Adam Hawkins has been a long time member of the NSS North Houston Space Society. And I have wonderful news to share. He has just landed a job at Blue Origin. Join me in congratulating Adam as his career in the space industry clears the launch pad.
Email: achawkins@gmx.com
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adamhawkins2012/
Checkout Adam’s Space Communicator speeches: https://www.northhoustonspace.org/2020-space-communicator-program/participants/adam-hawkins/
Here are some insights that Adam shared regarding his transition from Oil and Gas into the Aerospace sector:
I was seeking to retire from Oil and Gas industry and transition into space industry sometime between 2021-2025. Things happened to get fast tracked with me getting laid off from my Oil and Gas job on March 20th. I then began applying to jobs at four companies (NASA, Blue Origin, Space X, and Lockheed Martin). I would go on their website and apply from all things I remotely would qualify for from internships to entry level to higher up roles. The types of jobs I was applying for included Project Engineering, Project Management, Structural Engineering, and Mechanical Engineering (internship level only).
So I went to Blue Origin’s career page and looked at their roles in Florida, Alabama, and West Texas. There were only a handful of roles I qualified for so I applied to a couple of technical roles, a project management role, and an internship. I applied at 11pm at night and when I woke up at 8:30am I had received an email saying they would like to have a phone interview and everything went on from there.
The theoretical knowledge in managing projects is pretty translucent between industries, so they were really excited to having someone with a diverse background as mine in both construction management and project management. I have worked on some pretty prestige and record breaking projects in Oil and Gas industry which also aided in humblebragging my achievements through the interview process.
The interview consisted of a three step process which totaled 6 interviews, a writing assignment, and a 60 minute long presentation (the North Houston Space Communicator Award helped out tremendously in preparing and going through this).
My title will be Project Manage II and I will be helping Blue Origin get their Huntsville facility up and running. I am sure you are well aware Blue Origin is ready to start their mass production of rockets and so their Huntsville facility will be a rocket production and test facility. They currently only have about 50 ppl on board in the Huntsville location and the first few months to a year of the job will be mostly construction related getting things ready to start rocket production. Then once rocket production is ready to commence, the role will be more of a manufacturing management role implementing six sigma, kaizen, and lean methodologies to improve efficiencies and speed up rocket production. The exciting thing is I’ll be able to walk around the floor and see the rocket production and testing aspects so I should be able to see some cool things and as the company grows, I am sure there will be more diverse aspects to the role.
My advice to others would be to follow your passions and dreams and even if you do not think you will get the role or be able to chase your dreams, the ultimate defeat is not trying and who knows what might happen when you put yourself out there. Ensure that when you are going through the process, people can see that passion flowing through your voice as you discuss your plans for your future role and really make it transparent that you would rather be doing nothing else.
People are more than welcome to add me/message me on LinkedIn or email me if they would like to discuss more or have any questions for me.
If you (or someone you know) is looking to move into aerospace, here are some job listings that you could check:
NASA: https://www.nasa.gov/careers/search-and-apply
Blue Origin: https://www.blueorigin.com/careers
Space X: https://www.spacex.com/careers
Lockheed Martin: https://www.lockheedmartinjobs.com/space
Intuitive Machines: https://www.intuitivemachines.com/careers
ULA: https://www.ulalaunch.com/careers
Boeing: https://jobs.boeing.com/