What to do when your career is in transition

It's time to answer another of your engineering career questions, this time from Todd:

I found myself unemployed last December for the first time in 23 years. My last plant was a victim of the economy. There has been plenty to do searching for a new job but the results have been discouraging.

I wonder, is there still enough manufacturing left in the Delaware Valley to keep a guy like me employed? Or perhaps my engineering career has run its course and I should be thinking career change.

That's sad to hear, Todd. I'm sure everyone reading this feels for you. It's tough out there, and getting tougher.

To be honest, your mid-career age might make it a little bit harder to find a new job. According to a recent survey by IEEE-USA, older engineers took longer to find new jobs. They were still employable, and desirable, but it still took about twice as long for them to land new positions.

Part of your challenge might be the area you're living in. In your letter (which I only excerpted above), you express fears that too many manufacturing jobs have left the country, which is probably true. But a quick search of Experience.com's jobs database finds a large number of positions in Delaware, so I recommend giving them a search.

If that doesn't work, you might want to consider putting your engineering skills to use in a complimentary area, outside of manufacturing but still within engineering. Your long work history and reliability make you an asset to a company looking for a solid, stable employee.

And there's always the possibility that you might need to move to find the right job. If you want to stay in manufacturing, but there just aren't jobs where you live, it might be time to follow the jobs to a new state. Always an annoying prospect, but something to consider.

Your letter says you're already back at school getting a new degree, so you're already ahead of my next suggestion. Adding skills -- both new skills and enhanced versions of the ones you already have -- is vitally important to your continued enjoyability, so you're on the right track there.

Like I said, this might take a little while, but engineers are still highly desired employees, even in this recession. So hold on a little while longer, and we'll keep our fingers crossed for you.