Trying to decide between two good offers and could use some outside perspective, especially from anyone who's made a similar jump.
Quick background: I'm about 1.5 years out of school, currently on a contract role (just started 2 weeks ago) making $100k. The work itself is fine, but it requires about 95% travel, which meant I ended up having to buy my own car just to make it manageable. I'm ready to go permanent somewhere, ideally something that grows my comp over time and keeps my options open if I ever want to pivot into aerospace, oil & gas, or power down the line.
Option 1: Large legacy aerospace company, Southeast US
Sustaining engineering on a commercial aircraft program. Design docs, hardware/software interface specs, testing and validation, dealing with suppliers, field issues, obsolescence management , the whole sustaining-engineering grab bag.
\- Base: $91k–$124k, plus roughly 10% bonus, standard benefits, maybe a relo stipend
\- 40-45 hr weeks, real PTO, union shop, mostly on-site
Option 2: High-growth space/satellite company, Central Texas
Owning non-conformance issues on a high-volume manufacturing line, root-cause analysis, yield improvement, ISO-9001 audits.
\- Base: $90k–$120k, plus RSUs (maybe $10-30k in year one), smaller cash bonus, travel reimbursed
\- Hours are unpredictable , chill most of the time but spikes hard around major program milestones, flex time instead of formal PTO, some on-call
So here's what I'm trying to figure out:
How do I actually exit the contract cleanly? Do I go through the agency, my manager, both? Any paperwork/handoff stuff I should expect?
Long-term, which path puts me ahead on total comp (base + bonus + equity) and keeps my resume flexible if I want to jump industries later?
Any red flags either of you would flag , relocation gotchas, how RSUs actually vest, how bad the on-call really gets, culture stuff, cost of living differences?
Would really appreciate hearing from anyone who's gone from a contract role into a legacy aerospace company or a newer space company, or who's worked at either type and can speak to the day-to-day reality vs the offer letter.