searching with an engineering (not business) background

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July 12, 2021

by a searcher from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in Denver, CO, USA

Hi All, I've recently discovered venture search. My background is in engineering/research, not business, and I'm curious whether others' have gone through the search and acquisition without an MBA or formal business education. Or if anyone has partnered with someone? Thanks!

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Reply by a searcher
in Portland, OR, USA
I'm starting a full0-time search in September and have a MechE background, no MBA. Most of my experience has been managing ship building projects. There are a few podcasts I think help provide insight, namely Think Like an Owner by ^redacted‌. You can take basic accounting courses, learn about finance, and M&A in the evenings after work.


More than anything reading about business management just makes me feel more confident speaking about finance/M&A. I found the following pretty useful:
How Finance Works, the HBR Guide to thinking smart about the numbers
Financial Intelligence, A managers guide to what the numbers really mean
Coursera for a basic accounting class (They have like an MBA certificate through Wharton in there, it's part of that series)
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Reply by a searcher
from Harvard University in San Juan, Puerto Rico
I'm an MBA with a Mechanical Engineering background prior to business school. I think it depends on what kind of Mech E. experience you have as to how much of it will translate.

Working at a small###-###-#### people A/E firm or manufacturing operation? Probably lots will translate.

Working as a super specialized process engineer at a Fortune 500? Probably not a whole lot will be directly translateable. At least where I worked, engineers were very much in the technical details and very far removed from the business/financial side of things, so I had to learn all that stuff afterwards.

The one thing that was actually very helpful was the engineering experience in managing projects and people. That stuff is universal.
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