RF Drive Test Engineer Jobs
Radio-frequency (RF) engineering is not the type of career that has a high attrition rate. But if the profession is as good as it sounds, why are companies having such a difficult time finding RF engineers to fill their vacant positions?
There are two main reasons. The first is due to the basic supply and demand rule. The wireless communications field has grown steadily in recent years, much like the software and computer engineering fields.
Because the demand for software engineers has been so great, and the profession has a reputation of paying extremely high salaries, many engineering students have focused on this field.
"Most students in electrical engineering have been attracted by computer engineering," says Edward Jull. He's an electrical engineering professor.
"The present demand for radio-frequency engineers is also a result of the growth of wireless communications and the development of integrated circuits and computers."
The other reason there seems to be a shortage of RF engineers is that courses in RF are often hard to find in many universities.
"It's quite difficult to find a direct path to RF," says Lorna Carr. She is a senior RF engineer.
She says that when she was attending university, there were extremely few courses available in RF. Upon graduation, she says she was offered a position with a company where she was exposed to the skills required by an RF engineer.
She then took it upon herself to learn the rest of the skills needed to get involved with the RF side of engineering. "I was pretty much self-taught," admits Carr. "I would read for an hour to an hour and a half each morning before work."
Now, many universities offer co-op programs. That's something that wasn't available when she was in school.
"Co-op programs are definitely the way to go," says Michael Glaum. He is a control systems engineer in Middletown, Rhode Island. Although Glaum does not consider himself to be an RF engineer, his job does include some RF-related duties.
When Glaum got his engineering degree, he participated in a co-op program. He says co-op programs provided the majority of his RF skills.
"Any RF systems experience you can get in school is a big plus," says Glaum.
Carr recommends taking any RF course you can get your hands on. Even this bit of RF experience from school can help when applying for a job.
Once RF engineers have the required skills, they are often in huge demand. Carr says she is regularly contacted by headhunters who want to know if she is interested in changing jobs.
Being in demand is one of the perks to being an RF engineer, as is earning a substantial salary. These engineers move quickly up the pay scale. If they choose to go into management, wages are even higher.
But it's not just the money that attracts RF engineers to their jobs. For many, the challenge is also appealing. That, and the fact that "you get to work with lots of cool toys and really interesting equipment," says Carr.
"I like being able to go into the lab, figure things out, measure [components], then build [the item]."
She'll tell you that much of the lab work consists of measuring and remeasuring tiny little components (some of which are only 0.008 x 0.005 inches in size) and "fiddling, tuning and playing" with these parts to get them right.
