In my business group there were 13 engineers with various titles and roles. 9 of the 13 were outright cut and 1 left to another business leaving 3. We’ll see if my workload changes…..
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Sad to see such state of MTEs
heard they are going to announce the APAC MTE layoff next week. not a good way to collect your May salary
Sorry you had that experience. I’ve only ever worked with really strong MTEs and it saddens me the group isn’t valued more but seems like no one is valuesd these days unless you’re C-suite.
Yea CBG
Yeah I know the “Intent” of the MTE is to be experts to bridge the gap between St. Paul labs and the plants. Years ago when the MTE’s were “experts” this made sense. Nowadays here is the reality. College kid cuts his teeth in the plant for a few years, struggles to get to a T3. Then immediately goes to emerald city (or better yet working remotely from wherever). Gets to a T4 or higher within a year or two now they are an expert. The empty desks of St. Paul are littered with the nameplates of these faceless experts never to be seen again.
Regarding the previous post expressing confusion over Gibbons' decisions, I thought it might be helpful to consult with the internet for some insight into gibbon's behavior. Two things were notable:
(1) "...[gibbons] are strongly territorial, and defend their boundaries with vigorous visual and vocal displays". I believe this may be referring to some of the posturing we have observed in forums like our Townhalls.
(2) "...there are no documented cases of gibbons exhibiting true tool-use." I have come to believe that this means that there is virtually no understanding of the practical side of how 3M makes products in our factories.
What are the chances 3M will survive long enough for our gibbon to evolve into a more intelligent, sensible, and compassionate being?
We have a scale-up and execution problem at 3M, one that will get worse in succeeding months. A good MT engineer lives at the intersection of application and technology. They understand the more fundamental aspects of the processes and products they are involved with, as well as the nuts and bolts of how things happen in a real factory environment.
Being able to translate between the different worlds is critical, and Gibbons' attempts to decimate these groups is beyond baffling.
I don't know about hardest working is true, but in my journey they have been some of the best performing groups in the company. They have been spread far too thin for at least 10 years.
Layoffs to them will directly impact productivity in a big negative way. MT would be literally at the very bottom of my list of groups needing a cut.
Whats insane is who thought its a good idea to get rid off potentially hardest working technical team in the company. MTEs is almost always the first person of contact for pretty much any product and process quality issues. Who are project leaders for product oriented issues and support? Lab already got other stuff to do, and now they will be told by non-technical sourcing team to qualify new inputs or dual source? Insanity.
Heard CBG MTE team is reduce by half? Under Werners team. Donno true or not.
Which group was that? CBG?
Is this the FMS MTE group, plant or division?
Where was this done?
Manufacturing Technology Engineers - key folks for new product and new technology scale-up in the plants. So either the lab needs to pickup the slack or we just don’t do it, because it won’t get picked up by plant process engineers and Division Engineering is collective Dead Man Walking.
What is MTE short for? Maintenance engineers? Given 3M no longer does any maintenance and lets things fall apart, no more need for engineers. Right, tireman?
Some times the survivors are the ultimate losers in this nasty situation.