Engineering career areas are changing continuously and with increasing rapidity, not least as a response to the challenges of globalization. Next to the still necessary education in the specialized knowledge of the field, a holistic understanding of development and production processes (systems thinking) has grown in importance, and this understanding need not only encompass engineering, but also management, methodological, social and cultural issues.

Fields of work of systems engineers are mostly located in the following areas:

• project engineer in development
• planning and project engineers in production
• planning, project and production engineers in the process-engineering-oriented industry
• quality assurance engineer
• research engineer
• sales engineer for technical sales
• purchasing engineer in technical purchasing

Most graduates of the cooperative degree program systems engineering are hired by the enterprises where they do their training and find a suitable job there.