What I wish was different
From a personal standpoint, I wish I had been able to work consecutive terms! I was in the Tech Services group, which does batch scale up/scale down, process transfers, and manufacturing process changes. Since it was my first term at the site, I had a really large learning curve, so it was hard for me to get the hang of things until my term was nearly halfway over.
I really enjoyed being on the Tech Services team overall, but I found there was quite a bit of boring, grunt work associated with the job, like data collection and data reviews. Another thing I didn’t like was helping with final reports for projects. These were difficult to feel engaged in, as you had to struggle to catch up on all the background information/objectives, and I didn’t really feel like I had much ownership.
As for the company itself, I felt like every department had an employee shortage. I would have appreciated if the company were more patient-oriented, rather than business-motivated too, but the culture was still good overall.
update 8-4-23: I wish I had been able to develop my technical skills/process engineering knowledge more, but the role was more suited for developing leadership and interpersonal skills. I really wish the company/site culture were better. Communication between operators and managers was very poor, and production seemed to take precedence over employee well-being and product quality. I wish I had a longer term and been able to start some kind of project/initiative to address some of the shortcomings I identified.
