Electrical engineer moving to Ireland

karenpk

I currently live in Germany and am planning on moving back to Dublin with my (German) boyfriend. I know moving back to Ireland as our economy starts to go down the toilet might seem like a ridiculous idea but we have both decided to give it a shot. He has savings and is willing to take up any kind of job in the beginning to pay the rent while looking for something related to his studies.

His English is near fluent and he's 28 and has recently graduated with a diplom in electrical engineering & IT specialising in power engineering. This is roughly equal to a masters in Ireland (eight semesters.) It included a one semester internship with ENVIA in project planning in low & medium voltage power grids.

Q1. What's the job situation in this area like at the moment, are there any jobs?

Q2. What areas/ types of job/ companies etc should we look into?

Q3. Does anyone have any other advice, comments or useful resources that we aren't aware of ( e.g. not monster or jobs.ie) that they can add?

Thanks for taking the time to read, I hope it makes sense (I have only the vaguest idea of what the differences between variouse types of engineering are and what the hell they involve!!)

mikhail

I understand that electrical engineers are in moderate demand - there are jobs here in that field, recession or no. I'm not quite in that area, and I haven't been job hunting for some years, so I can't help further.

token56

Electrical Engineering isn't the worst at the moment relatively speaking. Our electrical grid needs some work at the moment and there are various projects on going from what I can see. So looking for any jobs with regards this would be a good idea, from Eirgrid to the vendors of the different jobs. Some research about who the vendors are for the different projects might give you some possible names of companies that could have jobs.

Renewables is obviously also another big area at the moment and their are a number of companies related to this. I think the key is just research to find the right companies doing work he is interested in and see if they have any positions available.

pljudge321

ESBI have had the same advertised vacancy for HV commissioning engineers for the past two years or so if that helps.

https://www.candidatemanager.net/esbi/

2011

OP, PM sent

sharkDawg

To be honest the job situation is pretty grim for a recent graduate. I myself graduated last october with a masters and my research project was in collaboration with ESB. So far the only job interviews I have gotten have been in the UK. I have offered to work for free with companies here just to get some more experience but without any luck.

If he has 2-3 years experience then job hunting becomes whole lot easier, but from my experience if he just has that one semester behind him, it will be very tough.

karenpk

Thanks for all the advice, so far it looks like there is some hope but it could be tough finding something. I think his limited amount of work experience will be the biggest obstacle, he is currently looking at trying to get a short term contract or internship here before coming to Ireland. There's still lots we have to figure out but at least it's a start. Thanks for the pm 2011 we'll definitely look into it.