u/Lost_Perspective_178

Edited to make it shorter

Hi, I am an Instrument Engineer with 3 years of experience: 2 years in a petrochemical plant and now 1 year in a metallurgical plant. I started this discussion because I am confused about what the role of an engineer should be in an operating plant, particularly regarding how closely engineers should work with technicians.

In my first job, I worked as an Instrument Maintenance Engineer, mainly handling reliability, maintenance planning, RCA, modifications, etc. When I joined, I was told to spend my first three months closely with the technicians and, when necessary, get involved in their work and get my hands dirty. As a result, I gained a lot of field exposure.

I noticed that the senior engineers who were really good at their jobs were almost always the ones who were close to the technicians and understood the equipment firsthand. Their engineering decisions were fast, and when problems occurred, they were often able to solve them because they understood what was actually happening in the field. I eventually continued working closely with the technicians throughout my time there.

My current company is very different. Engineering is a separate department, most engineers come from an EPC background, and they have relatively little field exposure. Most of our time is spent at our desks, mainly dealing with design defects, modifications, documentation, and reviewing vendor proposals. We rarely work directly with maintenance technicians.

Because of this, I sometimes see engineering solutions that don't seem to consider maintainability or field reality. For example, we have a CEMS installed in a difficult-to-access location and therefore rarely maintained. The proposed solution was to replace the analyzer with another technology (DOAS), rather than first addressing the installation and maintenance problem.

Another major difference is troubleshooting. At my previous company, our in-house engineers were involved from the initial troubleshooting and investigation through RCA and detailed engineering. Here, much of the analysis is given to vendors, and we mainly review their recommendations.

This has made me wonder whether my previous experience was unusual, or whether this is actually an important difference between effective plant engineering and desk-based engineering.

My current conclusions are:

1. Engineers with little field exposure can make poor decisions when they don't understand field reality.
2. Engineers should have at least some technician-level knowledge and practical skills.
3. Engineers and technicians should work closely together, especially when troubleshooting recurring problems.
4. Maintainability and accessibility should be considered part of engineering responsibility.
5. Engineers in an operating plant should ideally be involved in troubleshooting, not just reviewing vendor solutions afterward.

So I would like to hear from experienced plant engineers:

How much field exposure should an Instrument Engineer have? Should engineers regularly work alongside technicians and learn technician-level skills? And in your experience, are engineers who are closely involved with technicians and field activities generally more effective than those who are primarily desk-based?

I'd particularly like to hear from people who have experience in both EPC and operating/maintenance environments.

First of all, I'm still pretty green with SAP, and the only SAP i know is SAP PM.

I work in process plant as an engineer. We just transitioned to SAP not long ago after doing everything manually in excel, email, and our crppy procurement procedure.

However the way we use SAP still follows our old procedure, which i feel like many features are under utilized. We're still confused of who does what, like for example who create purchase requisition, purchase order, etc. What needs to be done first and later, etc. Amd for now everything is mostly handled by us engineers (we're also the user)

So my question is:

1. What is the procedure looks like in your workplace? If you can kinda describe to me from the very start until reservation, that'd really help.

2. Also who does what. Like i mentioned earlier for example, who create purchase requisition. Or better, for each procedure whose responsibility is that

Thank you

I am an engineer and have worked for my current company for just 8 months.

To tell you the context, I was in petrochemical plant before, where everything seems to be stable, structured, and very strict (technical & safety - wise). I decided to move to my current company, because i wanted a new challenge. Fortunately, the current plant i'm working in now is only 2 years into operation, and since it's metallurgical plant the culture is very different: no strict standard, no structured work, everything seems to be so chaotic and reactive.

H2 months in, with great effort i tried my best to fix how work is planned and executed, documentation, safety, and engineering workflow. And around that time my direct boss (section manager) started to be toxic towards me.

First incident: she called me & brought up how I tend to 'disrespect' the structural hierarchy because i always coordinate with her upper without telling her first. The fact however, every work, report, and idea was sent to her first with no reply at all or even any discussion. That's when i took the initiative to coordinate with our department head instead. We had a long debate about this that time, ended up with me apologizing and directing all of my work & report to her again.

2nd incident: few days later, she supervised field work and almost causing accident to technician, due to her not coordinating with operator for isolation. The next day i did the supervising, we did everything accordingly and concluded the item can't be fixed. She then procceed to accuse us of not being capable of the work and disrespecting the safety procedure. Luckily, we have CCTV record, so i was safe that time.

After this my relationship with her went down bad. For every problem in our plant, she never offered any solution, but when i offered a solution she always cut me off. I always have to tell other colleagues first, to tell her what to do, because she wouldny listen to me. Every meeting, troubleshooting, any kind of work, i was never included. I have to rely on my motivation, intiation, and basically force myself in to get involved.

On the other hand however, other co-workers, other departments, technicians, other bosses noticed my effort and actually began to depend on me more because i'm easier to work with. They care and support me in this situation. And actually many people have trouble with her too. I just don't know what kind of power she has behind her that even the management hasnt done anything to her yet.

However, since I'm new here, even with all that support, the decision making is still on her hand. Tbh, I'm exhausted now, i realize this condition has blocked my growth too. I'm thinking about quitting and there are already offers from many companies but on the other hand all colleagues that suppoted me told me to hold on and they need me and will support & protect my career.

What would you do if you were in my place?

I am an engineer and have worked for my current company for just 8 months.

To tell you the context, I was in petrochemical plant before, where everything seems to be stable, structured, and very strict (technical & safety - wise). I decided to move to my current company, because i wanted a new challenge. Fortunately, the current plant i'm working in now is only 2 years into operation, and since it's metallurgical plant the culture is very different: no strict standard, no structured work, everything seems to be so chaotic and reactive.

H2 months in, with great effort i tried my best to fix how work is planned and executed, documentation, safety, and engineering workflow. And around that time my direct boss (section manager) started to be toxic towards me.

First incident: she called me & brought up how I tend to 'disrespect' the structural hierarchy because i always coordinate with her upper without telling her first. The fact however, every work, report, and idea was sent to her first with no reply at all or even any discussion. That's when i took the initiative to coordinate with our department head instead. We had a long debate about this that time, ended up with me apologizing and directing all of my work & report to her again.

2nd incident: few days later, she supervised field work and almost causing accident to technician, due to her not coordinating with operator for isolation. The next day i did the supervising, we did everything accordingly and concluded the item can't be fixed. She then procceed to accuse us of not being capable of the work and disrespecting the safety procedure. Luckily, we have CCTV record, so i was safe that time.

After this my relationship with her went down bad. For every problem in our plant, she never offered any solution, but when i offered a solution she always cut me off. I always have to tell other colleagues first, to tell her what to do, because she wouldny listen to me. Every meeting, troubleshooting, any kind of work, i was never included. I have to rely on my motivation, intiation, and basically force myself in to get involved.

On the other hand however, other co-workers, other departments, technicians, other bosses noticed my effort and actually began to depend on me more because i'm easier to work with. They care and support me in this situation. And actually many people have trouble with her too. I just don't know what kind of power she has behind her that even the management hasnt done anything to her yet.

However, since I'm new here, even with all that support, the decision making is still on her hand. Tbh, I'm exhausted now, i realize this condition has blocked my growth too. I'm thinking about quitting and there are already offers from many companies but on the other hand all colleagues that suppoted me told me to hold on and they need me and will support & protect my career.

What would you do if you were in my place?