The broad field of communications ranges from landline and wireless phones to videoconferencing, computer networks, the Internet and satellites. For several years now, certain segments of the industry have been in turmoil, with downsizings, layoffs, and a cutback in recruiting.

Camille Luckenbaugh.

“It’s an extremely rough time right now for new graduates,” says Camille Luckenbaugh, employment information manager at the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE). NACE tracks hiring and starting salaries for new grads in every field.

Luckenbaugh notes that telecom companies reported a 55 percent drop in hiring between 2001 and 2002. “It used to be common for graduates to get four or five job offers. Now some students are graduating without jobs,” she says.

While hiring is down, salary offers have dipped only slightly. CS graduates are looking at a 5.9 percent decrease to an average starting salary of $49,596, while EEs are down 3.4% to $50,123. Business systems networking and telecom majors have seen a decrease of 3.2 percent, with an average starting salary of $42,158.

Despite the current downturn, some projections for 2003 are optimistic. The 2002 Telecommunications Market Review and Forecast predicts a 7.5 percent growth rate for telecom equipment and software in 2003, increasing to 10.9 percent by 2005. The forecast is put out by the Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA, www.tiaonline.org), which represents 1,100 equipment vendors and suppliers.

In fact, the forecast notes that the wireless services marketplace actually increased by 20.2 percent in 2002 and is expected to add another 17.9 percent in 2003. Specialized services like broadband Internet access and public videoconferencing services also grew substantially this year.

It’s pretty clear that jobs in communications will be available before long, and that after the shakedown period, the industry will be more eager than ever to bring on clever new grads equipped with the latest skills. Recent women grads are doing well in communications; here are the stories of several who are working in a variety of specialties within the field.

Rosa Chan of AT&T Wireless is responsible for a TDMA switch covering 200 cell sites.

Rosa Chan works in RF at AT&T Wireless
Rosa Chan was born in Panama and came to the U.S. for college. She received a BSEE from Texas A&M (College Station, TX) in 2000 and was hired by AT&T Wireless (Redmond, WA) to join its engineering and development program in Bothell, WA. After six months of training she became a radio frequency (RF) performance engineer responsible for one of five Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA) switches in the Dallas area.

“A switch can cover several hundred cell sites; my switch has about 200 sites,” Chan explains. “I check status and performance on a daily basis and do troubleshooting. I also support engineers working on the Global System for Mobile (GSM) switchover.” Sometimes, by way of a change, she goes out into the field to determine whether a specific problem is originating at the cell site or through external interference.

Chan started on the communications track with a summer internship in the wireless department of Ericsson (Dallas, TX), a switch vendor. “I learned software programs, checked for errors and did debugging,” she recalls.

Growing up in Panama, Chan concentrated on science in high school and at a community college. “When I decided to try EE at Texas A&M everyone told me it was too hard, but I wanted the challenge. When I got to the RF classes, that really interested me.”

Her challenge now is to learn as much as she can about wireless technology. “I want to get a good grasp on TDMA and GSM so I can increase my value and expertise,” she says. An MBA is also in her plans.

Nohemi Martinez, with Raytheon Co, loves the growing field of satcom.

Nohemi Martinez: satcom for defense at Raytheon
“I like wireless and RF, and now I’m involved in satellite communications, which is a growing field,” says Nohemi Martinez. Martinez is a systems engineer 2 for Raytheon Co (Marlboro, MA). She works in the Joint Tactical Terminal (JTT) program at the company’s St. Petersburg, FL facility.

Her group is developing a software-programmable intelligence radio that receives broadcasts of tactical data. Her work involves requirement analysis, test procedure development, test and integration activities, data analysis and software development support. “I’m also the interface between systems and software engineering to help meet customer requirements,” she explains.

The JTT program uses a Demand-Assigned Multiple Access (DAMA) network, a method of automated channel sharing used in satellite communications. Martinez has to verify the DAMA network protocol and JTT system requirements, so she needs to understand satellite communications as well as DAMA and JTT.

Martinez received a BSEE with a specialization in communication power systems in 1999 from the University of Puerto Rico-Mayaguez. She was active with the Tau Beta Pi engineering honor society and the Golden Key national honor society, and learned a lot at SHPE workshops and conferences she attended.

She started with Raytheon in 1999 as an entry-level systems engineer and moved to her present position last year. She loves the technical challenges of her job, and in the future hopes to get involved in test and integration activities for other types of networks.

At Qualcomm, Jill Jarvis is involved in wireless phones from start to finish.

Jill Jarvis: CDMA technology at Qualcomm
At Qualcomm (San Diego, CA), a wireless technology company, design engineer Jill Jarvis works in the Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) technology division. She’s involved in the design of wireless phones from start to finish.

“My job depends on what stage of the design process we’re in. When I’m on a new project I focus on design. Once the actual parts are made, my team and I move into the lab to test the product and eliminate bugs,” Jarvis says.

Jarvis got her BSEE magna cum laude from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI, Troy, NY) in 2001. She studied communications and information processing at school, but currently she’s doing hardware engineering and focusing on memory and timing issues. “I’m learning as I go,” she admits.

She also learned a lot through her summer internships. “After my freshman year I was considering industrial and management engineering, but a summer with an East Coast electronics company, assisting with the fabrication of flat-screen displays, influenced my decision to change to EE.”

Another internship with the same company got her thinking about working in a faster-paced situation, leading to her later internship with Qualcomm and ultimately her current job. “Qualcomm was always exciting and challenged me as an engineer. After my summer internship I was offered a full-time position,” she says.

In school Jarvis was president of the RPI chapter of Eta Kappa Nu, the electrical engineering honor society. She was also a member of Tau Beta Pi and the Society of Women Engineers (SWE).

Networking goes beyond engineering societies, Jarvis advises. “Get your resume out to companies that interest you; give their university relations contact a call. You don’t want to push too hard, but you do want the company to know who you are,” she emphasizes.

Jennifer Nowlin supports a local switch and RF engineering group at Verizon Wireless.

Jennifer Nowlin is a field engineer at Verizon Wireless
As a field engineer and part of an area team at Verizon Wireless (Bedminster, NJ), Jennifer Nowlin supports the local switch and RF engineering group in Minneapolis, MN. She gets input from corporate and national HQ about capacity and performance, monitors system capacity, forecasts needs and helps make decisions on the structure of the network.

Nowlin graduated from the University of Wisconsin (Madison, WI) in 1998 with a BSEE and a focus in communications. In school she interned with ADC Telecommunications (Minneapolis, MN), helping with a broadband system, and then with Motorola in Seattle, WA where she worked on two-way radio networks. “It’s a fascinating industry, and RF is forever changing,” she says.

Her first full-time job took her to the San Francisco operation of Sprint PCS (Kansas City, KS) to do systems performance engineering. “I worked on network problems and did day-to-day monitoring, as opposed to my current focus which is more long-term,” she explains. Late last year she started at Verizon Wireless. Her husband, an engineering contractor with Verizon Wireless, helped get her the job.

You might consider field engineering a traditionally male job, but Nowlin is used to that kind of work. “My father is in dirt construction, and he didn’t have a lot of employees but he did have three daughters.

“At an early age I was driving a skid loader and running a bulldozer. We did a little welding and some demolition work, too. So field engineering seems a natural fit.”

Apart from knowing the trades, Nowlin believes she has the personality for the job. “I’ve learned to work with both corporate and blue collar, from the VP to the cell-site technician.”

Alltel’s Kristen Cinek works on QA issues for both wireline and wireless networks.

Kristen Cinek: QA at Alltel
Kristen Cinek is an engineer 1 in the network quality group of Alltel Communications Corp (Little Rock, AR), a provider of wireline and wireless services. Her group handles quality assurance issues for both wireline and wireless networks and deals with a number of outside vendors and other engineers in the company. Cinek is also working on formalizing corporate policy for spares stocking and preventive maintenance.

She got her BS in electrical and computer engineering with a math minor from Baylor University (Waco, TX) in January 2002 and joined a leadership program at Alltel. “My mentor and my boss both help me set career goals and decide how to achieve those goals,” she says. “They also help me determine what kind of training to take.”

On campus, Cinek was involved in IEEE and was one of the original members of SWE’s Baylor chapter. “We were able to speak to older students, network and get help with studying.”

The atmosphere at Alltel has been equally helpful. “Coming into the job I was a little worried because I didn’t have much telecom experience, but I was accepted with open arms,” she recalls. “Just be ready to learn and ask questions. If you’re not assigned a mentor, find one for yourself,” is her advice.

Rachel Such designs microwave radio components in Alcatel’s wireless division.

Rachel Such is a hardware design engineer at Alcatel
Co-opping introduced Rachel Such to telecom. She interned with Motorola for five summers while pursuing her BSEE at the University of Texas-Austin. “I worked in different engineering groups within the semiconductor chip area. I had rotations with process, applications and device engineering.”

Armed with that experience and her 1999 BSEE, she found a job with Alcatel (Plano, TX) as a hardware design engineer. Alcatel provides communications networks, from satellite connections to undersea fiber optic cable, for telecom carriers and other business customers. Such liked the company for its microwave involvement, which interested her, and because she wanted to stay in Texas where her family is located.

She now works in Alcatel’s wireless division, designing microwave radios used by communications carriers. “I’ve been working in the RF group, which has fifteen people, for about two years now,” she says. “Right now I’m working on an RF radio head.”

After the group designs the radios, they test them. “We have to be sure the units meet FCC standards. There’s a lot of testing, debugging and going back to make adjustments.”

It was her mother who got Such into electrical engineering. “Mom started with a degree in social work, but later in life she went back to school for an EE. She graduated from the University of Texas in 1992. That drew me in as well.” In school, IEEE was Such’s society, “helpful both socially and for studying.”

At work, Such finds that she often calls on material she learned in school. “Expect that the courses you take will be used on your job,” she advises.

At WCG, Kelly Schubert is on rotation in service delivery.

Kelly Schubert: on rotation at Williams Communications Group
Kelly Schubert is a professional development associate on rotation with Williams Communications Group (WCG, Tulsa, OK). WCG provides a national fiber optic network that offers wholesale voice, data, IP and video services to major telecom providers and the media.

Schubert has a 2001 BS in industrial engineering from Purdue University (West Lafayette, IN). She first joined the company for a summer internship, and was put on the e-biz team: “We had to analyze the company’s internal systems to identify opportunities for e-business applications,” she explains.

Schubert is currently on her first rotation in WCG’s professional development program. She’s working in service delivery. “My role is auditing circuits for customers to ensure proper billing and help implement processes. I also handle billing disputes.”

Each rotation at WCG lasts a year. “I’ve already learned so much. They started me off on projects right away,” Schubert says. She expects to continue gaining telecom knowhow through the rotation program, “and to expand beyond my comfort zone.”

TRW’s Michelle Hazard develops microelectronic packaging for chip sets.

Michelle Hazard: microelectronic packaging at TRW
Michelle Hazard earned her 1994 BS in material engineering at California Polytechnic University (San Luis Obispo, CA) and her 2000 MS in engineering and production management at Loyola Marymount (Westchester, CA).

Now she’s an assembly engineer at TRW Space & Electronics (Redondo Beach, CA), developing microelectronic packaging for chip sets used in mobile phones. “The microelectronic packaging is the housing that interconnects the chips with the outside world,” she explains.

Hazard, who is Mexican American, came to TRW as part of a recruiting effort for minority students. She began in 1994 as a manufacturing engineer in the microelectronics production lab, and worked there for five years.

“I wanted to get more into manufacturing management,” she notes, and in 2001 she moved into operations. Now she’s the informal lead for a team of seven, working on component packaging for both microelectronic and optoelectronic products.

“I’m the primary technical contact for the subcontractors who do the actual packaging,” she explains. She also works closely with the design team to establish packaging strategies. “The main technical issue is selecting a reliable packaging method. For example, you have to consider whether a new epoxy will survive twenty years, and whether it will degrade the RF performance of the IC,” she says.

Hazard grew up with a fine Mexican American role model: her father, who was also an engineer at TRW. In high school, a woman reliability engineer came to speak about her work with satellites, and that sealed the deal. “It sounded so interesting. And the fact that she was a woman was really encouraging,” Hazard recalls.

That encouragement was important, because when Hazard got to Cal Poly she was the only woman in many of her classes. “It was often a struggle to get through, and I wasn’t always sure I wanted to stay in engineering,” she remembers. But she found friends and help at SWE and ASM, the materials engineering society, and “Two female professors encouraged me and got me involved in some interesting projects.”

One of the projects involved electroless deposition of aluminum for very large-scale ICs. “It really paid off,” Hazard recalls with pleasure. “It got me interested in microelectronics and gave me self-confidence. It also helped me develop research skills and learn to test a theory. That’s something you’re expected to do in industry.”

Veridian’s Julie Carreon works on network security, “a very serious issue.”

Julie Carreon promotes network security at Veridian
Part of the responsibility for a communications network is keeping it secure. Julie Carreon, a system security engineer, notes that September 11 brought increased interest in security issues. “The threat is real and people are taking it very seriously. It’s a big issue for both the government and commercial interests,” she says.

Carreon received her BSCIS from Our Lady of the Lake University (San Antonio, TX) in 2000. After graduation, she started at the San Antonio site of Veridian (Arlington, VA), which provides information-based systems and solutions to the intelligence community, law enforcement agencies, the Department of Defense (DOD) and other U.S. government entities.

While going to school, Carreon had a job in tech support at USAA, a San Antonio insurance company. She first met up with security there and found it fascinating. “It was much more interesting than sitting at the helpdesk,” she says.

Carreon joined Veridian with a good basic knowledge of networking and TCP/IP, and the company added extensive training in intrusion detection systems and vulnerability assessments. “We learned how hackers exploit the networks, and how we can use their own tools to test our systems for vulnerabilities.”

Her current work involves obtaining DOD security certifications (DITSCAP) for government medical agency information systems. “DITSCAP requires that security be applied at all levels of the system. I work with network admins, database developers and program managers.”

She recently achieved her own Certified Information System Security Professional (CISSP) certification. “This is the leading security certification, and it’s considered a huge accomplishment,” she says proudly. In fact, there are only about 3,000 CISSPs worldwide.

Although she works at her customer’s Denver, CO facility, Carreon commutes to San Antonio to be close to her family. “I stay in Denver three out of four weeks, then go home for a week,” she reports.

Consultant Nicole Zosa analyzes telecom providers for Booz Allen Hamilton clients.

Nicole Zosa consults at Booz Allen Hamilton
Nicole Zosa is a senior consultant at Booz Allen Hamilton (McLean, VA), a major consulting firm. She graduated from the University of Virginia (Charlottesville, VA) in 1999 with a systems engineering degree and a concentration in MIS. Now she’s working on an MS in information and telecom systems from Johns Hopkins University (Baltimore, MD), as part of an extension program the school is presenting at Booz Allen HQ.

For now, Zosa is using visualization tools to analyze the infrastructure of commercial telecom companies. “That includes assets, fiber routes, voice and data networks. Our clients are mostly government agencies, many of them military, and we model and design potential networks and analyze what the various telecoms have done or can do for them.”

Zosa typically works an eight or nine hour day, though when a deliverable is due it can be much longer. Most of her time is spent researching public sources for information, then inputting it into visualization tools. Since September 11, she notes, a lot of the work involves analyzing the security and vulnerability of telecom networks and suggesting mitigation strategies.

Zosa enjoys the stimulating atmosphere at Booz Allen. “Early on I was given a project of my own to manage, and it’s both a challenge and an accomplishment. You often get to work in the areas you find most interesting, and you never have a chance to get bored,” she says.

Deloitte’s Elizabeth Lee helps communications clients with IT.

Elizabeth Lee: communications consultant at Deloitte
Elizabeth Lee is a consultant to the communications industry for Deloitte Consulting (New York, NY), a management consulting firm. She works out of Deloitte’s office in San Francisco, CA.

Much of her experience has been with the integration of front- and back-office application models. “We work with different application providers, customizing their modules to implement customer solutions for the client,” Lee explains.

Customer care and billing in the communications industry involve support through the full customer life cycle, from sales to provisioning and, of course, billing. Lee’s clients have included major wireless providers, and the work includes dealing with issues like number portability and carrier outsourcing, variables not often encountered in wireline billing.

Lee went into consulting because it demanded a mixture of quantitative and qualitative skills and used her creative side as well. “I like teamwork. And in consulting you’re always working with different clients. It broadens your experience, gives you insight into how different organizations work, and allows you to see best practices.”

Lee has a 1999 BS in business administration from the Haas School of Business of the University of California-Berkeley. “My work involves mapping technology functionality to see how it works within the business. I need a good understanding of both technical and business processes,” she says.

“It’s more and more important to understand the technical side and how it can support the business. My role is to supply that bridge,” Lee says.

EE Juanita Banda works on laser tools for NRAO’s ALMA radio telescope antenna.

Juanita Banda: EE with NRAO
The National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO, Charlottesville, VA) is a research organization engaged in some of the most rarefied research on – and far, far off – the earth. Radio astronomy can involve a form of communication, at least when the astronomical observations involve a collection of radio antennas spaced far apart but networked together.

That’s the case in NRAO’s Very Large Array, Very Long Baseline Array and international Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) projects. These NRAO radio telescope antennas observe radio rather than light emissions. They use the principles of advanced RF transmission to detect and focus faint signals from outer space.

EE Juanita Banda works at the NRAO’s Tucson, AZ facility, on photonics for the ALMA antenna. She has been working with interferometry methods to measure surface deformations of the telescope dish so corrections can be made. When completed, ALMA will be set up in the Atacama desert of Chile in South America, and will be the largest millimeter wavelength telescope in the world.

“When I started with the NRAO in December 2001, I was given a preliminary block diagram of the system,” Banda says. “I purchased components and put them together. When the system was set up, I ran tests.

“Now we’re deciding how we’re going to package the unit so it can go in the center of the dish and examine deformation at distinct locations. Because we’re using a free space laser, alignment is a huge concern,” says Banda.

“Sometimes we have to do something ourselves in the machine shop. I might get to go in and make a moving stage or design a holder for a mirror. It’s really neat,” she says.

Banda received her BSEE from the University of Arizona-Tucson in 2001. She co-opped full time for NRAO for the final six months of her school career.

Despite the largely male makeup of the engineering groups supporting the radio astronomy world, Banda finds that her co-workers respect her as a valuable member of the team. “It might feel male-dominated in numbers, but it’s great how everyone contributes and shares their experience as a team,” she concludes.

Hope for the future
With such interesting work to be done, it’s frustrating not to find the right job waiting for you. But TIA’s Grant Seiffert, VP of global affairs and external policy, holds out hope. He feels that the current cooler climate is definitely a temporary adjustment.

“The industry is going through a cleansing cycle,” he says. “It may take us through mid 2003, but we will get back to stable growth.”

skills and make your connections, find a worthwhile internship, and be flexible. When opportunity arises, you’ll be ready to respond.

D/C

– Laurel McKee Ranger is a freelance business writer headquartered in Randolph, NJ.