Alex Toth Mentoring early-career engineers to pragmatically apply theory to real problems and grow into leadership.

How to shift your thinking like a senior professional

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Hey Reader

You probably spend hours learning Systems Engineering frameworks only to look at a senior job description and feel like a complete fraud.

I know exactly why that happens.
And I'll show you the mindset shift you need to fix it in a second.

But first?

Let's talk about coffee machines.

Almost every MBSE tutorial online teaches you how to model a coffee machine. Or a toaster. Or a flashlight ..

It's clean. It's simple. But real engineering is messy.

A few years ago, I was developing a Tire Pressure Monitoring System (TPMS).

We found a massive security flaw. Hackers could spoof signals to trigger fake alerts on the dashboard.

The "textbook" solution was heavy encryption.

But I was working with an 8-bit microcontroller that was already 98% full of code. And was powered by a battery that needed to last for 10 years!

No extra power. Zero bandwidth. No tutorial for that.

I had to invent a lightweight authentication protocol using basic XOR logic just to bypass the constraints.

See...

universities and online courses only teach you how to build toasters. But the job market asks you to secure an 8-bit constrained tire sensor.

So you feel like an impostor. You self-reject. You think you aren't ready.

Hiring managers already know this.

We know you only have "toaster" experience. And we don't care. This is exactly why companies expect a 3-to-6-month ramp-up period for new hires.

That's the first worldview shit you need to make.

We don't expect you to navigate a messy real-world constraint on day one without asking questions.

The other thing you need to understand is that your CV is just a ticket to learn more:
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Your CV and interview aren't a binding contract of absolute expertise. They are just an enticing "ticket" to get it.

A ticket that proves you are a pragmatic problem-solver willing to learn on the job.

So stop disqualifying yourself before the company even gets a chance to see you.

Make sense? Good.

I'm sharing this today because I see too many smart engineers talking themselves out of great roles.

There is nothing to buy in this email. No link to click.

But if you are looking at a job description right now and feeling like a fraud... Or if you just don't know how to translate your "toaster" experience into a real-world ticket...

Hit reply and tell me about it. What is the biggest thing holding you back from applying right now?

I read every single email. Your Turn!

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Alex