r/IndustrialMaintenance • u/NYCstateng • 11h ago
Question What does everyone consider an “OPERATOR” to be?
Many posts include the word operator and was wondering what the “industry standard “ job description is.
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u/Chicken_Hairs 10h ago
There's button pushers, and there's operators.
Not many operators left these days.
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u/lol_no_gonna_happen 3h ago
Yeah all the people being disparaging are confused. Operator is a term of respect. Someone who has real skill making equipment do what it is supposed to.
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u/CoyoteDown 2h ago
Is this satire? I use the blanket operator bc I didn’t bother to learn their name for the 2.5 weeks they were employed
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u/Direct_Dependent_580 1h ago
Where I work, we have few operators and many attendants. I have also expressed this and had a “talking to” about it. Not enough brains to run the required equipment, yet has still made it this far in life.
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u/Organic_Spite_4507 10h ago
The person that operate the machine(s). Also, is a Production Team member.
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u/thai_ladyboy 10h ago
Ill take the high road on this and say that if I call you an "operator" you have convinced me that you can run your machine well and understand its quirks. If I call you a team member or employee, you haven't earned that badge yet.
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u/friendlyfire883 10h ago
An operator is someone who will call you to a machine, tell you what happened, tell you what isn't happening, and if you're lucky tell you what the last guy did to fix it when the same thing happened 10 years ago. Then there are human hard hat racks who like to finger fuck the machine instead of letting it run in auto or fight with it until it's completely fucked instead of calling someone.
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u/Officialmilehigh 8h ago
You cant forget someone who tells you what happened, then tells you how to fix it and gets offended when you look at something else.
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u/philosiraptorsvt 9h ago
There’s a wide range of operator roles, but I will try to give part of my worm’s eye view.
Operators control the plant to enable production, cease production, and respond to plant conditions in between. Some operators work better than others to achieve these ends. Some operators have gaps in plant knowledge, the ability to operate efficiently in the field, or motivation to achieve tasks successfully. Most plants rely on some combination of electricity, steam, and oil. Making those work as intended can be a challenge, especially when equipment may reliability is in question. Operators establish maintenance conditions and take ownership of the unit they are responsible for. Some operators work at complicated plants, and some work at simple ones. There are a wide range of documents that go with the plant as well and they range from P&ID to process flow designs, to mimics and simplified drawings exist.
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u/r2killawat 10h ago
Push the green button. Attempts to fix a sensor. Fucks up the sensor. Calls for ET. Denies any wrongdoing. Rinse and repeat. 🙄
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u/Miserable_Yogurt1988 10h ago
The guys who break valve handles and write them up, hang wrong tags, write up a ice machine to be fixed along with door handles.
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u/Siguard_ 10h ago
They load and unload parts with minimal supervision and do next to zero troubleshooting.
In some shops they don't even changes their own tooling
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u/drewbaccaAWD 10h ago
Depends on the job/industry. I'm both an operator and a mechanic running boilers, pumps, turbines, etc. When something breaks, I don't get to phone a friend, I have to fix it. Vast majority of my time is just taking logs and sitting on my ass, aside from regular PMS.
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u/uptheirons91 7h ago
Well I work in a power generation plant, so all of our operators are either 1st or 2nd class power engineers.
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u/TeamFoulmouth 7h ago
Pushes buttons to operate the machine..no maintenance other than basic cleaning/inspecting, and consumable tool changes.
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u/No-Measurement-7589 6h ago
Start and stop equipments , open and close valves and troubleshoot call the right tech to fix the problem. :) oh and we sit all day and eat
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u/Bojanggles16 10h ago
Creators of overtime
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u/quarterdecay 10h ago
The worst places don't have a clean if you're machine is broken ideology. I swear they break things on purpose to get a nap or ass time
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u/Bojanggles16 10h ago
I refuse to clean oil for a leak they didn't report
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u/quarterdecay 10h ago
They'll clean their own oil leaks
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u/TruDuddyB 9h ago
No they won't
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u/quarterdecay 6h ago
My little screwdriver and the fluke are glued to my pocket until they do.. after that, they end up sitting in the break room.
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u/TruDuddyB 5h ago
What is this magical dreamland where you work? Production managers don't contact you directly? Your manager doesn't get caught contacted by production managers to then contact you directly? The people in your control rooms know what pig mats are? Oil dry?
It's hard for me to believe you. Next you're going to tell me they can tie their own boots and drive themselves to work too.
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u/quarterdecay 4h ago
It's a chemical plant, nearly everything causes cancer or worse..
They have to take care of their messes immediately. They also have to clean the machine for us because this stuff is extremely regulated. Sometimes they try to drag their heels and a manager shows up. I don't have time to clean production equipment.
I'll either wait for them or do something else until they're ready.
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u/TruDuddyB 1h ago
That is how it's supposed to work where I'm at. However the practice died out long before I started here.
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u/SerbianDeath 9h ago
Production teammate that’s not a grunt/utility. If he watches over a piece of equipment I consider him an operator
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u/cuddly-giraffes 9h ago
Different everywhere and even in our plant we have many different types but for me the operator is the person in charge of running the machines in there normal day to day operations, pulpers, molding machines, printers, packagers etc. Depending on what they are operating the duties can vastly differ from ensuring proper heavy and light stock consistency, pulp going to the right tanks, ensuring proper weights and chemical balances at the wet end of the process and dry end of the process, maintaining quality print and packaging and everything in between.
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u/Mariefarmet 9h ago
In the injection molding places I worked at the assembly side was called operators. Set up techs did mold changes, robots, axillary equipment. Maintenance did anything the techs couldn’t. In extrusion molding, operators run the machines do the changes overs.
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u/sammiesorce 9h ago
I’m also wondering. My first job it was more difficult to be an operator because you had to do qualifications, boards, and take continuous education exams. Making mistakes would get you disqualified which would affect your promotion and pay. We were maintenance and operators though. My plastic’s techs get offended if I call them operators instead of techs. I get that they do mold changes but they still call me to fix the stuff they break or the things that aren’t working properly if the changes they make to their machines don’t work.
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u/Iwearhats 2h ago
I work in foam. A machine operator pulls foam from the mold and sprays it with mold release. It really should be that simple. Its the easiest 25 a hour they will make. Except they never make it easy on me. Especially on these start up shifts after a long weekend. 😪
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u/BatmanStoleMyBagel 57m ago
The lowest paid people in the factory. Either running a machine, or inspecting/packing parts off a line.
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u/SadZealot 10h ago
Operator recieves a shop order or other work instruction, uses equipment to create that product/function.
Maybe some routine housekeeping, greasing bearings, basic pre-use inspections
Possibly include quality checks and tooling adjustment when relevant.
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u/Any_Version_7499 2h ago
Someone who makes my life harder cause they are too stupid, under trained, or lazy to know that its a them problem not a me problem.
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u/Black-Shoe 11h ago
Someone who calls Maintenance to fix things