WHAT DOES AN ENGINEERING TECHNICIAN DO?
Published: Feb 12, 2025 – The Engineering Technician evaluates and reviews single-family residential development proposals, land use actions, and utility permits while ensuring compliance with stormwater, infrastructure, and right-of-way requirements. This position collaborates with City staff across multiple departments to coordinate plan reviews, permitting, and inspections, and resolve concerns related to drainage, construction impacts, and utilities. The technician also researches maps and records, assists with construction site inspections, and supports the acceptance and approval of infrastructure improvements.
A Review of Professional Skills and Functions for Engineering Technician
1. Engineering Technician Roles and Responsibilities
- Material Review: Take responsibility for reviewing rejected material/jobs.
- Root Cause Investigation: Investigate the root cause of failure and plan rework instructions.
- Preventative Maintenance: Maintain a preventative maintenance (TPM) program.
- Manufacturing Equipment Setup: Set up and program manufacturing equipment (i.e., laser etching machine).
- Tooling and Process Design: Design/Develop new production tooling and production processes.
- Labor Analysis: Analyze labor standards, efficiencies, and productivity.
- Production Requirement Analysis: Read and analyze charts, work orders, or production schedules to determine manufacturing requirements.
- Time and Cost Estimation: Estimate production times, staffing requirements, and related costs to provide information for management decisions.
- Statistical Forecasting: Apply statistical methods to estimate future manufacturing requirements and potential.
- Budgeting and Vendor Management: Develop budgets, research vendors, and collect bids for supplies, materials, and equipment on an as-needed basis.
- Machinery Recommendations: Make recommendations for the purchase, modification, and/or repair of machinery or equipment in the plant.
2. Engineering Technician Duties and Roles
- Safety Engagement: Participate and be engaged in the safety culture.
- Communication: Effectively communicate updates to Client representatives and the Project Manager.
- Gas Detection: Use the Optical Gas Imaging (OGI) camera to detect/identify emissions.
- Job Safety Analysis: Complete comprehensive Job Safety Analysis at their job site.
- PPE Management: Maintain and use all required PPE.
- Piping and Instrumentation Diagram Review: Review and mark the Piping and Instrumentation Diagrams.
- Database Management: Update and maintain the LDAR component database.
- Instrument Calibration: Perform and document calibration of the monitoring instrument.
- Site Compliance: Comply with all permit and sign-in procedures for the site.
- Field Inspections: Perform and document field inspections accurately, safely, and efficiently.
- Training Participation: Participate in training for career development, safety, and maintaining required certifications.
3. Engineering Technician Responsibilities and Key Tasks
- Process Support: Support process engineering sustaining activities, cost reduction, yield improvement, and tool availability for production.
- Job Performance: Ensure all given jobs are effectively and efficiently performed to ensure that the Team’s and department’s goals are achieved.
- Process Investigation: Perform investigation on process-related issues.
- Problem Resolution: Resolve the process-related problem, planning, and performing corrective prevention actions.
- Preventative Maintenance: Perform process-related PM as per schedule.
- Troubleshooting: Perform minor troubleshooting and preliminary assessment of line issues.
- Safety Compliance: Strictly follow all safety procedures and Standard Operating Procedures (SOP).
- Activity Recording: Ensure all activities are properly recorded and attended.
- Housekeeping: Perform 5S and proper housekeeping.
- Process Engineering Support: Support Process Engineer in other activities when needed.
- Reporting: Report to Process Engineer.
- Area Support: Support other required areas as deemed necessary by Engineers.
4. Engineering Technician Roles and Details
- First-Level Support: Act as first-level support for the factory automation systems team.
- Troubleshooting: Attend to day-to-day systems issues and perform troubleshooting.
- Data Coordination: Coordinate with the equipment and process engineering team to ensure data collected by business systems is accurate, relevant, and critical for monitoring purposes.
- User Training: Assist in providing briefing, guidance, and training to end users on the implementation of new features or enhancements developed by the automation team.
- System Enhancement Participation: Participate in system enhancement initiatives by collecting user feedback and suggesting improvement ideas, potentially helping to develop and implement them.
- Best Practices Documentation: Create and document best practices for using automation systems for end users.
- System Testing Support: Support system testing activities on the machine by the automation engineer.
- Server Management: Manage servers and computers that fall under automation team responsibility.
- Continuous Learning: Actively demonstrate a passion for continuous learning.
5. Engineering Technician Key Accountabilities
- Design Support: Provide support to design engineers and scientists to help meet internal and external customer requirements.
- Quality Assurance: Follow strict industry standards, procedures, and processes to ensure that quality test data is generated.
- Testing Methodology: Understand the problem to determine/suggest a required testing method.
- Data Analysis: Perform database queries, and analyze data in Excel spreadsheets or other forms.
- Product Evaluation: Support evaluation of products or technologies by providing timely updates, summarizing test results, and writing test reports.
- Team Collaboration: Work in a team environment to meet goals.
- Testing Coordination: Coordinate testing to maximize quality and efficiency.
- Issue Resolution: Address test-related issues (logistics, instrumentation, etc.), create solutions, and provide test results to engineers within established deadlines.
- Competitor Benchmarking: Perform competitor benchmarking and analysis.
- Communication: Communicate written/verbal information or data to other associates.
6. Engineering Technician General Responsibilities
- Agile Planning: Participate in Release and Sprint Planning using Agile methodology and provide work effort estimates to the Delivery Team and/or Manager.
- Requirements Analysis: Analyze and review requirements and functional specifications, and communicate findings to the Delivery Team as comments, point estimates, and/or test cases to achieve Test Driven Development (TDD).
- Test Environment Management: Plan and manage personal test environment for Sprint and Acceptance Testing.
- Test Case Execution: Write and execute test cases against requirements and functional specifications and create tasks for completion.
- Status Communication: Communicate work status to the Delivery Team and/or Manager.
- Manual and Automated Testing: Execute manual and automated test cases for Regression and Acceptance Testing to ensure proper operation of the software.
- Test Results Communication: Communicate test results to the Delivery Team and/or Manager.
- Defect Management: Create and verify defects from various sources.
- Software Deployment: Deploy a software application from scratch to test the installation process.
- Usability and Performance Testing: Design and execute usability and performance tests.
- Version Control: Utilize software code version control/source management and defect management tools.
- Accountability: Demonstrate accountability for completing work assignments to meet agreed-upon commitments and deadlines.
- Test Fixture Design: Design and assemble test fixtures for new and existing products.
- Customer Support: When necessary, travel to customer sites to assist in sales and service of products.
- Problem Solving: Participate in problem-solving teams to resolve product or customer issues.
- Industry Knowledge: Stay current on new developments in the industry.
- Process Improvement: Contribute to the development and improvement of company product development processes.
7. Engineering Technician Role Purpose
- Technical Functions: Performs and documents basic to moderately complex technical functions relating to test, quality control, layout fabrication, modification, and assembly of mechanical equipment and/or components, under close supervision.
- Duties Execution: Performs basic electrical, mechanical, electromechanical, developmental, or test technician duties in such areas as manufacturing, maintenance, quality testing, and engineering where limited judgment and initiative to solve problems and make recommendations.
- Change Order Management: Perform change orders or requests as part of engineering changes.
- Assistance in Maintenance: Assists in construction, inspections, calibrations, adjustments, tests, and documents, and maintains basic equipment, components, devices, and systems.
- Electronic Measurements: Performs simple and complex electronic measurements using meters, scopes, and custom analyzers.
- Test Setup Assistance: Assists in carrying out complex test setups, and coordinating activities with inside and outside personnel.
- Mathematical and Software Knowledge: Possesses an understanding of basic algebra, trigonometry, and fundamentals of software programming.
- Cross-functional Collaboration: Works with engineers, supervisors, and production personnel to ensure all operational imperatives are met within the areas of safety, quality, production, and new products.
- Process Development Support: Assists engineering in the development of new processes.
8. Engineering Technician Essential Functions
- Computer-Drafting Software: Operates computer-drafting software to prepare scale maps and plans showing existing infrastructure and proposed construction.
- Mathematical and Geometric Calculations: Performs mathematical and geometric calculations to complete drafting assignments.
- Inventory Management: Establishes and maintains an organized inventory of existing plants, paving and drainage plans, and as-builts, and can retrieve information on such on time.
- Geographic Information System (GIS): Uses the Geographical Information System to enter and retrieve paving and drainage system inventory data.
- Spatial Coordinates Mapping: Establishes exact spatial coordinates of missing surface features to update GIS maps.
- Webpage Maintenance: Maintains the updating of the engineering webpage, maintains the engineering computer system, and recommends new hardware and software for CAD and GIS.
- Surveying Equipment Operation: Operates surveying equipment including level and Global Positioning Systems and mechanical distance measuring devices for precise angular and distance measurements for geodetic surveys, feature identification, and data collection.
- Research and Data Compilation: Researches, compiles data, and prepares reports, drawings, charts, slide presentations, graphics, and maps of and for various city projects and services.
- CAD and GIS Software Evaluation: Researches, evaluates, and recommends computer hardware and software for CAD and GIS applications in engineering operations.
- Equipment Installation and Maintenance: Installs, maintains, and performs minor repairs on equipment and software for the division.
- Training and Technical Assistance: Trains and provides technical assistance to department personnel in the use of software and equipment.
9. Engineering Technician Additional Details
- Maintenance Contracts Administration: Administers maintenance contracts for all division equipment.
- Record and Report Preparation: Reviews, prepares, and/or submits various records and reports including reference manuals, maps, engineering drawings, charts, technical reports, construction plans, etc.
- Resident and Developer Inquiries: Responds to residents' and developers' inquiries and provides drawings, maps, and data showing existing public services work.
- Engineering Site Inspection Assistance: Assists Engineering Department personnel with engineering site inspection and mapping services and assists in other related office duties.
- Meeting Participation: Attends meetings related to engineering issues.
- Discretion and Judgment: Uses discretion and judgment in developing and implementing courses of action affecting the department.
- Technical Work in Engineering Plans: Provides advanced technical work in the preparation of a wide variety of engineering plans, and the management of computer systems in the Engineering Department.
- GIS Software (ArcView, ArcInfo): Uses GIS software including ArcView and ArcInfo to enter and retrieve engineering systems inventory data and generate reports and maps.
- Data Upkeep: Keeps the data up to date with the latest field surveys.
- GPS Operation: Operates portable Global Positioning System receiver to identify and pinpoint exact spatial coordinates of features such as existing plats, paving and drainage plans, as-builts, and infrastructures including pipes, catch basins, end walls, controls, and structures.
- City Infrastructure Mapping: Prepares various maps of city infrastructures.
- GPS Data Download: Downloads the Global Positioning Data into the GIS database to keep it up to date.
10. Engineering Technician Overview
- Residential Development Review: Review and evaluate single-family residential development/redevelopment proposals and land use actions (plats, short plats, lot line revisions, etc.).
- Pre-Submittal Information: Provide pre-submittal information to applicants regarding City requirements for infrastructure improvements (stormwater management plans and calculations, street, sidewalk, water, sewer, and right-of-way improvements).
- Electronic Plan Reviews: Plan reviews are performed in electronic format using Adobe Acrobat DC and Bluebeam.
- Utility Permits Processing: Review and process utility (sewer, stormwater, and water) permits.
- Right-of-Way Use Permits: Review and process right-of-way use permits and encroachment applications.
- Customer Concern Resolution: Respond to and resolve customer concerns and complaints related to storm drainage, site work, water, sewer, construction impacts, and related issues.
- Collaboration with City Staff: Work collaboratively with City staff including building plans examiners, planners, City Arborists, Fire Marshals, Senior Development Engineer, inspectors, permit coordinators, GIS coordinators, City Attorney, and Public Works Department operations personnel in the review and inspection of private development projects.
- Pre-Application and Intake Screening: Participate in pre-application and intake screening meetings with applicants.
- Plan Review Coordination: Attend meetings with City staff to coordinate plan reviews, permitting, and project inspections.
- Research and Record Assistance: Research maps and records to assist City staff and the public regarding utility and easement-related matters.
- Construction Site Monitoring: Assist Site/Utility Inspector occasionally to monitor construction site erosion/sediment control measures, right-of-way, connections to the City's infrastructure, storm drainage detention systems, as-built plan submittal, acceptance of improvements, grant of easements to the City, and final approval of construction.