Advises, M.Tech Admission Advises, Post Engineering Confusions

Master Of Design A Great Alternative To Master Of Engineering

After working in a top notch company for three years as a programmer I was just fed up with my job. I loved programming and stayed awake all nights doing it since my B.Tech first year. I was an average student but teachers and classmates known me for programming. After PhD I joined this job and worked with dedication for three years, then I started feeling what is it going on and where is career is heading? During that time I wrote a post too, What you will be if not an engineer?

That moment was very important for me. I sat alone many hours neither wrote something for InI nor talked to people much. I had to think what is best for coming days, because life is short and I really don’t have time to do something that I am not confident and sure about. During this time I constantly thought about a new area of study that can be a great career choice. Yes that was DESIGN.

There are lots of reasons why I started thinking about design as a great career. The first and foremost was, my visit to one of the design offices of my company. There I saw employees design and analyze every single product we engineer. They had total freedom to move around and make decisions that we as engineers dont have right to make. The freedom to think beyond conventional boxes and use of colors with free will made me think that this could have been my choice if I know before making decisions about course of study.

The second reason why I started thinking about design is that I clearly see these days how design has become an integral part of almost all the products produce. Thanks to Apple. Inc., for their contribution of making big companies to think about design in their products. These days almost all big companies in any domain have a design team that approves a product before its launch.

Third reason for being fascinated with design was the amount of money moves around it. As design become most important part of products success, people involved in design team are given direct access to the decisions about a product, which is a clear honor for an employee. They usually have total freedom to stop a product based on design decisions and make a thrid class engineered product just on the name of design.

Fourth reason was possibility of single man startup. A good designer can start a consultancy without many employees and least investment but can grab work worth millions of dollars. The possibility of least investment and high returns always fascinated me.

The fifth reason I was thinking about design was the office environment. A totally unconventional office, with no desks and no usual arrangement of chairs and desks, was giving view of free people. I feel that there will not be any bosses and ladders of social hierarchy in those environments. It’s just a guess : ) because in this world everyone in looking for control and there are always limits to freedom.

To sum up, I loved to think about design as a great career path because of freedom and money involved in it. On the same time, I know it’s good for people who know what they want and looking for. For all others looking for some job its not a good option because finding a promising design job is a tough call. One must have guts to take challenge from everything around, that has been done for years together.

One with the intuition of what they want would do great in design. For example if you are reading a book and thinking that a different cover, a different font and different colors of font for different headings would make it more pleasant, readable and easy to a readers eyes. If you are sitting on a chair, you think about its anatomy, comfort and colors. If you are using a phone you think that if the dimensions, shape and another color would have made it reat. If you are living in a house you think if you make a home you would have all these here there with specific dimentions. you love light so you will make sure light is coming home from every possible way inside home,..etc . Hence you have a feeling for your own products. If you feel that given a chance you would want a product this way. Then Design is surely for GAME.

In coming posts I would cover more about design and how to change the track from conventional areas of engineering to multidisciplinary domains and do great in that.

22 Comments

  1. Rupesh Kumar Sahu

    I am a electrical engineering graduate , I have AIR 466 in gate 2015, i am interested in pursuing m.des, i have good sketching skills. is there any institute that take admission via gate?

  2. Sakshi

    Sir, which IITs provide courses in designing related to subjects of electronics and communication branch and from where to find there gate cut off marks.

  3. nisha

    I am interested in doing Master degree in 3D Animation Course for creating character design.
    Which course would be preferred?
    Which college is good for 3D animation?

  4. kanani dhaval

    sir I am from instrumentation and control engineering .my GATE rank is 1500 .should i have to join IIT delhi in M.des? how’s the scope?

  5. Chetan soni

    Hi there,

    I am a MDes final year student from IIITDM kancheepuram

    Course offered here is 80% tech + 20% design…so the degree is equivalent to M-Tech…surely one can go for teaching profession.

    If you have plans to do Phd join the course.
    Placement is a concern but 50% will get job in core sector for sure.

  6. Kishor Gupta

    Really useful information. Thanks for sharing this.

  7. mani

    Sir I completed my engineering in 6 year due to some reason. Sir m I want to do m.des through any of iit college. Is it possible to get iit and m wanted to know about career in this

  8. RISHAV RAJ

    Sir, what is scope of M.Des. after B.Tech civil engineering.

  9. MANO

    I am in a confusion to choose a college for M.Tech. My options are IIITDM kancheepuram, Anna University Chennai and PSG TECH Coimbatore. Which would be a better option?

    Pls Reply… urgent..

    1. Ankit

      your Priorities should be
      1. PSG Coimbatore
      2. Anna Univ

      dont go for IIIT Kanceepuram, there is no placement record plus you cant opt for teaching also because there degree is not m.tech.

  10. Ankit

    Hello Zahid Sir,

    Sir, Please comment on M.des Program in Electronics Design from IIIT D&M, kanchipuram, Chennai in terms of Placemnt n Research.

    Is it worth to go for it instead of M.tech from central Univ?

    I am looking for a R&D Job, no teaching after PG. Please Please comment on this no body knows about M.des in Electronics.

    Regards

  11. Manu

    Awesome… gud guidelines sir..
    Wt s t scope of M.Des in E&EE..
    which are t institutes offering M.Des in Electrical & Electronics Engineering?
    Post the details of M.Des entrance exam?

    1. Bevin

      There is
      iiit Kancheepuram
      M. Des. In Communication Systems
      M. Des. In Electronics Systems
      and on related to mechanical field

  12. Anu

    Thanks for wonderful article sir,
    I really appreciate your efforts to “aware” students.

    And, as per this article is considered… the last para i found is made only for me to realize my domain of interests.. and here it lies in “Designing”… past few days i have surfed about it and came up with CEED exam but i missed its deadline 🙁
    I am B.Tech final year student of IT branch … I have applied for GATE 2013.
    I have great zeal to pursue my career in designing. And i guess M.Des is an answer to it.

    Next, I am hoping to have a good guidelines from your side in this area.
    THANK YOU!!! 🙂

  13. Abhishek

    Hello Zahid, Could you please give more details about MDes, such as what course in MDes is good.There are different courses in MDes(User Experience Design,Industrial Design, etc., ) but what suits a computer science student? Please give more details (Job Opportunities,Further Studies etc.,)and more posts about it ASAP , so that we can think about it and make a decision.
    Thank You.

  14. smile

    Thanks for the wonderful article. Your blog truly stands for what it tels “Inspire”!

    I would highly appreciate if you could throw more light on differentr design options availble with their merits/demerits such as: product design, industrial design, interaction design, web design, graphics design, creative design etc. Would like to know which one you had in your mind while writing the above blog.

    Adding to the above list: IIT Bombay provides design masters in:
    Industrial Design,Mobility and Vehicle Design,Visual Communication,Animation,Interaction Design.

    Could you also provide more information on research options in design field.

  15. smile

    I had a question regarding GATE admission process for M Des. According to brochure one can needs to chose the GATE paper based on the UG graduating degree. For Eg: A CS student would take a CS paper and Civil student would opt Civil paper. The complexity and percentile score would be realtive. So how would the admission process take this into account. Moreover CEED exam is quite different when compared to GATE with it’s structure and complexity. So is there an adavantage of choosing GATE over CEED?

    Thanks in advance 🙂

    1. virendra kr. verma

      see if you have good drawing skills & good analytical power you may go for ceed its much more easier than gate

  16. Kiran Raj

    Great article. Thanks for writing this and inspiring many students.

    Only thing I thought missing was, good universities that accept GATE students for M.Des.

    From CEED 2013 website I found that, following colleges provide respective courses based on GATE qualification.
    IIT Kanpur: M.Des. in Industrial Design*
    IIITDM Jabalpur : M.Des. Programme*
    IISc Bangalore: M.Des. in Product Design and Engineering*

    Would it be possible for you to explain the chances of a gate qualified students for above courses and other colleges worth looking at. (As at this point of time one would have already missed the deadlines of CEED 2013.)

    Also if possible different studies in design i.e. Interaction Design/Product Design/… which would best suit for a student.

  17. biplab

    Thanks for the info sir, Looking forward to know more about the course. I am currently studying M.Tech from NITTTR, Kolkata. Should/can I join the course..?

    1. biplab

      My field is electronics. Can I join the course..?
      Kindly assist.

  18. Srikant

    Excellent Topic…..There is always a Confusion whether to chose M.Des or M.Tech…..
    Anyway thank U Sir for showing us the Reality…..

    Plz Mention some Good University or Institutes for M.Des Program…..Thanks.

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