Mechanical Engineering, Sheffield Hallam University, graduated in May 2009.
My route into Mitsubishi Chemicalwas through the Year in Industry scheme (YinI). After completing my A Levels I decided on an industrial placement year through the scheme, which put me in touch with Mitsubishi Chemical. When I finished my year at Mitsubishi Chemical, I went to university but returned to work there every Easter and summer break. It was during one of these sessions in my third year that I was approached by the Site Asset Manager, who offered me a full time engineering post on the successful completion of my degree. I accepted, got the degree and haven’t looked back since.
As a YinI student I was given a project to undertake which involved assessing the lubrication and maintenance policies for all the pumps across site. The idea was to reduce failures and maximise uptime for the pumps. It was a successful project and the maintenance policies I created are still in use today.
I started here as a Mechanical Asset Engineer. The role includes solving short-term plant issues as well as thinking about the longer-term life and reliability of the plant. The overall aim is to maximise plant uptime, reduce failures, improve on life cycle cost and maintain a safe operable plant. As well as the Asset Engineer role I have also taken on a project role. This involves specifying new equipment and layouts at the front end of projects. The aim is to think about the maintainability of new equipment at the beginning of a project to ensure the correct maintenance policy is made live when the new equipment is made live, thus eliminating any potential problems from the start.
Mitsubishi Chemical does not believe in holding you back; something I learnt very early on! If you are willing to put the work in and want to progress and develop there is no limit on where you can go or what you can achieve. The Company will support you in any way they can. I’ve had the opportunity to develop my engineering skills on one of our smaller production assets before taking on a project role covering the whole site. It’s been very good to gain experience across the range of plants on site. I’ve also completed a range of courses aimed at developing my engineering skills as well as personal and management skills.
Since joining at the age of 17, all of my experiences have been positive. Even as a placement year student I was very impressed with how slick the organisation was and how well the staff are looked after. Nearly eight years on from joining as a student my impressions remain the same. There is a great spirit amongst all employees and the site has a friendly open door policy. It makes working here a pleasurable experience.
I really enjoy the outdoors and am a very keen mountain biker, the area is perfect for it with easy access to some of the best countryside and mountain biking the country has to offer. With friends I also enjoy trips to the coast to places like Whitby or Saltburn. Nightlife in nearby towns, such as Yarm, is also good. Some may say I’m biased as I’m local, but I can’t see a reason for leaving the area or Lucite International.
I am currently working towards becoming a works engineer nominee, allowing me to authorise repairs and modifications on registered codal equipment. Over the next 10 years I would like to progress to area engineer level and on to responsible engineer status. This is something that has already been discussed at my reviews and the Company is willing to support and help me achieve this.
