Interview Assessment

 

Name: Marco Garcia

 

Work: Mechanical Engineer at Frito Lay

 

Date: 11/17/2017

 

Assessment:

 

    Marco Garcia is a mechanical engineer at Frito Lay. He works a similar job to one of the other people I interviewed, Allen Fosha. Mr. Garcia works on the robotic side of the packing part of Frito Lay. He is constantly building and designing new and better products that will improve the packing of Frito Lay. Mr. Garcia had been doing a lot of work with robotics and design in the recent years. He started out working for Frito Lay, where he would oversee the manufacturing of a wide range of STEM, science technology engineering math, projects. After this he relocated to a different company, which is when he switched from manufacturing to design. He then came back to Frito Lay because the company was wanting him to move to Germany. He told me that Germany has fantastic engineering minds, but was not the right move for his family. Now Mr. Garcia is designing robots to so some of the packaging for Frito Lay. One of the very interesting things he talked to me about was the fact that he had mentored an ISM student before along with the fact that he mentors student at Southern Methodist University, or SMU. I asked him what he does during a typical mentor visit and he said that he wants to cater to the needs of the person he is mentoring. He told me that he plans for what they want to talk about next and even try to get them into some meeting and presentations. This was great to hear because if I was going to choose Mr. Garcia as my mentor I know that I will be getting taught great lessons and would be able to go out and experience real world projects. My meeting with Mr. Garcia was not very long, but I was able to get some very valuable information out of my interview. One of the main points he ended with was when I am going on an interview or going on a mentor visit, I should have a topic to focus on, whether it is something you want to know more about or something you know nothing about. This was a very great point because if you talk to your mentor before you meet with them, and tell them what you want to talk about, you will be able to have a much more informative discussion. I was very glad that I was able to talk to Mr. Garcia because it allowed me to talk to someone who has been a mentor in the past. I was able to get a glimpse into the part of ISM after we choose our mentor, which has taken the nerves out of thinking about it.

 

All in all, Mr. Garcia was a great resource into the world of engineering and mentorship because he has been a part of both in his professional career. Mr. Garcia would be a great mentor because he has worked in many different engineering practices and has been a part of ISM in the past. He also mentors college students so the college students could be another resource that I could be able to talk to if needed.