Engineering Company Purchase

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October 03, 2023

by a searcher in Houston, TX, USA

Has anyone stepped into an engineering heavy company from an engineer running it without having any experience as an engineer? I would assume it would be hard to build the employee trust and you would be relying on them heavily..

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Reply by a searcher
from University of Toronto in Toronto, ON, Canada
Engineers are a fickle bunch (I'm a fickle Engineer myself). We tend to think we are the smartest people in the room and reporting to non-Engineers who don't get the technical side of the business will be a challenge for you. I've been in several Executive roles at Engineering firms, and I've never been the most technical Engineer, but in those experiences it's important that I had a "working knowledge" of the technical side of the business. By no means did I have to be an expert. I owned that I wasn't a strong technical leader, but I was able to interact on the technical side of things to at least hold my own. If you have a logical mind and are persistent (like most Entrepreneurs), you will develop enough credibility from a technical perspective. With that out of the way, then the your real skillset as a Leader/Owner will be able to shine through. Simple analogy: if you bought a Mechanics shop, you don't need to be a mechanic, but you need to know what an oil change is before you can manage the mechanics that do oil changes. As part of your ramp up, you will likely want to be able to do a couple oil changes yourself. DM me if you want to have a more detailed conversation.
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Reply by a searcher
from The University of Chicago in San Antonio, TX, USA
It totally depends on a # of factors … as an engineer, I’d be happy to chat re my experiences - feel free to DM or email me at redacted
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