Fiona Vick

"Coordinator really fits with my job. I work alone a lot of the & jobs come straight to myself from various sources and departments so I must coordinate and be organised to when & how I should do these jobs, prioritising the urgent ones! I need to provide and deliver what people have asked me to do. I have to work well with others as I work with so many different departments. I always have to be willing to help and be patient. All my work has to be done to a high standard and on time. Influencer – When I’m asked to complete jobs, I need to explain what’s required so that they understand what has to be done and how long this may take. I have to be very good with the details and keep extensive records. I have to find out a lot of information when I’m completing work, for example if we have a buoy light failure, I need to access many sources of information, location of buoy (Latitude and Longitude co-ordinates), type & make of light fitted, batteries and solar panels fitted, what character the light flashes too, what colour the light is, how many nautical miles the light needs to be seen at sea, & history of the buoy installation, before I can prepare new equipment to be sent to the failure. Sometimes things don’t always go to plan in my job with equipment and maintenance, so there has to be thinking outside the box, I always have to be through and reliable, as I am the only person in my role within the company, so I need to make sure I can be relied upon. Manager – I must keep myself motivated, especially when I’m managing my own work and time a lot. I hope this keeps the rest of the team I work with motivated & they understand what my role involves. My role always has to be adaptable, as I do many things from sourcing parts and equipment, to fixing broken and damaged equipment, and many other things in between. I’m always eager to listen and have discussion about work and better way that maybe we can do things. I especially like to organise and plan. "

"The main things I do are work on Navigational Lights, LEDs, Filament lamps, AIS ( Automatic Identification Systems ) Radar Beacons, Solar Panels and Batteries (Ni-CAD, NiMH and Lead Acid). All equipment to be installed on lighthouses and buoys come through the workshop I work in first to be tested for functionality and any faults. So I get to work on a large variety of equipment which I enjoy hugely, as every day is different and I’m always getting to learn new things and being able to share what I have learnt with the rest of the team is great, we have a great team of technicians at the lighthouse board, and also all the support teams are really helpful and it works really well allowing us to get on with the work we need to complete. The outcomes of my work are to keep the navigation aids working, so we need to have working lights, battery banks, solar panels, generators, lights, radar beacons and monitoring equipment so we can see that everything is working correctly. The most enjoyable parts of my job are knowing that equipment is working correctly and the lights are on! Working as part of a bigger team and being appreciated for all the help I gave to all the other departments. I have worked at the Northern Lighthouse Board for 14 years and I absolutely love my job and knowing the difference I’m making. I love to help people. Working for the Lighthouse board also enabled me to keep working full time in engineering when I had my family they fully supported me with maternity leave and flexibility , they have a great family friendly policy and its enabled me to stay working full time while raising a family."

"As a teenager I loved cars. My dad loved to fix things and make everything he could. I loved to help and watch him work. I started my career training to be an accounts technician in an accounting firm when I was 16. I knew I loved numbers but I also loved cars & knowing how things worked! It was hard to decide when I left school what to do, after 18 months I decided that I needed to try & look for an apprenticeship. I wanted to be a car mechanic, but I couldn’t find an apprenticeship doing that. My Dad worked at the local Power Station and told me there was an apprenticeship coming up and I should have a go and apply!I applied for an apprenticeship at Cruachan Power station as a technical trainee doing a multi skilled apprenticeship in engineering. It was the best move I ever made, as I got the job! I was the first female to work down the tunnel (underground power station, 1 kilometre underground) they even had to add a female toilet as there had never been need for one before. I loved it and it gave me such a good background & start in my engineering career.After my apprenticeship, I worked at the power station for a year, but there was no full time role for me, so when I left I couldn’t find another engineering job in my area as at that time there wasn’t many opportunities in the area, so luckily I had admin and accounts experience and worked in an office for a couple of years.I got back into engineering by taking a welder/fabricators job with a local aquaculture firm & soon after starting work with them progressed to fixing all their equipment & working as a plant fitter for them which I really enjoyed. It gave me much more experience & variety to my engineering knowledge. A good friend of mine had mentioned that he was applying for a technician’s job at the Lighthouse Board and they were looking for more technicians so I applied, and was delighted to get the job, that was 14 years ago and I have loved every minute of the job, the people and the lighthouse"

"In my spare time, I love to spend time with my kids, My daughter is 10 and helps out with RDA Carriage driving and rides horses, she spends most of her time at the stables or at Pony Club, My son who is 7 loves football and golf so we try to keep him active as possible with these sports. We love to walk our dog and enjoy the countryside near our home. We are currently building our home and have been living in a caravan for over a year now, it’s been an experience, some of it good and some bad! I’m also a STEM Ambassador and enjoy helping out the local schools and groups, the Lighthouse Board have really helped me with being able to have groups and kids visit work and show them what I do. I also love old technology and collect singer sewing machines from the early 1900’s I’m not so good at the sewing part but I’m learning! I also still have a huge love for cars! We have a few classic cars and I would love to get more! Before we had children we would spend every weekend at car shows, rallies or anything car related! Myself and my husband even got married on the way to a car show and visited the M SPORT rally team workshops straight after the wedding service. We then did a tour of the Lake District with the wedding ribbons on our car with 180 other classic cars this was out honeymoon! "

"My typical day will start with checking for outages/failures as these are the most important jobs. A typical day completing an outage would be:Speak to the engineer on call & find out what the possible failure would be & what equipment I would need to prepare. I find out from our engineering database which equipment is fitted & find a replacement in our critical spares which is held in the workshop I work in. I would then open a work order detailing what is needed to be done, this will store all the work I have completed on this job in our engineering database. I can then need to find out the navigational needs for that particular station so range of light (nautical miles it needs to flash to) what the flash character is (there is hundreds of different ways a navigational light can flash this helps the mariner know exactly where they are when at sea). I can set up the equipment & as I go along with the setting up, I complete a configuration sheet and keep records with photos when needed. I will set up and test the equipment that’s needed to make sure it’s working correctly. Once it’s all prepared, I would contact the engineers again and we can see the quickest way to get it to the outage, weather that is by road, sea or with our helicopter. The aim is to get the outage fixed as quickly as possible to keep everyone safe at sea - if we have a lighthouse or buoy not working this can have a devastating effect if a ship were to crash into rocks. On days without any outages, I could be catching up on emails checking for other work requests, ordering spares and tools for the workshop, as I must also keep this fully stocked for visiting technicians to be able to use the facilities.The most important parts of my day are to keep accurate & up to date records of everything I’m doing. This helps everyone know exactly what’s fitted & working on lighthouses & buoys. We have 206 Lighthouses & over 170 Navigation buoys all can have different equipment installed."

"•\tHNC & SVQ Level 3 in maintaining electricity generation systems•\tNC & SVQ level 2 in engineering manufacture •\tModern apprenticeship completed in maintaining electricity generation systems (mechanical, electrical, instrument and control )•\tABF maintenance and servicing, polyethylene welding and fabrication.•\tAbrasive wheels and disc cutting.•\tRigging and slinging.•\tCounterbalance forklift truck license •\tDangerous Goods By Air Sea and Road "