This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Q: Walk me through your typical workday.

A: The first thing I do is check emails. I review all my emails and check to see if sales has requested anything for the customer or if there are revisions that need to be done. [Then] I make a list of all tasks that I need to get done and I start making drawing revisions. I [also] review our dashboard and see if we need any new draft drawings. Then after lunch I start on designs.

Later in the afternoon I review drawings I’ve created. Asking myself, can components on the drawing be gamma irradiated? Is this good for the customers’ PSI and sterility requirements, that kind of thing? Just ensuring that it meets the customer standards.

My typical workday changes every day; I’m never doing quite the same thing. Sometimes it’s difficult to answer that question, because it’s always something fresh. It’s very cool.

Q: What brought you to pharmaceutical engineering?

A: I worked in a biomedical engineering lab, and we were making cell cultures and gene editing, like some of our CCG customers. That’s what led me to apply for this job [at CCG], to help design the [assemblies] our pharmaceutical customers are going to use.

Q: You recently celebrated your one-year anniversary with CCG. How would you describe your experience here so far?

A: It was stressful sometimes but rewarding. There’s a fast turnaround in industry, especially in our industry, working with pharmaceutical companies, because they’re on tight deadlines. It’s important for us to be very customer-facing, so when our sales ask us to complete designs, the designs must be quick and exact. That can look like double-checking each component’s documentation, pressure rating, etc. Engineers must be detail oriented, and that is what makes it stressful. The first year was a big learning curve in some ways. Luckily, my team is fantastic, and they truly understand when I need help and say, “Let me go ahead and try and tell her about my experience with something like this.” It’s nice to work on this team.

Q: What’s your favorite part about working with the customer?

A:  I have to say my favorite part is getting feedback from customers and trying to make it work. Sometimes that can be designing something in SolidWorks and printing it to make sure something’s going to function the way I want it to, or [to ensure] it’s going to fit. Sometimes it’s as simple as making a mockup. That’s the most fun part; figuring out how I can make this work for the customer, solving customer problems. That’s the most fun for me.

Q: Of our five CCG philosophies (Lead the Way, Look Long Term, Press Pause, Focus on the How & “How Can I Help?”), which one resonates with you the most?

“How can I help.” That’s definitely it. [One example] was a job coming through the clean room from kitting. The job was these [components] that are so painful to get on, because it’s this tiny piece of tubing and then you have to put the [component] over the tubing. They’re difficult for our clean room technicians to put on and they need extra hands, so a lot of our engineering team suited into the cleanroom to help. I think it’s very important to help coworkers out, because it helps the company which then helps the customer. So that really resonates [with me] and gives me purpose. It feels very personable.