Evolution of a Career in Tech

Estimated reading time: 7 minutes

About five years ago, Sunstone Circuits partnered with George Fox University, both based in Oregon. Nolan Johnson worked for Sunstone at the time and helped several students with their capstone projects. We recently met with two of those young professionals, now five years past graduation, to see how their career trajectories have played out. What do they think about working in the industry? How did their education prepare them to work, and what are they passionate about?

In this interview, we speak with Jake Whipple, who is now working at Siemens and loving what he does. He eagerly shares his professional journey and provides advice for others during and after their college years. 

Marcy LaRont: Jake, take us through your journey as you graduated from George Fox and began your professional career.

Jake Whipple: I graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in computer engineering. When we last spoke, I was in my first semester of senior year at George Fox, and I had just been through an interview and selection process with Tektronix in Beaverton, Oregon. That process had been so quick, but I wanted to get plugged in and committed with them. I graduated in 2019 and started working there that summer. It was a software job working on oscilloscopes, and I loved it. It's amazing how college prepares you for so many different things you could be doing.

At that time, I remember talking about how much I love PCBs and how much fun that was. But realistically, computer engineering at Fox was so much more than just printed circuit boards. There's so much software involved, too. Tektronix realized that the computer engineering major included a significant software portion. I had some knowledge of the C++ programming language, but they also trained me. I had some great mentors when I started, and I enjoyed that. Believe it or not, though, five months later, they had a big layoff, and I was part of that. They didn’t want me to go but it was out of the control of my direct managers. About five months after that, I was hired by Siemens (formerly Mentor Graphics) and I have stayed here since, working on a particular EDA tool. Design automation is a big deal for them.  

Johnson: I spent the first 10 years of my career writing code at Mentor Graphics. I was employee No. 232. 

Whipple: Small world. 

LaRont: I’m guessing it’s changed a little bit since then. 

Whipple: Just a little. 

LaRont: Jake, being laid off is difficult at any point in your career. How did you handle it? 

Whipple: It was rough. I had just gotten my momentum, and Tektronix was really pouring into me. The layoff was completely a corporate decision and not performance-related, but it was still demoralizing. My coworkers were dumbfounded by the news because they thought highly of me. They were incredibly supportive, though. All of them reached out to me on LinkedIn, and many endorsed my skills. Things like that look great for potential employers, which was a big morale boost. It helped me get my confidence back. Tektronix had pretty much been handed to me on a plate, and I was very thankful for that. This next job was not that way. 

LaRont: Suddenly, you're doing the real exercise of searching for a job. 

Whipple: Exactly. I just kept applying, and eventually, Mentor Graphics had an opening. They moved the interview process along very quickly. The big takeaway here is that the people I worked with at Tektronix really helped me bounce back. 

LaRont: Let’s hear about your journey with Mentor Graphics/Siemens. What position were you hired into? 

Whipple: I was hired into a software engineering role for a particular high-level synthesis Mentor Graphics product called Catapult. I’m on the Design Analyzer team. We take an abstract programming language—in this case, we work with C+ or System C—and we synthesize that down to register-transfer level (RTL). It's very helpful for customers because they can write more abstract designs that help configure their hardware without having to write it all themselves. That is the product table. Design Analyzer allows the designer to view how we synthesize. We are a graphical user interface (GUI) tool. We show the user the source code for their design, a software schematic, and other relevant data, with the ability to cross-probe in between.

I've been here for almost five years, and I enjoy this job a lot. It is a very nice balance of software and what I was learning about computer engineering and digital logic at George Fox. I still need to understand the concepts of adders and multiplexers along with writing complex code. It’s really fun. 

LaRont: So, you are working in what you studied?

Whipple: Yes. It really encompasses so many things within computer engineering at George Fox. I’m using about 90% of what I learned at school. The missing piece right now is the physical hardware, but I'm getting to work with schematics in a digital format. 

Johnson: Looking at all you've done now, is there anything more you wish they had taught you in the university setting? 

Whipple: I wish there was more emphasis on using just Linux systems. We're running a red hat Linux machine. That is how we interface with all our servers, build systems, and test systems. George Fox gave us some terminal experience, but it was part of an operating system class to grasp operating systems concepts. 

Today, I would have appreciated some focus on knowing good terminal commands and how to navigate in that space. But, like everything else, you figure it out, so it’s not a big deal. 

LaRont: Looking back on graduation, what have you enjoyed doing the most? 

Whipple: Right now, I most enjoy that, on my team, we consume the user's design on the front end of our product. The customer will write some source code in C++, and my team is consuming that code right away. We are analyzing their code with our own code, verifying all the user classes, variables, and functions. We can extract so much information from that and then work to provide helpful features based on our analysis. We are constructing a database that we then pass on to the synthesis team, or we may immediately be able to display a feature in some helpful way. I find that the most fascinating right now. 

Johnson: Jake, what encouragement do you have for new graduates with technical degrees, especially those without a job lined up?  

Whipple: Getting a job is becoming more of a numbers game. So, the more applications you put out there, the higher chance you have of landing a job. Put your head down and just send out the applications. Also, put out high-quality applications. When you land that first phone screen, be excited about the role and passionate about the work. You’d be surprised at how many interviewers say they love to see someone who’s actually interested in their product and passionate about the work itself. That has more weight than I think people realize. Just remember, it's not easy. You might be super passionate, have all the right credentials, and kill the interview, yet they still come back and say, “We aren’t hiring right now.” But you’ve got this. Show your passion and show potential employers that you're ready to hop into the industry.

LaRont: That's really good advice. What can you tell students still working on their degrees? What might help distinguish them before they start applying for jobs? 

Whipple: The canned answer is, “Do your own products. Contribute to GitHub repositories and all the open-source projects out there.” But that doesn’t work for everyone. The best thing right now is to genuinely understand your assignments and homework—not just what you have to do, but the why behind it. That carries over into the industry. If you can explain why you do things, why this optimization is better, or why you’re using this algorithm—not just that you need to know it—you can convey that to a potential company. It shows that you really understand. Companies see that they can mold you into becoming a better programmer and employee.

LaRont: Thank you, Jake, and continued good luck in your career.

Whipple: Thank you. It’s been great to reflect on these past five years.