Jack Blears started as a Special Apprentice with Metropolitan-Vickers Electrical Co Ltd in 1936. After his apprenticeship he became a Section Leader in the Physics Section of the Research Department. He went on to become Chief Engineer of the Scientific Apparatus Department in 1954. He left Metropolitan-Vickers Electrical Co Ltd in the 1960s when the company became part of the GEC Group of companies.

After leaving Metropolitan-Vickers electrical Co Ltd he went to work at Liverpool Polytechnic, now Liverpool John Moores University. On retiring from the Polytechnic in 1979, he responded to the challenges presented by changes introduced by government on the education system, particularly the engineering/technology sectors. Jack Blears was one of a group of university professors who annually met up to discuss ideas about matters to do with education of engineers. This group established themselves as The Engineering Professors' Conference (EPC).

In 1979 Jack Blears was appointed Honorary Research Officer of a Research Unit created by the EPC. The Unit looked at official and un-official published statistical data to identify trends developing in engineering, both in the UK and internationally. This work took forward ideas emerging from the EPC committee meetings.