Automotive designer vs staff engineer

The differences between automotive designers and staff engineers can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. It typically takes 4-6 years to become both an automotive designer and a staff engineer. Additionally, a staff engineer has an average salary of $107,530, which is higher than the $69,782 average annual salary of an automotive designer.

The top three skills for an automotive designer include industrial design, sketch and powertrain. The most important skills for a staff engineer are java, python, and architecture.

Automotive designer vs staff engineer overview

	Automotive Designer	Staff Engineer
Yearly salary	$69,782	$107,530
Hourly rate	$33.55	$51.70
Growth rate	2%	2%
Number of jobs	76,806	277,011
Job satisfaction	-	-
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 53%	Bachelor's Degree, 74%
Average age	41	41
Years of experience	6	6

Automotive designer vs staff engineer salary

Automotive designers and staff engineers have different pay scales, as shown below.

	Automotive Designer	Staff Engineer
Average salary	$69,782	$107,530
Salary range	Between $44,000 And $108,000	Between $69,000 And $167,000
Highest paying City	Belmont, CA	San Mateo, CA
Highest paying state	Massachusetts	California
Best paying company	Meta	Flexport
Best paying industry	Automotive	Telecommunication

Differences between automotive designer and staff engineer education

There are a few differences between an automotive designer and a staff engineer in terms of educational background:

	Automotive Designer	Staff Engineer
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 53%	Bachelor's Degree, 74%
Most common major	Mechanical Engineering	Electrical Engineering
Most common college	Northwestern University	Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Automotive designer vs staff engineer demographics

Here are the differences between automotive designers' and staff engineers' demographics:

	Automotive Designer	Staff Engineer
Average age	41	41
Gender ratio	Male, 80.2% Female, 19.8%	Male, 87.9% Female, 12.1%
Race ratio	Black or African American, 3.5% Unknown, 4.6% Hispanic or Latino, 9.8% Asian, 11.0% White, 70.9% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.1%	Black or African American, 3.1% Unknown, 4.5% Hispanic or Latino, 7.8% Asian, 16.8% White, 67.6% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.1%
LGBT Percentage	5%	5%

Differences between automotive designer and staff engineer duties and responsibilities

Automotive designer example responsibilities.

Manage documentation of existing projects, perform ECN resolutions.
Design of brackets and torsion bar components are validated using FEA inSolidworks.
Designate as group training mentor during transition from CADAM to Unigraphics V9.
Complete several fully fillet and draft angle solid models on Unigraphics for direct manufacturing.
Perform mechanical engineering design for facilities including calculate building HVAC requirements to ensure adequate capacity of system air flow.
Release drawings and BOMs in PDM/Link Windchill.

Staff engineer example responsibilities.

Manage complete design flow: schematic creation, layout design, PCB fabrication, parts procurement and assembly.
Develop and manage technical procedures for quality control to comply with ISO laboratory accreditation.
Implement a process for reusing SilverStream Java custom reports and UI code on a ColdFusion server saving 1.5 man-years of development.
Develop and document communication stack API, enabling parallel development of third-party stack and UI interface.
Participate in relocating network infrastructure, server farm, network monitoring and IP telephony to another data center.
Web pages contain HTML and JavaScript.

Automotive designer vs staff engineer skills

Common automotive designer skills

Industrial Design, 24%
Sketch, 19%
Powertrain, 13%
FEA, 11%
Cost Reduction, 9%
Catia V5, 8%

Common staff engineer skills

Java, 15%
Python, 10%
Architecture, 7%
Software Development, 4%
Project Management, 4%
API, 3%