Forging
Futures

When I first started, I struggled for a week with the noise, the heat, and the repetitive tasks. Even my brother thought that I would not last long. But I stuck it out, learned the trade, and slowly moved my way up to become a hammer operator.

I love working with my hands, and in maintenance, we are always doing something different, so it never gets boring. Since I knew how the hammers functioned from my experience as an operator, it made it easier for me to repair them.

The first day being a Group Leader was a little scary, since now I had a small crew that reported to me and I was responsible for them! Teaching them what I knew and leading by example was not always easy. But I was used to doing the tasks, and now I got to show them how. It was a great experience.

Attending the meetings and being able to understand the priorities for the day and being able to schedule the crew around those priorities give me a sense of accomplishment, a sense that the Maintenance Department really does make a difference in the day-to-day operation of our company.

I started working here at ELLWOOD through a temp agency. After a few months of long, hot shifts in grinding, I knew I wanted to do more so when a new position opened up, I jumped at the opportunity.

After my first year at ELLWOOD, I was given the opportunity to learn how to use the large band saws, small lathes for billets, and a large carbide circular saw. This is when I also learned how to multi-task and run several machines at once.

Going into the machine shop was a great chance for me to put my skills to the test as well as to learn new ones such as operating the CNC mills and CNC programming. I was able to use my knowledge to help others work hard and improve their performance coming out of the machine shop. I also learned how to lead others while also focusing on safety.

After taking over this role in the plant, I was able to influence the mindset of the shop and improve product flow. Being able to sit in morning production meetings helped me get a better understanding of how our plant works together to get parts to our customers.

With the changing world towards automation, I was given a chance to learn how to program and work with our new machining robots. Being able to learn more and gain knowledge on something that will take us into the future really stoked my drive to help ELLWOOD become an even better company.