Engineering Jobs in Networking but it seems like no one wants it...

I am definitely not wrong on this one... I have worked for both Cisco and Juniper... and I hardly seem to see Americans in Engineering roles.. QA Engineers/Developers..or any other role.. Maybe some in hardware manufacturing or something like that.. But maybe the ratio is like 90:10... Its mostly immigrants... Is there something that I am missing here... Don't get me wrong..I am not against immigrants or Americans..Everyone I come across are smart... All of them... but somehow I see "Americans" probably in sales or SE roles or something else but hardly anyone in Engineering....(I have only worked for Networking Companies and mostly as a QA\Developer)...maybe I am wrong and seeing only side...

But any ideas why?

Cheers
Hoogen

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Comments

Bl8ckr0uter

At my last job I worked there were a considerable amount of non americans in the network engineering roles (Level II on up).

While I can't comment on that I can tell you why it would be good to keep sales jobs American. It is simple, people want to talk with people that sound like them, people they can relate to. Maybe the support roles (network engineering, etc) are full of people who aren't American because they usually don't face customers.

Hyper-Me

At least some of it probably has to do with the types of ethnic backgrounds as well.

Chinese-Americans and Indian-Americans seem to have very strict lifestyles and dedicate a lot of time to study and career advancement, which is why you'll see those ethnicities in more difficult job roles.

hoogen82

Well I understand that... and I do think sales job with Americans is kind of good because honestly they are good at it... But engineering jobs pay well too... actually really good when compared to most IT jobs...

hoogen82

I wouldn't call these roles difficult... yeah they are in a sense because they pay well too... but I see people in these forums talking about getting tech support/desktop support roles.. and then working hard to get their ccnp and ccie or bigger certifications...Those jobs I understand aren't hard but all those people are working hard to get into better positions... I had posted about a contract job no one replied back... I do understand its contract but it has good chance of turning into a permanent hire... My manager has been handing out resumes to me asking me to interview people and I only get Chinese Americans or Indian Americans..I asked him why no one else is applying and he had no answers...

PS: Nothing against Tech/Desktop support every job is good and equally difficult in its own right...

jeanathan

Hyper-Me wrote: »

At least some of it probably has to do with the types of ethnic backgrounds as well.

Chinese-Americans and Indian-Americans seem to have very strict lifestyles and dedicate a lot of time to study and career advancement, which is why you'll see those ethnicities in more difficult job roles.

I am Anglo-Saxon and I live a very similar lifestyle. I actual identify with Indian and Chinese cultures well because of this (I see where they are coming from). I am working towards becoming a network engineer so while most maybe immigrants some are not. Who cares anyways? Cisco has a lot of resources devoted to India and China so I can understand that some would move up in the company and come to the US as a result.

Speaking of which about 50% of the Cisco employees I have talked to via smart-net contracts have been Indian and the rest were from the US and Australia, one girl had a thick Spanish accent even.

These are global companies, and yes in sales being a White catholic/protestant depending on your location within the US (I know no one wants to talk about it because it is not P.C.), can be a benefit to gaining the trust of a manager or ceo of a medium sized business.

MentholMoose

hoogen82 wrote: »

But any ideas why?

Do they have H-1B visas? If yes then the answer is money.

hoogen82

I think I said any ideas why Americans aren't in many Engineering positions... what does it have to do with H1b... and also everyone is making 6 figures here... so doesn't make sense why people wouldn't want such a job...

MentholMoose

hoogen82 wrote: »

I think I said any ideas why Americans aren't in many Engineering positions... what does it have to do with H1b... and also everyone is making 6 figures here... so doesn't make sense why people wouldn't want such a job...

Companies can pay lower salaries to people with H-1B visas, so it is not that Americans don't want the job at all.

I've been at companies that hire H-1Bs and companies that don't. The companies that hire H-1Bs had many employees with H-1B visas (foreigners), whereas the companies that don't hire H-1Bs have mostly citizens. It's all about the bottom line.

ColbyG

I haven't seen this at all. The guys I work with (locally) are all American born white dudes. We do have guys in India doing L2/L3 support, but they're actually in India.

Norrlands Turk

MentholMoose wrote: »

Companies can pay lower salaries to people with H-1B visas, so it is not that Americans don't want the job at all.

This holds true in most cases.

Regarding the OP's question, I also think its about lifestyle. As a rather new immigrant who holds the qualifications you see on the left column, I have to say that its easier for me to compete for technical roles rather than customer facing roles in business/accounting/finance areas.

Not so long ago when I was doing my MBA at a no-name state university, I remember applying for all kinds of business jobs and instead receiving calls from recruiters only about helpdesk/deployment contract jobs in every other week, just because I had A+ and N+.

Kaminsky

"immigrants" as a word, has such negative connotations. The vast majority of immigrants I come across professionally are very bright, very well read and usually quite laid back people.

In Europe, most countries are in the EU which, amongst other things, allows anyone to apply for jobs in any of those countries. Lots come to the UK but you don't hear of many going in the other directions due to the pay and hours which would be too little and long for most UK people. You would also be expected to be pretty fluent in that language, which unfortunately we arn't as a whole. However, their command of English when they come here is embarrasingly good.

I have a Polish neighbour who is very well qualified and told me of a cleaning job she went for back home because there wern't enough jobs in her field, that she didn't get. It was cleaning in a large hotel and to apply, you needed to have at least 3 fluent foreign languages. There were over 100 applicants and that wasn't in a big city.

Turgon

hoogen82 wrote: »

I am definitely not wrong on this one... I have worked for both Cisco and Juniper... and I hardly seem to see Americans in Engineering roles.. QA Engineers/Developers..or any other role.. Maybe some in hardware manufacturing or something like that.. But maybe the ratio is like 90:10... Its mostly immigrants... Is there something that I am missing here... Don't get me wrong..I am not against immigrants or Americans..Everyone I come across are smart... All of them... but somehow I see "Americans" probably in sales or SE roles or something else but hardly anyone in Engineering....(I have only worked for Networking Companies and mostly as a QA\Developer)...maybe I am wrong and seeing only side...

But any ideas why?

Cheers
Hoogen

Whats the difference between SE role and engineering? By SE do you mean systems engineer?

A lot of big companies have arrangements in place to bring in offshore workers provided by TATA, Tech Mahindra or other large resourcing companies. These usually provide a lot of technical workers i.e support, build and designers. They also provide developers, testers, platform managers and project managers.

networker050184

ColbyG wrote: »

I haven't seen this at all. The guys I work with (locally) are all American born white dudes. We do have guys in India doing L2/L3 support, but they're actually in India.

Same here. All the engineers I work with and the engineers at other carriers I've worked with have all been American (as far as I can tell). The only time I end up dealing with a large majority of immigrants is on the software development side or low level phone support. We were bought out by a larger company not too long ago and their engineers are all American except one. I really haven't seen the trend you speak of, but location might have something to do with it also.

contentpros

Without sounding prejudiced I think culture has a fair amount to do with why you see many Indian and Asian engineers. I run the IT groups for a large "global" company that deals with a fair amount of offshoring/outsourcing. I primarily deal with India but I have noticed a few things working with several different companies. The Indian engineers and developers that I have worked with tend to be very analytical and do exactly what you tell them and how you tell them to do it and stop. Don't get me wrong this is a GOOD thing. But sometimes when you are working on a project or such you want to deal with people that will act as a sounding board that will give you feedback or suggest alternatives that might be a better way to approach the issue or yield better results. I personally do not know the best solution to every issue and value having a discussion to explore other options.

I have had this discussion with other CIO/CTO's and the common item that I hear (and I hate to use the cliche saying) is that they "don't think outside the box". There are plenty of instances where this is a good thing but sometimes the lack of communication or suggestion can have negative effects like the stereotype of not thinking outside the box.

I can only speak for myself and my experiences and I find that many of the "American" engineers I deal with on projects tend to have the additional conversations and propose alternate options. As a result of this many of them find themselves becoming more involved with the architecture, pre-sales, project management, or management roles versus the implementation or traditional engineering roles.

HTH
~CP

impelse

hoogen82 wrote: »

I am definitely not wrong on this one... I have worked for both Cisco and Juniper... and I hardly seem to see Americans in Engineering roles.. QA Engineers/Developers..or any other role.. Maybe some in hardware manufacturing or something like that.. But maybe the ratio is like 90:10... Its mostly immigrants... Is there something that I am missing here... Don't get me wrong..I am not against immigrants or Americans..Everyone I come across are smart... All of them... but somehow I see "Americans" probably in sales or SE roles or something else but hardly anyone in Engineering....(I have only worked for Networking Companies and mostly as a QA\Developer)...maybe I am wrong and seeing only side...

But any ideas why?

Cheers
Hoogen

I do not know where you are located, but here in Houston everytime that they talk about Network Engineer they always mention a ver loooong skill list that normally span from Security, Network and Voice and the list is like 3 specialization at hte same time.

hoogen82

Thanks Contentpro... I think your reasoning is very true..

GAngel

That's because they're all getting degrees in poly sci or english

.

But seriously have you been to a major unis and taken a look at there postgrads. Atleast 50% are non western countries and they're usually right at the top of there classes for the amount of money they're paying.
Now you get a 50/50 mix of grads with 5-8 yrs schooling the western kids will spend the first 5-10 years essentially getting coffee by which time there skills are outdated. The foreign kids usually head back to the mid east/asia where they're immediately thrown into leading roles that make or break them. 5-10 yrs they running divisions of intl companies with a host of experience. If i were going back for thesis program it's exactly what I would be focusing on.

chmorin

Why does it have anything to do with background or ethnics? Wouldn't it make sense if people who are good at the job, went to get the job? Maybe it is just a coincidence that people from different areas didn't want to be good at that job. It is a matter of individual characteristics, because we are all unique.

This topic is very prejudice. While I will agree that the environment in which one is taught has alot to do with what they achieve, the environment is not dedicated or limited to the areas in which many here have placed. My lifestyle could have been just as strict and beneficial to my work career as anyone from any other county. That goes for everyone.

GAngel

chmorin wrote: »

Why does it have anything to do with background or ethnics? Wouldn't it make sense if people who are good at the job, went to get the job? Maybe it is just a coincidence that people from different areas didn't want to be good at that job. It is a matter of individual characteristics, because we are all unique.

This topic is very prejudice. While I will agree that the environment in which one is taught has alot to do with what they achieve, the environment is not dedicated or limited to the areas in which many here have placed. My lifestyle could have been just as strict and beneficial to my work career as anyone from any other county. That goes for everyone.

You've jumped to conclusions read it again. The best job markets currently for engineers to ply there trade is the middle east or asia. A new grad will get further sooner over there than here because they're begging for engineers and willing to pay for them albeit with some very major major cultural drawbacks depending on how you view it. My point isn't about who is a better student that is irrelevant. There new class of engineers get exposed sooner and far heavier than our current ones because in most market places we're saturated. That isn't a shot at our school system just how the market forces are working currently.

If you show up in dubai or shanghai with a degree and a head on your shoulders you're going places. If you go to silicon valley with the same credentials you're just a number.

1MeanAdmin

I think hoogen82 meant the immigrants working in US (or other highly developed country) rather than foreigners in their native countries.

I'm an immigrant living in NYC area and have classmates who moved to other highly developed countries so I do have some perspective on this. I think that the percentage of talent that any given country is able to produce is roughly the same everywhere. When we separate the immigrants from all foreigners, we'll see the following:

Those in less developed countries who try to increase their quality of life DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT and either (a) move to a more developed country or (b) stay and try harder where they are. Those who lack ANY initiative usually stay and do little or nothing to improve their lives. I'm sure many would agree that in this case, statistically, the percentage of talent among those who leave would be at least somewhat higher than the ones who stay (if I move I'm obviously counting on at least one skill that I have).

Therefore I think that the percentage of talent among Americans and foreigners is the same, while it is to some degree higher among immigrants. At the same time, this talent only has some monetary value in technology and other non-culture specific fields.

EDIT: There are different things that stop a highly developed country and a less developed one from raising much more talent than they already have. In a highly developed country some people with potential take all the opportunities they have for granted and don't always pursue them because they may already be comfortable. In a less developed country some people who try to be comfortable, don't have so many opportunities to begin with so that talent may never develop.

chmorin

GAngel wrote: »

You've jumped to conclusions read it again. The best job markets currently for engineers to ply there trade is the middle east or asia. A new grad will get further sooner over there than here because they're begging for engineers and willing to pay for them albeit with some very major major cultural drawbacks depending on how you view it. My point isn't about who is a better student that is irrelevant. There new class of engineers get exposed sooner and far heavier than our current ones because in most market places we're saturated. That isn't a shot at our school system just how the market forces are working currently.

If you show up in dubai or shanghai with a degree and a head on your shoulders you're going places. If you go to silicon valley with the same credentials you're just a number.

I did not consider this, thank you for correcting me.

1MeanAdmin

GAngel wrote: »

If you show up in dubai or shanghai with a degree and a head on your shoulders you're going places.

I disagree. Many foreigners say the same thing about US, UK, Canada, etc. and actually do it.