Differentiating Between Different Engineering Industries
Differentiating Between Different Engineering Industries
(OP)
I am at present living in Perth, Western Australia having lived and worked most of my life in Europe.
My trade is a Static Equipment Engineer – pressure vessels, shell and tube heat exchangers, ACHE’s, columns, flares, etc,etc.
In Europe I could be working at one of the major world engineering contracting companies on say a refinery project. The next project might be a chemical plant or an LNG project or a pharmaceutical plant, an FPSO, a rig, etc
Here in Oz they have the strange habit of pigeon holing people.
If you have worked on refinery projects you can only work on that type of project, if you are from a mining / minerals background or have offshore experience again you are placed in a box and are not allowed to work on other types of projects.
I find this bizarre to say the least and it makes it difficult to move around the workplace. Maybe its just people protecting their little empires.
In my discipline for example a pressure vessel is a pressure vessel. The only difference will be the vessel contents, design pressure and temperature, materials of construction and design code. It does not basically matter whether it is going onshore / offshore, on an LNG plant, a mining project, a chemical plant, etc. There are of course some slight differences for each project based on the project and client requirements.
Has anyone else come across this sort of attitude before?
My trade is a Static Equipment Engineer – pressure vessels, shell and tube heat exchangers, ACHE’s, columns, flares, etc,etc.
In Europe I could be working at one of the major world engineering contracting companies on say a refinery project. The next project might be a chemical plant or an LNG project or a pharmaceutical plant, an FPSO, a rig, etc
Here in Oz they have the strange habit of pigeon holing people.
If you have worked on refinery projects you can only work on that type of project, if you are from a mining / minerals background or have offshore experience again you are placed in a box and are not allowed to work on other types of projects.
I find this bizarre to say the least and it makes it difficult to move around the workplace. Maybe its just people protecting their little empires.
In my discipline for example a pressure vessel is a pressure vessel. The only difference will be the vessel contents, design pressure and temperature, materials of construction and design code. It does not basically matter whether it is going onshore / offshore, on an LNG plant, a mining project, a chemical plant, etc. There are of course some slight differences for each project based on the project and client requirements.
Has anyone else come across this sort of attitude before?





RE: Differentiating Between Different Engineering Industries
-The future's so bright I gotta wear shades!
RE: Differentiating Between Different Engineering Industries
I always work in the oil refining industry but I think that the most experience you got from the diverse projects others than Refining, it enriches you! And as much different the projects you deal with it gives you more secure background and knowledge to work in different areas.
RE: Differentiating Between Different Engineering Industries
RE: Differentiating Between Different Engineering Industries
It can vary from industry to industry, location to location, onshore offshore, etc.
It takes time to get up to speed on the differences. It is much quicker to get someone already familiar with the particulars to do it again. This is one benefit of specializing.
Just a thought.
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Albert Einstein
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RE: Differentiating Between Different Engineering Industries
Since I've moved to and started working in the US I realize it may have been more a large company/small company difference but think there is still an element of truth.
I don't know if it's similar in Aus.
RE: Differentiating Between Different Engineering Industries
The reason I found is that they cannot weed people based on technical skills, ( most recruiters are similar to car or real estate agents) due to limited technical knowledge if any.
It is usually a sure bet if they can hook some guy from the same industry.
I had to replace agents number of times when I looked for people because they could not understand what we were looking for.
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