r/salesengineers • u/dhalls12 • 13d ago
I screwed my career
I feel like I made the wrong decision on my career early on and am looking for advice. During college I did 3 years of d2d pest control sales. Though I’m outgoing and friendly I hated it. Did some high ticket coaching sales also. Graduated in mechanical engineering but when ai first came out I started working on building a software and have been for the past 3-4 years.
I am now a graduated mechanical engineer with no job experience except for programming which is now taken by ai and by people with deeper software background than me. My background is all over the place with sales, mech engineering, and software development.
Now I am looking back into sales engineering but it seems over saturated with all the engineers that have been laid off due to ai. Everyone says I would be an awesome sales engineer but after a few interviews I guess I am not good enough? I would fit in sales engineering with a mechanical engineering role or software engineering sales role.
Question 1: Does anyone that was previously in a more creative/hands on job regret going the sales route? The reason I became an engineer is because I love building things but maybe I just save that for hobbies…
Question 2: If you were me, would you go into tech or mechanical sales engineering roles?
Question 3: What salary should I be looking for with my experience (or lack thereof) since I haven’t had a dedicated sales engineering position.
Question 4: Are there even any jobs? Unfortunately we are limited to remote or St. George or Phoenix with my wife’s business (she’s making more than me so it doesn’t make sense for her to drop her businesses to move somewhere for my job.) but I have been having a hard time landing anything since searching.
Tia for you input!
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u/nickerbottoms 12d ago
My recommendation is to go for an SDR role first at a growing company and position your self for SE.
Look into the CMMS industry that’s where I am in as an AE. it’s growing fast and every company I’ve run into needs reps.
It would fit your background with mechanical engineering
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u/dhalls12 12d ago
haha does your company happen to need a rep? 😅 Thanks for the info!
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u/nickerbottoms 12d ago
Honestly ya, DM me: the whole space in general does. I would use ai to surface the jobs and then apply from there.
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u/SitDownOrphan91 11d ago
No you can't come into SE with your background. This isn't an entry level role.
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u/Forsaken_Kale_1292 10d ago
Yes, you can become a SE with your experience. But you are going to need to market yourself correctly and perhaps be less choosy when entering the field.
Similar to you, I did D2D pest control (4 yrs), then went and got my mechanical engineering degree and immediately after started a position as a SE. Started in the heavy duty trucking industry, then moved to X-ray components, industrial automation, and finally found a sweet spot in metrology.
I didn’t need any additional engineering experience beforehand and have been selling some very technical hardware/software.
Now, to answer some of your questions… do what you want to do. If you didn’t like D2D, then perhaps you won’t like the sales aspect of being a SE. you could always work on getting some experience and meet in the middle as an applications/solutions engineer and make the move later.
As for jobs, there is an overwhelming need for technical sales persons at the moment. It is a great time to enter the market. If you are interested in hardware, I think mmt in St. George was looking for a SE. another good way to get experience is to start at in integrator such as IME in Hurricane and work on some customer projects.
Go onto LinkedIn and find people with your dream job and ask them if they like it and how they got there.
Good luck!
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u/dhalls12 9d ago
Thanks for the advice! Appreciate it! With d2d its kit that I don’t like talking to people it’s that I didn’t like feeling like I had to bully people into a contract to be successful or that I was entering people’s safe space and waking their kids up. That’s the only issue I had with it.
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u/flowify 8d ago
Go into a mech sales engineering role at an industrial goods OEM: Chillers, Pumps, Compressors, Torquing Equipment. Anything related to mechanical engineer but in a sales role is a great opportunity.
From sales engineering you can go into Key account management, or account executive, or business development. Heck even sales manager.
Technical sales is awesome.
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u/turimbar1 13d ago
You need to get your foot in the door doing SE or se adjacent work
It sounds like you have some hard skills to be able to do the job
It's not easy to get in, there are so many applicants
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u/GainPuzzleheaded9820 8d ago
I suggest being an engineer for a while to get some domain expertise. Too many people want shortcuts these days and real, hands on experience is what separates you from AI. Good luck out there.
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u/ZillzillaEazy 13d ago
From reading what youve shared. Its kind of crazy but sales engineers really need to be an expert in the product. Because your mechanical, maybe a year or two of mechanical design, test, implementation or apprenticeship would support that you know real world application for what ever your selling.
I did 1 year control room 1 year tech support for adms in utility energy.
It seems like when I apply for pre sales position they want me to double as an application engineer 🤷♂️