Accendo Reliability

Your Reliability Engineering Professional Development Site

  • Home
  • About
    • Contributors
  • Reliability.fm
    • Speaking Of Reliability
    • Rooted in Reliability: The Plant Performance Podcast
    • Quality during Design
    • Critical Talks
    • Dare to Know
    • Maintenance Disrupted
    • Metal Conversations
    • The Leadership Connection
    • Practical Reliability Podcast
    • Reliability Matters
    • Reliability it Matters
    • Maintenance Mavericks Podcast
    • Women in Maintenance
    • Accendo Reliability Webinar Series
    • Asset Reliability @ Work
  • Articles
    • CRE Preparation Notes
    • on Leadership & Career
      • Advanced Engineering Culture
      • Engineering Leadership
      • Managing in the 2000s
      • Product Development and Process Improvement
    • on Maintenance Reliability
      • Aasan Asset Management
      • CMMS and Reliability
      • Conscious Asset
      • EAM & CMMS
      • Everyday RCM
      • History of Maintenance Management
      • Life Cycle Asset Management
      • Maintenance and Reliability
      • Maintenance Management
      • Plant Maintenance
      • Process Plant Reliability Engineering
      • ReliabilityXperience
      • RCM Blitz®
      • Rob’s Reliability Project
      • The Intelligent Transformer Blog
    • on Product Reliability
      • Accelerated Reliability
      • Achieving the Benefits of Reliability
      • Apex Ridge
      • Metals Engineering and Product Reliability
      • Musings on Reliability and Maintenance Topics
      • Product Validation
      • Reliability Engineering Insights
      • Reliability in Emerging Technology
    • on Risk & Safety
      • CERM® Risk Insights
      • Equipment Risk and Reliability in Downhole Applications
      • Operational Risk Process Safety
    • on Systems Thinking
      • Communicating with FINESSE
      • The RCA
    • on Tools & Techniques
      • Big Data & Analytics
      • Experimental Design for NPD
      • Innovative Thinking in Reliability and Durability
      • Inside and Beyond HALT
      • Inside FMEA
      • Integral Concepts
      • Learning from Failures
      • Progress in Field Reliability?
      • Reliability Engineering Using Python
      • Reliability Reflections
      • Testing 1 2 3
      • The Manufacturing Academy
  • eBooks
  • Resources
    • Accendo Authors
    • FMEA Resources
    • Feed Forward Publications
    • Openings
    • Books
    • Webinars
    • Journals
    • Higher Education
    • Podcasts
  • Courses
    • 14 Ways to Acquire Reliability Engineering Knowledge
    • Reliability Analysis Methods online course
    • Measurement System Assessment
    • SPC-Process Capability Course
    • Design of Experiments
    • Foundations of RCM online course
    • Quality during Design Journey
    • Reliability Engineering Statistics
    • Quality Engineering Statistics
    • An Introduction to Reliability Engineering
    • An Introduction to Quality Engineering
    • Process Capability Analysis course
    • Root Cause Analysis and the 8D Corrective Action Process course
    • Return on Investment online course
    • CRE Preparation Online Course
    • Quondam Courses
  • Webinars
    • Upcoming Live Events
  • Calendar
    • Call for Papers Listing
    • Upcoming Webinars
    • Webinar Calendar
  • Login
    • Member Home

by Fred Schenkelberg Leave a Comment

Success as a Reliability Engineer

Success as a Reliability Engineer

Whether by design or by accident some of us become reliability engineers. Making a career in reliability engineering relies on your ability to make a difference and to add value. Being successful as a reliability engineer, while creating reliable products, permits continuation and growth as a reliability professional.

Your career motivation may be intrinsic or extrinsic [1]. If you define success at work as

  • attaining a milestone or accomplishment,
  • working at the best of your abilities, and
  • satisfying a sense of curiosity,

then you are intrinsically motivated, whereas if you define success at work as

  • receiving a bonus or reward,
  • achieving honors and accolades, and
  • getting a promotion,

then you are extrinsically motivated. Of course, you may define success with some combination.

It is what you do and how you perform as a reliability engineer that leads to success however defined.

Add value to be successful

Reliability engineers may work as part of a team on a small portion of a project, or support an entire product development program, or be engaged across an entire organization. In each case, your success relies on your ability to make a difference and add value.

Much of the work of reliability engineering entails enabling design engineers and managers the ability to make informed decisions.

  • Is the product meeting the stated reliable goals?
  • What are the barriers and risks that would prevent the creation of a reliable product?
  • What is the best (cost-effective and informative) reliability tool to use?

Whether you are providing an estimate or performing a detailed failure analysis, if the results influence the decisions that alter the design of the product, then we have made a difference.

Results do matter

The results of reliability engineering are obvious when in the hands of customers. The product either works (is reliable) or does not.

Unfortunately, many of the tasks we perform with the development team are investments to discover design weaknesses or to estimate product life. During the development phase, these costs are large.

Being able to identify and articulate the value of these investments followed by reliable products builds our credibility.

It is the combination of providing useful information, recommending solutions or best practices, and achieving reliable products that together means you have added value.

My mentor and his successful career

One of the most successful reliability engineers I know led an organization through a decade-long warranty expense reduction program, authored papers and books on reliability engineering, volunteered in professional organizations and mentored hundreds of engineers and managers.

Talking to him about a year after retirement, I found him to be happy and proud of the accomplishments of those he helped train or motivate.

He set an example for me of a talented professional that selflessly gave his knowledge to those who asked (or needed) his advice. Moreover, he was happy with his career, he had made a difference.

Filed Under: Articles, Musings on Reliability and Maintenance Topics, on Product Reliability Tagged With: professional development, value

« Why Wait for Field Returns?
Failure Modes and Mechanisms »

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Article by Fred Schenkelberg
in the Musings series

Join Accendo

Receive information and updates about articles and many other resources offered by Accendo Reliability by becoming a member.

It’s free and only takes a minute.

Join Today

Recent Articles

  • Risk Prioritization in FMEA – a Summary
  • What Are Best Practices for Facilitating Qualitative Assessments?
  • So, What’s Still Wrong with Maintenance
  • Foundation of Great Project Outcomes – Structures
  • What is the Difference Between Quality Assurance and Quality Control?

© 2023 FMS Reliability · Privacy Policy · Terms of Service · Cookies Policy

This site uses cookies to give you a better experience, analyze site traffic, and gain insight to products or offers that may interest you. By continuing, you consent to the use of cookies. Learn how we use cookies, how they work, and how to set your browser preferences by reading our Cookies Policy.