What the Industry expects from a fresh engineer?

V.J.Mandrawadker (Retired principal, VCDET)

Maharashtra State has got more than 400 polytechnic colleges with various streams. A few common streams are listed below. i. ii. iii. iv. v. vi. Mechanical Engg. Civil Engg. Computer Engg. Computer Technology Electronics Engg. Electronics and Telecommunication Engg. And so on. MSBTE has done an excellent job in starting various demanding courses for a student passing S.S.C. Examination. Last year A.I.C.T.E. and D.T.E. reduced the percentage required for getting admission into diploma courses to 35, which is just bare minimum of passing marks. Due to this, the level of students taking admission will be between average and excellent. As the quality of engineers produced, depends on the quality of students admitted. The engineers, produced from the college will be average to excellent category. But no company wants average engineers to appoint, whatever may be the salary they are paying. Every company wants the best engineer at the lowest salary.
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At first, many of the fresh engineers coming out of the colleges will not be knowing what are the duties of an engineer in a company, what he should do in the company etc .He will be in the state of confusion about his duties and responsibilities, leave apart what the company or industry expects from him. Hence it is very much essential for the engineer to know what are the duties and responsibilities of the engineer, what are the expectations of the industry . An effort has been made in this article to present how a company works, what are the departments responsible for running a company, producing the products and making a profit. Profit making depends on so many factors, like Machines i. ii. iii. iv. v. Manpower (Employees) Material All departments Money Management

Now let us go in detail. We normally find that companies or organizations or industries can be classified as, i. Small scale industries Examples: any fabrication industry, machine shop ii. Medium scale industries Examples: Garlick Engg., Primatex machinery iii. Large scale industries Examples: Cooper Engg , H.A.L., P.A.L., L&T., Mahindra, Godrej The structure of the organization depends on the size of the organization .Whatever may be the structure of the organization ,all the functions like design, planning ,manufacturing ,assembly , testing
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,inspection ,purchase ,stores , dispatch, sales &marketing etc., are to be carried out satisfactorily. Then only the companies can make profits. For performing above functions satisfactorily, every industry needs, i. Efficient , knowledgeable, intelligent, hard working, sincere and dedicated human resources. ii. Machineries iii. Materials iv Funds (Money) The first requirement is about engineers, workers and other employees. Other employees mean non technical people i.e., clerk, typist, peons, hamal etc. Worker is a person working on machine or plant, skilled or highly skilled, educated thru I.T.I. Engineer is qualified, educated from polytechnic/engineering college. He is supposed to be a leader for all workers, clerical staff and all others. He has to make decisions regarding technical problems arising during manufacturing/assembly and guide the subordinates /workers till products are dispatched to clients. Even after dispatch, sometimes he has to go to sites and solve the problems. That is why ENGINEER is given more importance in industry. Now let us the duties and responsibilities of engineer in a company. i) Duties and responsibilities of a MECHANICAL ENGINEER: A mechanical engineer can work in any company as Design Engineer, Production Engineer, Planning Engineer, Shop Engineer, Assembly Engineer,
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Inspection/Quality Engineer, Purchase Engineer, Material Engineer etc. In general every engineer should have following skills for performing a job in the Industry. i) Knoweldge gained from the curriculam during Diploma programme. a. About materials: properties, merits and demerits, processes for producing materials, testing of materials and their selection. b. Design formulae, force/stress calculations used for designing various machine elements like shaft, bearing, lever, spring, keys, couplings etc. c. Manufacturing processes like turning, shaping, slotting, milling, welding, sheet metal working etc. d. Metrology and Quality control: Use of instruments in measurement. Techniques used in inspection and quality control. e. About Management: Departments in the Industry, their functions, structure of the departments, roles of manager, engineer, worker and staff. Every thing mentioned above taught in the colleges. But most of the students study only for the sake of getting better marks or to pass, which is not correct. The students must study with heart, understand, remember and use them in real life. Besides above technical skills, every industry expects the following qualities in the freshers. However these qualities are in born, they can be suitably developed by putting some efforts.
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ii)

Confidence:

In professional companies, fresh engineers are properly trained before posting them in regular job. In real life, most of the companies are not very much professional. They want immediate results. Hence it is always better for a fresh engineer to be confident in his subjects/field. If he doesnt have, he must work hard, refer books and develop confidence in his subjects so that nobody can challenge him. iii) Leadership and teamwork: An engineer is a boss for workers and other staff. Hence he has to be a good leader and develop a good team under him. If the fresh engineer appointed lacks in leadership, he can not extract work from his workers/subordinates. Initiative: This is a very important quality expected from every engineer. An engineer shall work on his own, try to get more work and do successfully. He should not waste time in gossiping or remain idle. He should try to innovate new techniques in performing job for reducing the cycle time and cost. Hard working nature: Every company expects that it should grow very fast. There is no substitute for HARDWORK . The growth of the industry depends on the work culture and attitude of the employees. More the work input, more the output. More production with the same resources increases productivity of the industry.

iv)

v)

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vii)

Positive attitude: Negative attitude of employees or management is not a healthy sign for any industry. Everyone should have positive attitude while taking decisions. This helps in the growth of industry as well as employee. But unfortunately most of us have negative attitude, which must change. Sincerity: The sincere persons are liked by every one, because sincere engineers do not waste time in gossiping or in non productive activities. Therefore managers can trust sincere engineers and assign important jobs to these engineers.

viii)

ix)

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Punctuality: Punctuality is another very important quality of a fresh engineer which can be appreciated by every industry. Late attendance is never liked by any boss. Nowadays punching clocks, card swapping systems etc., are used in most of the companies. Even then there are many engineers going late to industry which is to be avoided by fresh engineer. Capability: Capability of every engineer will be varying. Even though the engineer wishes to do this and that , he may not be able to do because of his limited capability. However he can increase his capability by seriously putting efforts in proper directions. Competence: Today is the age of competition. Hence every engineer has to be competent enough to win the race. For example, if 4 fresh engineers are selected as trainees, they may have to face a test after training and if only two vacancies are there, only top two most competent engineers will be selected.
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xi)

xii)

Passion: Engineering profession should be a passion for the fresh engineer. By nobodys wish one should become engineer. Patience: Engineer should have lot of patience for every activity. If engineer works without patience, he may do lot many mistakes and results will not be as per expectations. Dedication: Totally engineer has to be dedicated to his company/industry. Dedication means till he is in service with an industry, he should work with honestly and sincerely without cheating the organization in any case. He should have a feeling that he and his family are fed and maintained by the company by employing him. In above discussion, only mechanical engineering has been analyzed. The expectations for other branch engineers remain same as per points ii) to xiii).Only point no i) the technical skill should be as per the core branch, the fresh engineer must possess.

xiii)

WISH ALL FRESH ENGINEERS A BRIGHT CAREER