Maintenance engineers’ work involves the maintenance of machinery and equipment, as well as optimization of procedures, systems, infrastructures, and budgets for the purpose of improving reliability and maintainability. Maintenance engineers typically analyze the equipment maintenance structure, look into equipment and machinery failures, assess the needs for spare parts and equipment replacements, report safety hazards, and evaluate alternatives. Maintenance engineers are most frequently employed in the production, manufacturing or transport sector. They are responsible for designing maintenance methods and strategies, scheduling maintenance work, identifying problems, and managing maintenance equipment and tools.
Maintenance engineers must have a good knowledge of logistics, statistics, and probability, and an excellent understanding of how the machinery that they are working with operates. They need to have excellent diagnostic and problem solving skills, and be good at negotiation and business in general.Good interpersonal and management skills are always an asset, as maintenance engineers are typically responsible for defining the required skills for maintenance staff. They usually work with professionals from other areas, so good communication skills are essential, both for individual projects and jobs and for long-term success and career advancement. Excellent writing skills are a must for maintenance engineers, as they are responsible for providing written instructions for maintenance strategies, which help with commissioning and installation guidelines.