Lead Engineer Overview
Working as a Lead Engineer
There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a lead engineer. For example, did you know that they make an average of $34.85 an hour? That's $72,494 a year!
Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 4% and produce 12,800 job opportunities across the U.S.
What Does a Lead Engineer Do
There are certain skills that many lead engineers have in order to accomplish their responsibilities. By taking a look through resumes, we were able to narrow down the most common skills for a person in this position. We discovered that a lot of resumes listed mechanical skills, listening skills and math skills.
When it comes to the most important skills required to be a lead engineer, we found that a lot of resumes listed 8.6% of lead engineers included python, while 7.4% of resumes included architecture, and 4.9% of resumes included java. Hard skills like these are helpful to have when it comes to performing essential job responsibilities.
When it comes to searching for a job, many search for a key term or phrase. Instead, it might be more helpful to search by industry, as you might be missing jobs that you never thought about in industries that you didn't even think offered positions related to the lead engineer job title. But what industry to start with? Most lead engineers actually find jobs in the technology and manufacturing industries.
How To Become a Lead Engineer
If you're interested in becoming a lead engineer, one of the first things to consider is how much education you need. We've determined that 45.1% of lead engineers have a bachelor's degree. In terms of higher education levels, we found that 32.7% of lead engineers have master's degrees. Even though most lead engineers have a college degree, it's possible to become one with only a high school degree or GED.
Choosing the right major is always an important step when researching how to become a lead engineer. When we researched the most common majors for a lead engineer, we found that they most commonly earn bachelor's degree degrees or master's degree degrees. Other degrees that we often see on lead engineer resumes include associate degree degrees or high school diploma degrees.
You may find that experience in other jobs will help you become a lead engineer. In fact, many lead engineer jobs require experience in a role such as engineer. Meanwhile, many lead engineers also have previous career experience in roles such as software engineer or senior engineer.
What is the right job for my career path?
Tell us your goals and we'll match you with the right jobs to get there.
Lead Engineer Career Paths
In addition to switching up your job search, it might prove helpful to look at a career path for your specific job. Now, what's a career path you ask? Well, it's practically a map that shows how you might advance from one job title to another. Our career paths are especially detailed with salary changes. So, for example, if you started out with the role of chief engineer you might progress to a role such as engineering director eventually. Later on in your career, you could end up with the title senior director of engineering.
What is the right job for my career path?
Tell us your goals and we'll match you with the rights job to get there.
Average Salary for a Lead Engineer
Best Paying Cities
Recently Added Salaries
Job TitleCompany  | Company | Start Date | Salary |
|---|---|---|---|
Western Union Leader, Cloud Engineering Leader, Cloud Engineering | Western Union Western Union | 01/31/2021 01/31/2021 | $105,97401/31/2021 $105,974 |
Management Decisions, Inc. Lead Front End Engineer Lead Front End Engineer | Management Decisions, Inc. Management Decisions, Inc. | 01/29/2021 01/29/2021 | $180,00001/29/2021 $180,000 |
Randstad Lead Full Stack Engineer (162431) Lead Full Stack Engineer (162431) | Randstad Randstad | 01/28/2021 01/28/2021 | $135,65501/28/2021 $135,655 |
Randstad Lead Engineer Lead Engineer | Randstad Randstad | 01/27/2021 01/27/2021 | $165,00001/27/2021 $165,000 |
Braintrust Lead Engineer (React Native + Typescript) [Remote, No C2C] Lead Engineer (React Native + Typescript) [Remote, No C2C] | Braintrust Braintrust | 01/26/2021 01/26/2021 | $146,09001/26/2021 $146,090 |
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Lead Engineer Resumes
Designing and figuring out what to include on your resume can be tough, not to mention time-consuming. That's why we put together a guide that is designed to help you craft the perfect resume for becoming a Lead Engineer. If you're needing extra inspiration, take a look through our selection of templates that are specific to your job.
Learn How To Write a Lead Engineer Resume
At Zippia, we went through countless Lead Engineer resumes and compiled some information about how best to optimize them. Here are some suggestions based on what we found, divided by the individual sections of the resume itself.
View Detailed InformationTop Colleges for Lead Engineers
1. Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Cambridge, MA • Private
2. Georgia Institute of Technology
Atlanta, GA • Public
3. Stanford University
Stanford, CA • Private
4. Cornell University
Ithaca, NY • Private
5. Northwestern University
Evanston, IL • Private
6. Columbia University in the City of New York
New York, NY • Private
7. Harvard University
Cambridge, MA • Private
8. Duke University
Durham, NC • Private
9. Michigan Technological University
Houghton, MI • Public
10. Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA • Private
Top Skills For a Lead Engineer
The skills section on your resume can be almost as important as the experience section, so you want it to be an accurate portrayal of what you can do. Luckily, we've found all of the skills you'll need so even if you don't have these skills yet, you know what you need to work on. Out of all the resumes we looked through, 8.6% of lead engineers listed python on their resume, but soft skills such as mechanical skills and listening skills are important as well.
- Python, 8.6%
- Architecture, 7.4%
- Java, 4.9%
- C++, 4.6%
- Javascript, 4.3%
- Other Skills, 70.2% See All Lead Engineer Skills
Best States For a Lead Engineer
Some places are better than others when it comes to starting a career as a lead engineer. The best states for people in this position are Maryland, Utah, California, and Massachusetts. Lead engineers make the most in Maryland with an average salary of $100,892. Whereas in Utah and California, they would average $96,850 and $94,673, respectively. While lead engineers would only make an average of $88,424 in Massachusetts, you would still make more there than in the rest of the country. We determined these as the best states based on job availability and pay. By finding the median salary, cost of living, and using the Bureau of Labor Statistics' Location Quotient, we narrowed down our list of states to these four.
1. Maryland
$100,893
Avg. Salary
2. District of Columbia
$105,676
Avg. Salary
3. Utah
$96,850
Avg. Salary
How Do Lead Engineer Rate Their Jobs?
Top Lead Engineer Employers
We've made finding a great employer to work for easy by doing the hard work for you. We looked into employers that employ lead engineers and discovered their number of lead engineer opportunities and average salary. Through our research, we concluded that Wipro was the best, especially with an average salary of $63,595. HCL America follows up with an average salary of $64,634, and then comes General Electric with an average of $121,702. In addition, we know most people would rather work from home. So instead of having to change careers, we identified the best employers for remote work as a lead engineer. The employers include Goldman Sachs, TSYS, and Mutual of Omaha
Lead Engineer Videos
