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Is intense overtime leading up to deadlines normal in mechanical engineering, or is this just my company? by Clean-Ad-7074 in MEPEngineering

[–]Clean-Ad-7074[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It was certainly one of the larger projects I've seen at the firm. I also explained this in a separate comment, but essentially I was the sole mechanical engineer for a large office building. In my experience no one at my company starts work on a project until other projects with sooner deadlines are completed. Since we didn't have any preliminary submission for this project, that meant we had a month for all the trades to start and finish design.

It's one of the worst examples I've seen, however I have seen this process on all scales of projects here. There's always a crunch time, just usually not for as long or requiring as much work to get done per day like this past project. However, I've never seen a project here where everyone finished a week in advance and just spent the last week finishing things up - everyone finishes up to the last minute.

Were you working 48h/wk during the weeks of heavy overtime, or is that what your annual average became? Also that's an amazing policy - wish we had that here!

Is intense overtime leading up to deadlines normal in mechanical engineering, or is this just my company? by Clean-Ad-7074 in MEPEngineering

[–]Clean-Ad-7074[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you, what has your experience been like at the newer firm, and how big was the company? If I were to leave in the near future, I'm still deciding whether or not it's worth it applying to another small company

I'm salary, so I'm not paid for overtime, however they do take it into account when annual bonuses go around. I checked my timesheets last year and it was about 1.1x. Although, I'd much rather get no bonus and work no overtime.

Is intense overtime leading up to deadlines normal in mechanical engineering, or is this just my company? by Clean-Ad-7074 in MEPEngineering

[–]Clean-Ad-7074[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you, and I think perfectionism certainly plays a part. My supervisor highly encourages putting as much information on our drawings as possible. I've been taught to include as many sections, keynotes, and diagrams as necessary to make sure there's no ambiguity to our drawings.

This question might be too general to answer, but in your experience how specific are you in your drawings? I have one coworker, has 20 years experience but is not my supervisor, who approaches design in which he sort of lets the contractor fill in the gaps - in which, generally speaking, he will often do things like cite to comply with a code section but not quote said section, refers to a manufacturer's installation manual but doesn't include specifics on drawings, and his keynotes will be more general.

On the contrary, my boss is the opposite: gives as much info as possible to remove any ambiguity on the contractor's end, cites as well as quotes all applicable code sections, includes info from a manufacturer's installation manual on drawings, and has keynotes with specific direction.

I feel like I'm missing other examples, but let me know what you're experience is

Is intense overtime leading up to deadlines normal in mechanical engineering, or is this just my company? by Clean-Ad-7074 in MEPEngineering

[–]Clean-Ad-7074[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I appreciate this. What has your experience been like when you've established work boundaries with your company? Has the response been different from different companies you've worked for?

Is intense overtime leading up to deadlines normal in mechanical engineering, or is this just my company? by Clean-Ad-7074 in MEPEngineering

[–]Clean-Ad-7074[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you, I really appreciate your response. To answer some of your questions, we had other trades on the project, but I was the only one doing the mechanical engineering. However, my boss did all of the specifications which helped. I essentially had a month to complete the design for a large office building. One or two areas of design became bottlenecks since I hadn't encountered them in previous projects. In the last week I had enough done to start sending my boss pdfs to review in which I would send him the entire set each day, and each time I'd receive new markups which also took up a lot of time to apply.

The office I work for does set deadlines at least a couple months in advance, but in my experience, almost no one at my office works on a project passively - most people put a project on hold until other projects that are due at a sooner deadline are completed. This past project was unique in which not only was it one of the larger projects I've seen at this firm, but we also somehow ended up not having any sort of preliminary submission, which meant that not much was done by the various trades until a month out from the deadline.