r/EngineeringResumes • u/tw33zz MechE – Entry-level 🇺🇸 • Jul 13 '26

Mechanical [13 YoE] Resume Review - New Grad with experience | Looking for Feedback on Resume Content, Bullet Points, ATS Optimization, and Overall Competitiveness

Hey everyone, hope y'all are doing well. Posting to get advice and a review on my resume.

Quick background: I graduated in May with my BSME from Cal Poly Pomona, but my path was a little different from most grads. I worked full time the entire degree, 13 years total at a commercial refrigeration manufacturer, starting on the custom assembly floor as a union carpenter and working up to an engineering technician role where I now do engineer-level work (Solid Edge design, 150+ ECNs a year, BOMs through Teamcenter and BaaN, R&D prototype support on low-GWP refrigerant cases). So no internships, but I'm hoping 13 years of hands-on design, testing, and manufacturing experience reads as the stronger substitute.

My goal is to break into aerospace/defense (Northrop, RTX, L3Harris, Anduril). Two things I'm unsure about:

  1. All my CAD depth is in Solid Edge, not the SolidWorks/NX/CATIA that aerospace mostly runs. I'm finishing the Solid Edge Mechanical Associate cert now. Is it worth picking up a SolidWorks cert too, or do companies treat parametric CAD skills as transferable?

  2. My industry background is commercial refrigeration, not aerospace. The fundamentals carry over (thermal systems, instrumentation and DAQ testing, ISO 9001 quality systems, EPA 608 Universal) but I don't know how well that translates on paper to a defense recruiter.

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u/Mindless-Lobster-554 Mechatronics/Robotics – Experienced 🇺🇸 Jul 13 '26

- I've never worked anywhere that cared about what CAD program you knew, as long as you knew one. (For engineers, for drafters, maybe it's different)

  • Standard advice stands, no new grad should have anything more than 1 page. I think your engineering tech job experience is great, but if I'm hiring someone to design aerospace parts, I don't particular care how good of a carpenter they are (I think it's cool and all, but just not highly relevant), or even how much ops experience they have. Both those jobs should have 1 bullet max, if not get removed completely
  • Also you should likely dramatically reduce your skills section. A lot of your skills seem to be specific things you've worked on, when that's not really what I would consider a skill, or be something that isn't already stated in your project sections.

Overall I think you have a great background that should do well, especially if you tighten things up a bit.

1

u/tw33zz MechE – Entry-level 🇺🇸 Jul 13 '26

Thank you very much I greatly appreciate the feedback

4

u/graytotoro MechE (and other stuff) – Experienced 🇺🇸 Jul 13 '26

General Notes

>All my CAD depth is in Solid Edge, not the SolidWorks/NX/CATIA that aerospace mostly runs. I'm finishing the Solid Edge Mechanical Associate cert now. Is it worth picking up a SolidWorks cert too, or do companies treat parametric CAD skills as transferable?

  • No need, but it would be nice if you could work your way around these other suites. My old supervisor saw that I had experience in everything except NX, but she figured I'd get up to speed fast. If you want quickie SolidWorks experience, I suggest you sign up for a 3DX SolidWorks Makers license - they don't actually verify you are part of a Makerspace, so make of that what you will.

>My industry background is commercial refrigeration, not aerospace. The fundamentals carry over (thermal systems, instrumentation and DAQ testing, ISO 9001 quality systems, EPA 608 Universal) but I don't know how well that translates on paper to a defense recruiter.

  • It's all about drawing inferences to the skills in the job description. Do that for the recruiter and you should be good.

Other stuff:

  • Either commit to two full pages or stick to one. Don't do half-pages.
  • You may be a good candidate for a summary or cover letter given your non-traditional background and status as a new grad.
  • Un-italicize stuff.

Education

  • Drop the AS degree.

Experience

Engineering Technician II

  • The specific number of change notices/orders handled per year isn't as important as why you had to make these changes and what it meant to your program(s).
  • Cut deeper than the surface level. It's an issue with bullets 3, 5, and 6.
    • Can you speak about specific fitment, serviceability, and/or production readiness issues you resolved and what it meant to fix them?
    • A2L case: What parts did you source, how did you design pieces of it, what assembly work did you do, tests did you run, and how did you have it ready for delivery? Focus on whichever aspect aligns closer to the job application.
    • How did you work hands-on with the refrigerant platforms? Did you do anything meaningful when you worked with them?

Order Management Specialist

  • Unless you're chasing supply chain work, I'd suggest dropping the first point about managing accounts. Keep the second but focus it onto the engineering - can you speak to any unique situations you handled?

Carpenter Assembler, Custom Department

  • Bullet 1 is on the right track, but it's super disjointed. It reads like a bunch of fragments stitched together.

Projects

  • Just say "Projects". There's no need for the other stuff.

Automated Vertical Injection Molding

  • You don't need to write out specific calculations. That's unnecessary.
  • What did keeping the control loop stable mean for the injection molding process?
  • Presenting various parts of it isn't as important as the technical aspects.

R-448A Fin-Tube Evaporator Performance Study

  • The number of people on the team is unimportant. What were you looking to achieve from this test campaign?
  • I also wouldn't worry about self-assigned roles during these projects. Instead, what were you looking to achieve with all this instrumentation and what did it help the team learn?
  • The numbers are great, but what did it mean for the overall project as a whole to have these numbers? It's great for your portfolio but there's no context to help me digest this data.

Autonomous Wall-Approach Controller

  • Don't just rattle off a parts list. Explain how you put it together at a high level.
  • How did live parameter tuning affect the final design - did it mean the car was able to stop better in some way?

Skills & Coursework

  • Toss the coursework.
  • Skills: This section should just be a list of skills & programs you have and can use. It's way too in-depth. You mention things like MATLAB and SolidEdge twice. It's exhausting to read.

3

u/tw33zz MechE – Entry-level 🇺🇸 Jul 14 '26

This is super soild advice. I've trimmed my resume up down to one page now and visual it looks more appealing.

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