Video Transcript

STEVE SOLACK: Hi, I'm Steve Solack, and I'm a controls engineer. So as controls engineers, we're essentially responsible for bringing our equipment to life. That includes doing all the programming, electrical design, robot programming, HMI interfaces. So my current role here at Mission, I'm fortunate enough to be the controls engineering manager. A big part of that duty is actually mentorship and training for the young men and women coming up through the ranks here at Mission.

As a controls engineer you're going to learn a lot about manufacturing. You're going to learn a lot about PLCs, robots, electrical design, and just what it takes to make a machine work and work reliably. When we're looking for, you know, newer, younger controls engineers, I'm not looking for anybody who has all the answers because we're going to train them and bring them up, you know, on what we do.

But essentially I'm just looking for that drive, the curiosity that they want to learn. They want to know what makes this stuff tick.

CHAD VANDERKOOI: Hi, I’m Chad Vanderkooi and I'm a fabrication specialist. On a typical day, I'll come in and look at my drawings and check the specifications, and then if I have the materials on hand, I'll start to cut the materials. If not, I'll make an order for new materials. I started welding when I was about 12 years old. I wanted to build a go kart.

My father had an arc welder, so he kind of showed me how to arc weld a little bit, that kind of snowballed since then. There's a need for welders everywhere. You can have your own business, you don't need much for start up to be a mobile welder. Qualities that would make a strong fabrication person would be attention to detail, strong work ethic.

Right now you can pretty much do it anywhere in the world. You can underwater weld, you can TIG weld, you MIG weld, you can arc weld. And there's also laser welding, which is a new form of welding, which is really pretty cool. And in the future, maybe you can weld on a space station or on Mars. I mean, it's limitless.

SAJINA POUDEL: Hi, I’m Sajina Poudel, I’m an applications engineer. My job is to get all the departments together in a room and then make them think through a problem to figure out a solution. During my school years, I got introduced to a core program which happened to be in the automation industry, and it was kind of like the best platform that I could find. In this role, you are learning on a daily basis. It's, it's never ending. The top qualities that I would kind of say an applications engineer would need would be the go-getter attitude and then learning, right? For this role, it is kind of debatable, but anybody that has a high school degree or is eager to learn can adapt to the role.

It is favorable for any people, just getting familiar with the industry and having some knowledge about how finances work.