Julie Thompson

"I am a bubbly, sociable person who loves meeting and working with new people. I love solving challenges and learning new things. I like to challenge myself and do stuff that scares me and from this I have learned a lot about myself. Engineers have to typically work with lots of different disciplines and understand technical information so problem solving, team working, and confidence are important."

"In my current role I am mostly office based and I support a manufacturing facility that makes pharmaceuticals. It's a highly regulated area so there is a lot of paperwork and strict ways to do things. My role covers a lot of different things like projects where I may specify, select, and supervise installation and commissioning of some equipment, ensuring the equipment is properly maintained by managing maintenance engineers and contractors, providing technical support if there are issues on plant, upgrading equipment and making sure documentation is in order. I manage the site Environment, Health and Safety function so am responsible for ensuring we have sufficient procedures and processes in place to keep everyone safe and the environment protected. This involves a lot of understanding of EHS laws and has been a very steep learning curve. I sit on the management team where I'm involved in decision making for the site and what direction we are going in. We are a small site so I get exposure to a lot of different stuff and I have to keep learning lots."

"I went to school in Aberdeen and studied higher Maths, English, Chemistry and Physics. I started at Heriot Watt university in Edinburgh in 1998 where I did a Masters of Engineering (MEng) in Chemical Engineering with Pharmaceutical Chemistry. I did 3 summer placements during my time there, first one in pharma then 2 in the oil industry and from that I decided I wanted to work in pharma. I graduated in 2003 and moved to Kent to work at Pfizer, a pharmaceutical company. This was a massive site with about 6000 employees. I started off in the engineering department looking after facilities to ensure they were performing correctly and then I moved onto a £86m project to bring a new dry powder inhaler to the site. I was responsible for specifying (with input from other departments), ordering, liaising with suppliers, supervising installation of equipment and then testing and commissioning and closing out any issues before training operations staff and handing it over. I had to write lots of technical documents and perform physical testing on the equipment to ensure it met our specifications. I spent a few years travelling a lot to do this and visiting factories all over the world. When this project was finished (it took several years) I then moved to the solid dosage form (tablets, capsules etc) manufacturing group and sat in their technical support group. This involved managing purchase of new equipment, upgrades of existing equipment, attending breakdowns to help troubleshoot and get equipment back on line, working with suppliers and service engineers, projects to reduce operator exposure to products and working with many departments to ensure the plant was operating as required. I worked with Pfizer for 9 years and then moved to Northern Ireland to work as a project engineer. This role involved delivering projects to install new equipment and make factory improvements. I did this for 18 months and then took a year off to have my first son."

"With 2 small boys, William who is nearly 6 and Arlo who is 2, I don't get much time to myself anymore. I love spending time with them out in nature and we can often be found at the beach. I have recently taken up open water swimming and faced my fear and took a dip in the north Atlantic. I am now completely hooked and try to get in for a swim a couple of times a week. I'm also fulfilling a long lived desire to learn the cello and try to fit in a couple of practice sessions a week doing that. I am active in a fabulous community of fellow mums who provide breastfeeding and parenting support to others, something I've became very passionate about since having my boys. Ultimately though I spend my free time with my husband and sons."

"It is very hard to define a typical day as my job has always been so varied. I'm not someone who likes a lot of really routine work so it suits me really well. I could be writing a user requirement specification for a new piece of equipment (a document stating what we want the equipment to do), I could be writing a risk assessment on a process, I could be writing an emergency response plan and working with emergency services to ensure we have a plan if anything goes wrong, I could be reviewing reports or writing procedures, I could also be called to help fix a problem on site which may mean referring to technical manuals, working with maintenance engineers and equipment suppliers. I could be delivering training, or arranging a collection of hazardous waste, or doing a STEM event, or responding to emails or performing an audit. There is a lot of paperwork in my job and some time for filing too!! It really is a varied job."

"I obtained Higher Maths, Chemistry, Physics at A and English at B. I then received a MEng in Chemical Engineering with Pharmaceutical Chemistry with Merit in 2003. I obtained chartered engineer (CEng) status in 2010 and my NEBOSH certificate in occupational health and safety in 2015."