What is the first thing you do when you get started with work for the day?  

Typically, I start my day reviewing previous day plans and making new ones for the day ahead. I like doing it the traditional way with multi-colored pens to indicate different status of activities. All of these are done whilst having my morning coffee.  

What are your main areas of focus in your work as an NPI Engineering Manager? 

As an NPI Engineering Manager, my main area of focus is meeting production plans for the day leading to the week’s target. That job entails coordination with support groups either through a meeting, calls, instant messenger or in person. Recently though, I’ve been working on a product transfer from our Boulder, Colorado site to our Manila facility. I was one of three engineers who were able to travel to the Boulder site to learn everything about the production of this product and responsible for transferring this knowledge to our Manila site for a smooth line transfer and operation start.

How do you organize/structure your work day with tasks/projects?   

From the list of things I have for the day, I would I prioritize things based on impact to production plans. Things like resolving a problem and project action items execution are  next. 

As an NPI Engineering Manager, do you collaborate with a team or mainly work autonomously? Which do you prefer?  

My job requires lots of collaboration with my line managers, support groups like Planning & Supply Chain and Process and Equipment Engineering because their functions directly affect how production will perform. Collaboration is also paramount to the product transfer project we are doing right now. For other projects such as resolving  technical issues or helping develop processes for new products and materials with the engineering team, I normally work autonomously. I don’t have a single preference on what method I use to complete a job, rather it depends on what job it is. 

Which part of your work do you enjoy the most, and why? 

The opportunity to lead manufacturing and achieve whatever is required by the planners with limited resources is one thing I enjoy a lot. It also brings me a great deal of satisfaction when I am involved in resolving technical issues affecting productivity and yield. I also enjoy mentoring or coaching young engineers and helping them optimize die attach and wire bonding processes.

If you had more hours in the day to focus on new skills related to your job or projects for your work, what would you focus on?  

If there were more hours in the day, I would like to gain a much deeper understanding of the properties of the materials we are using in our products. In the meantime, I hope to have more time to finish my Master’s thesis in Mechanical Engineering which I started working on midway through 2020.

What is your special skill/ magic power/ hobby you’re proud of?  

I always look forward to weekends and do my hobbies with gusto. Playing with my power tools and doing some fabrication projects, carpentry and furniture –making, completes my week. It doesn’t matter if I finish that project in one weekend or several weekends; what is important for me is that I enjoy doing these, especially the details that I am able to apply to a particular project. Working on my home projects has helped me a lot to develop my patience especially as I still consider myself to be a rookie – sometimes things can  go wrong. When that happens taking a step back and analyzing how the problem happened almost always leads to making it right  the next time around.