A complete guide to career in Engineering | Ashish Ranjan | Live at IIIT Raipur

Summary

Ashish Ranjan’s central message is that an engineering career is not a single, fixed track. His own path—from competitive-exam preparation and jobs at BARC and ISRO to graduate study abroad, Silicon Valley work, and entrepreneurship—shows how experiences from different fields can build on one another.

Students do not need to settle on a lifelong plan in their first year. Instead, they should use college to develop skills, explore options, and make informed choices.

Main ideas and advice

• Make the most of the four years of college.

  • College is a valuable transition from the familiar environment of home into wider professional and social worlds.
  • Ranjan cautioned against treating dropout success stories as a general rule. In his experience, college provides useful knowledge and perspective.
  • Even if students later choose a path outside engineering, the skills and experience gained during college can still matter.

• Build a strong GPA early.

  • A high GPA can preserve eligibility for jobs, exams, and further study, regardless of which direction a student eventually chooses.
  • Ranjan advised establishing good academic habits in the first semesters. Strong early performance creates momentum that can be easier to maintain.
  • A lower GPA can be improved, but doing so may require considerable effort. It is better not to discover eligibility problems late in college.

• Explore options, then begin committing to a direction.

  • Potential routes include competitive exams, public-sector or government work, campus placements, an MBA, graduate study abroad, civil services, and entrepreneurship.
  • Ranjan suggested that by around the end of the second year, students should have a clearer idea of what they want to pursue, since preparation and action often intensify in the third year.
  • His advice is not to copy his choices, but to understand why he made them and apply that reasoning to one’s own circumstances.

• Treat competitive exams as one possible route—not the goal itself.

  • Ranjan chose GATE partly because it offered a route to further study and technical work without requiring a large financial investment.
  • Competitive exams are highly demanding and require deep conceptual understanding.
  • A rank by itself is temporary; the career and capabilities built afterward matter more.
  • Exam preparation can strengthen concepts, but it does not automatically provide practical experience. When a relevant opportunity arises, students should consider whether applying their knowledge in real work would help more than continuing to pursue a rank.

• Choose education and work with financial realities in mind.

  • Ranjan wanted to avoid taking on large debts for further education and eventually paid for graduate study with his own savings.
  • Before starting a company, students should consider how they will support themselves and pay their bills.
  • He advised becoming financially self-sufficient rather than building a startup at the expense of family or friends. A startup with revenue or funding is different from an idea with no means of support.

• Use work experience thoughtfully.

  • Ranjan’s highly technical roles helped him understand engineering applications, sensors, and complex systems—knowledge he later drew on as an entrepreneur.
  • He acknowledged that people can learn from working inside an industry and seeing how teams operate, even though he sometimes wishes he had spent more time pursuing his own projects.
  • He distinguished this from jobs with little technical or industry learning, which may offer less preparation for building a company.

• Adapt to AI by becoming more capable, not less technical.

  • In Ranjan’s view, AI is changing how engineering work is done: small teams can now build products that previously required many developers.
  • AI does not reliably build serious systems without human oversight. Engineers still need enough technical understanding to guide, check, and coordinate the work.
  • AI can reduce some jobs while creating others, so students should treat it as both a disruption and an opportunity.
  • For software-oriented students especially, he recommended learning how AI systems and tools work, experimenting with them, and staying current as the technology changes.
  • He cautioned against pursuing management education solely to become a manager without technical grounding. Technical knowledge can help people manage AI-driven work and technology teams.

• Respond to changing circumstances by finding another route.

  • Ranjan described how COVID-19 disrupted plans he had made to give in-person seminars. Rather than abandon the work, he shifted to an online format, which led to a new initiative.
  • His general approach was to ask: What can I still do, given the situation now? A setback may close one route without eliminating the underlying goal.
  • Economic downturns, technological shifts, and other disruptions will continue to occur; no career environment is permanently stable.

• Build evidence of ability, not just credentials.

  • For students worried about fewer conventional entry-level jobs, Ranjan noted that expectations have changed: employers may be less interested in credentials alone and more interested in what candidates can actually make.
  • He encouraged software students to build projects, publish work on GitHub, share useful tools or models, and show that their products function.
  • A working project can demonstrate practical ability, initiative, and an understanding of how separate components fit together—qualities that may help a candidate stand out.

• Practice making your own decisions.

  • Ranjan said he became better at decision-making by making many decisions, including some that turned out badly.
  • He urged students to distinguish between asking others for information and asking others to choose for them.
  • People are best placed to weigh their own goals and preferences. A decision does not have to be perfect to provide valuable experience.
  • His choices—including studying mechanical engineering, pursuing exams, joining ISRO, and later leaving secure employment—reflected his interests and priorities, even when others might have chosen differently.

Questions addressed during the session

• How to move on from exam preparation: Reconsider whether the goal is genuinely a particular career or only a rank. A rank is soon superseded by new results; practical learning and career development last longer.
• Why leave a secure government job: Ranjan felt he wanted a different growth trajectory and more independence. He also recognized that a conventional work routine did not suit him, while noting that others may find fulfilling careers in government or industry.
• How to face uncertainty or fear: He said he did not eliminate uncertainty before making major choices. He accepted the possibility of being wrong because he wanted the choices to be his own.
• Whether to start a company immediately or work first: There is no universal answer. Relevant, technically substantive work can provide useful insight, but students must also consider their finances and whether a startup can support them.

Speakers and sources featured

• Ashish Ranjan — Main speaker; discussed his education, career choices, engineering, AI, and entrepreneurship.
• Event host/moderator and organizers — Introduced the session, coordinated questions, and closed the event; one organizer is addressed as Shelly.
• Student audience members — Asked questions during the Q&A. Names audible or partly audible in the subtitles include Krishna/Abinav (unclear attribution), “CS” (possibly initials), and Kish. Several other questioners are unnamed.