u/htrptr

Hello, I'm in a bit of a unique situation. Last month I interviewed for a remote engineer position at a company that's basically my dream job. Ultimately I didn't get the job because they decided to go with local candidates, but the recruiter said they really liked me and that I was the next choice over the ones they hired. The recruiter also said that the hiring manager was hoping to open up another position in a month or so and that he'd let me know to apply.

Well lo and behold, a position just opened up and the recruiter told me to apply and that I'd be able to skip the interview process. He reiterated that the hiring manager really liked me but that they'd have to post the rec and interview candidates again.

Here's the thing. Today, I just received an offer from another company for a similar engineering position, but onsite full time. I really want this remote job that I feel like I've been given a second chance at, but I'd be dumb to pass up this onsite position that's a close contender.

I may just accept this first offer and (politely) back out if I get my dream offer. But should I tell the recruiter for my dream job that I received another offer in the hopes that they might move a little more quickly to make a decision, even though they just started interviewing?

I have a potential interview for a contract position at JPL. It would be in engineering (mid to senior level experience) and has the potential to convert to full time. With all the job uncertainty going around right now, how risky would this be, given in most industries contractors are the first to go when layoffs hit.

I work at a big aerospace OEM right now so relatively my job security is pretty high. Working at NASA has been a dream of mine though and the work JPL does would be much more interesting and fulfilling. Any advice is appreciated.

Hello, I’m interviewing for experienced structural analyst roles at both NASA JPL and Boeing El Segundo. I’d love to get the opinions of anyone in these positions at these locations!

How do you like working here? Would you recommend working here? Is the work interesting? Good work life balance? Job security?

I’ve heard JPL has gone through a ton of uncertainty and layoffs and raises are basically nonexistent. I don’t know much about Boeing El Segundo but I’ve heard both good and bad things. Both are 9/80s and I think fully RTO?

Any insight is appreciated!

What the title says. I had an interview 2 weeks ago, then a few days ago the status changed to Post Interview Hiring Manager Decisions. I thought this meant I’d likely be getting an offer. Then checked today and the status changed back to Hiring Manager Review.

Any idea what this means? Does it have something to do with the apparent hiring freeze?

Open to DMs if anyone has any idea what’s going on

Hello, first time parents here and looking for advice, so thanks in advance! My wife just accepted a night shift job where she'd be in a hospital 2 days a week from 8pm to 8am. I work a regular 9-5 office job. We have an almost 6 month old who would need care on the days she comes off of night shift (she'd be home, but sleeping all day).

The thing is, my wife's 2 shifts a week will be assigned to her by the hospital without any guarantee that they'll be on the same day every week. According to my wife, she would find out her schedule a month in advance. Are there nannies out there who are willing to work part-time when the schedule changes on a monthly basis? Obviously a consistent schedule is ideal, but just trying to get advice on how to go about this and take into account the needs/opinion of whoever we hire!

Hi all, just trying to get some advice on how to go about taking care of a child when one parent works day shift and another works night shift.

My wife just got a job that's going to open doors for her, but it's a 5 month contract, night shift position in a hospital from 8pm to 8am, 2 days a week. I currently work a regular 9-5 job that's on-site, but I have a very understanding manager who would likely let me work remotely (or at least half the day) on the days my wife is coming off of night shift. The complicated part is that we have a 6 month old.

Does anyone have any advice on how to go about this? Obviously my wife will be exhausted and I don't expect her to take care of the baby when she could be sleeping. I also am fully aware that on the days I'm home, I won't be able to fully divide my attention between our baby and my work. Luckily we have a fantastic baby who's not fussy and happy to play on her own.

If my job allows me to work from home on these days, I'm thinking I may take the productivity hit and try my best to get as much done while also giving my baby attention and care when I can. I know this will be difficult. If my job only lets me work from home for example for a half day, my wife would have to wake up early to take care of the baby. I'm also fully aware that employers require you to have childcare if you work from home. Has anyone had any experience with this?

Another option is to have my mom come over to watch the baby, but she'd likely only be able to once a week because she lives about 45 min away.

My very last option is daycare, or more likely, an in-home nanny. We really want to avoid daycare for as long as possible, but I know it would fix all of our problems. But what about an in-home nanny once or twice a week? Has anyone gone this route?

Are any stress analysts at Boeing El Segundo, CA willing to share their opinion of working in these roles, specifically on spacecraft/satellites? Would you recommend it, do you enjoy it? How's the work life balance? I'm interested in transferring from BCA and wondering if it's worth it.

Hello, I have an interview coming up for a structural analysis engineer position in the space industry and I know the interview will be very technically heavy on structural dynamics (modal analysis, frequency response, random vibration, etc.). I have 6+ years of experience in aerospace static linear/non-linear analysis and structural analysis/classical hand calc. I have very little dynamics experience in industry but understand the basics (I.e. natural frequency, modal mass participation, mode shapes, resonance, damping, sinusoidal frequency response, random vibration [PSD]) and the general analysis process (modal —> frequency response —> random vibration)

But what are some good technical interview questions or topics I should be aware of?

Apologies if this discussion isn’t allowed, but I’ve worked in BCA as a stress analyst for a few years now at the Long Beach, CA site and am really getting fed up with the lack of ownership and friction with our counterparts in Everett. In LB we do a large chunk of the analysis and certification on various commercial aircraft and customers, but we don’t actually own any of the work statement. The level of efficiency is laughably low when every decision, no matter how simple, has to be made by someone hundreds of miles away, causing endless rework and way too much disagreement. We’re supposed to be one Boeing, but us LB engineers don’t feel that way. I understand that it’s normal to work with people all over the world, but at my last job I collaborated with Europeans and Americans all over the world and it was light years easier to produce quality engineering because there was the agreement that we all owned our work.

What’s the situation on C-17 on the BGS side? There’s a large C-17 presence at the Long Beach site, but are the engineers here plagued by the same headaches on the BCA side due? Or do (stress) engineers have more ownership and do different teams have less friction between each other? There are a few stress analyst reqs open right now and I’m debating on moving over.

My wife started having sacroiliac (SI) join pain about 1.5 weeks ago, so severe that she couldn’t support her own weight, 10/10 pain, etc. She was prescribed muscle relaxers, opioid pain killers, and prednisone. As of today, there’s been almost no improvement and she’s barely managing the pain with all these meds.

She’s trying to rest as much as possible, but is it too early to start stretches and light exercise to try to get the pelvic muscles to relax given that she’s still in so much pain and the inflammation doesn’t seem to have let up much?

Edit: the few stretches she’s done have been done gently and have given her a sense of relief in the moment but haven’t provided any lasting effects

My wife is going through what seems to be Sacroiliac (SI) joint pain. Standing and especially sitting sends her into excruciating pain and even laying on her back in bed (somewhat firm mattress) creates discomfort.

The only relief she’s found is lying flat on her back on the floor. Until she’s able to reduce the inflammation and get proper physical therapy and rehabilitation, is there an issue with staying on the ground for long periods of time with 1 hour standing/walking/bathroom/etc breaks in between?

My wife and I stayed on our current health insurance and added our child to it when she was born just because of the cheaper cost of childbirth. Well, my child is 4 months old now and in the last week or so my wife has had a few nightmare experiences at the doctor's office (think dismissal of severe pain and doctor unwilling to provide care, and specialist appointments >2 weeks out).

My wife just got offered a new job, which would allow us to leave our current health insurance for a better one. Has anyone switched health insurances with an infant? I just want to make sure that my baby's appointments, vaccinations, etc. would be taken care of seamlessly and she'd get proper pediatric care. TIA!

Does anyone know of any good training or resources for structural dynamics with FEA? I'm not talking about structural dynamics theory, there's plenty of that online and in textbooks.

I'm looking for resources specifically for the implementation of structural dynamics using FEA (like random vibration, frequency response, etc.) on an actual structure (preferably in aerospace). Thanks!

Hello, I applied for a senior engineering position but haven’t heard anything for 2 weeks. My application is still active and I believe I really do have the qualifications for the role. I found a current employee’s LinkedIn profile and they’re in the exact position and level I’m applying to. I messaged them asking for their experience and they actually suggested we hop on a phone call to answer my questions.

I plan to ask them questions about the role, their opinion of the company, and a few general technical questions, but I was wondering, would it be inappropriate, unprofessional, or just generally a bad idea if I were to ask if they’d be willing to put in a good word for me or just a simple nudge to the hiring manager/interviewer? This is even assuming this employee has the seniority to do this but to be honest I don’t have much to lose. TIA!

Hello, I’m trying to understand how in industry (aerospace/space/etc) conduct fatigue analyses in conjunction with FEA. In my career, I’ve rarely touched fatigue so I’m looking for a better understanding of how engineers in industry go about it. Please correct me if I’m wrong, but my current understanding is:

1. A static FEM is created of the structure
2. Using this FEM, critical locations are identified (i.e., hotspots, stress concentrations)
3. The far field stresses at these locations are collected (max principal?)
4. Assuming there is fatigue data for the tested materials/properties, at this point would the engineer use a secondary fatigue specific software which takes as inputs:
   • Fatigue allowables/test data
   • Far field stress from static FEM
   • Some kind of cyclic loading data that the structure sees in service?
   • Any factors/reduction factors based on the environment/material
5. Using the fatigue software, calculates the fatigue life of the structure

Is this a rough example of how an engineer would perform a fatigue analysis? TIA!

I applied to a few positions in Workday and some applications say “Resume Review” and others say “Under Consideration”. What’s the difference between the two? And which comes before the other in the application process? TIA!

I’m sure I already know the answer, but is it normal that my 11 week old is suddenly waking up screaming maybe 5-7 minutes after putting her down at night?

We’ve been blessed with a relatively easy baby, where she’d go down at 8pm without too much fussiness. Rocking and shushing would get her to sleep within 10-20 minutes and then we could set her down in her bassinet without waking her (95% of the time).

Now for the past week, she’s started to wake up screaming hysterically a few minutes after being put down. The majority of the time my wife has been the only one able to calm her back to sleep, which can take anywhere between 20-40 minutes.

A few times she’s woken up a second time crying. But then at this point she’ll let us put her down and will actually give us 4-5 hours of sleep. Why is it only when we first put her down that’s she’s so hysterical? I know we could have a much fussier baby, but is this just some phase or is she just starting to realize that she doesn’t want to be alone? Or is the bassinet cold?? TIA