blog, we wanted to share pieces from an article via Fuel Fix that focuses specifically on that need.

Written by LM Sixel, the article Poaching workers becomes business strategy for oil and gas as boomers retire explains that energy companies are aware that they’re facing a shortage of talent as the baby boomer generation begins to retire. Their solution? Steal from their competitors.

According to a survey completed by global consulting leader Mercer, 112 companies worldwide that employ more than 1 million workers indicated their plants to rely on the ability to ‘steal and poach’ to fill their job openings. A few weeks back, John Koob, the leader for the energy consulting practice for North America division of Mercer hosted a roundtable discussion with several oil and gas clients in Denver. Upon the discussion in regards to their plans to fill these key roles once this ‘great shift change’ begins to take place, the representatives from each company clearly stated their intent to steal experts from each other.

Koob explains that there has to be a large shift in the thinking going forward to increase the pool of available workers, and suggests increasing training, relying more on immigrant labor and contractors or making changes to current staffing models.

According to the article, petroleum engineers and plant/operations engineers will be in highest demand over the next five years. Additionally, plant managers, geoscientists, upstream product managers, finance managers, sales, traders and marine shippers will also be in short supply.

Photo via FreeDigitalPhotos.net

We’re in Houston, Texas this week attending the Offshore Technology Conference, an event that is expected to bring more than 100,000 industry professionals to Reliant Park, North America’s largest and most versatile complex of event venues. The OTC offers attendees the latest technology in offshore resources including drilling, exploration, production and environmental protection.

This conference offers an opportunity to see ground-breaking innovations as well as meet the leading providers of products and services packed into four days. The program is selected by knowledgeable and experienced professionals, and offers an opportunity to meet and network with thousands of individuals.

History of the Offshore Technology Conference

Founded in 1969, the Offshore Technology Conference is the world’s foremost event for information and development on offshore resources. The conference is sponsored by 13 industry organizations and societies who work cooperatively to develop the technical program. Among the largest 200 trade shows held annually in the United States, OTC is among the 10 largest meetings in terms of attendance, which consistently exceeds 80,000 and more than 2,700 companies participate in the exhibition. OTC includes attendees from around the world, with over 120 countries represented at recent conferences.

The OTC is governed by a Board of Directors made of up 14 representatives, 12 from OTC’s sponsoring organizations and two from OTC’s endorsing organizations.

The primary goal of the OTC is to promote and further the advance of scientific and technical knowledge of offshore resources and environmental matters.

Engineering Search Partners will be attending the conference through the end of the week, so if you’re attending as well, we look forward to meeting with you!

 Photo via the OTC website.

The 2014 US Wood Design Awards were recently announced! It is no wonder why Architects and Engineers love to work with Wood…. It is a beautiful building material.  This Terrific Video showcases the “Best of the Best” in Wood Design and Construction.

Congratulations to the winners in each of the Eight Categories:

Multi-Story Construction: The Bullit Center – Seattle Washington

Labeled the “Greenest building in the World.”

• The Miller Hull Partnership Architects
• Schuchart Construction

Beauty of Wood: Reed College Performing Arts Building – Portland, OR

 This is one awesome building!

• Opsis Architecture

Green Building with Wood: BioMass Heating Plant – Hotchkiss School

Best looking Power Plant I’ve ever seen! One cool building!

• Centerbrook Architects & Planners – Lakewood, CT.

Commercial Wood Design: Federal Center South – Building 1202 –Seattle, Wa.

Wow, the Feds got this one Right! Beautiful Building!

• ZGF Architects and KPFF Consulting Engineers 

Innovative Wood Engineering: Promega Feynman Center – Madison, WI

Cross Laminated Timber never looked so good!

• EwingCole

Wood School Design: Cascades Academy – Tumalo Oregon

Wish I could have gone to this school!

• Hennebury Eddy Architects 

Institutional Wood Design: James Robinson Nature Center – Columbia, Md.

Love that Cedar Siding, Leed Platinum also!

• GWWO Architects

Traditional Use of Wood: Muckleshoot Smokehouse – Auburn, WA

 Wow, Neat Project, not your bread and butter building this is amazing!

• Mahlum Architects

For more photos of these magnificent structures, visit the Building Design & Construction website.