Gratitude

Inspired by a writer on the topic of gratitude, I thought that I am going to share some too in my career journey!

Some of you knew that I was laid off by Medtronic during their workforce reduction last year, I was being asked multiple times if it was a mistake to join Medtronic and if I would rejoin Amazon.

I said I never regretted to leave Amazon in 2017 to join Medtronic. I learnt something new even it is a bit less than 2 years. I know the colleagues I met and the lives I impacted. They are meaningful, and that I have a very different perspective in life after working in a healthcare industry.

I never enter a lab with bunny suit nor really know what my husband did even I knew he had a patent in electromagnetic micro valves when I met him in Georgia Tech. It was those years in Medtronic that I really appreciated him as a designer in medical devices. He said that Wendy, you need to appreciate the technology in the APF if you wanted to be a good industrial engineer in this field. He took his electronic packaging book and taught me about lithography, and what it meant for positive photoresist and negative photoresist. I told you that I never admire my husband that much until I worked inside Medtronic.

He is just a natural born designer. We went to vacation in Las Vegas, and he would suddenly tell me about a footwear to measure people heart beat, and different things to track their health, and seriously took a napkin and started to draw those layers of circuits that I won't able to appreciate until I saw the structure in the microscope.

I was super proud of my heijunka design in the photo department because I realize if I can fix and control my takt at this bottleneck in the various layers, and set up a system to drive scheduling, I would reduce leadtime and make defect very visible. As I built the system with the operators, I can tell they see what I meant by visual management even they get used to electronic tracking. I made it very easy for a laymen to see which layer we are working on, and which product I have problems and need escalation. The waterspider asked me one day if this is what you did in Amazon, I said yes, I was there to coach people how to see waste, and how to see it from the customer perspective and drive lean. They was shocked that an IE can apply their skills despite of their industry since they do not see anything after they work so long in Intel or Medtronic. I said that is why I like to be an IE, and that's why I am hired as a new eye to help ramping up production. I told them I learnt a lot about FDA, and its challenge to drive lean with that quality regulations which takes a lot of paper work.

Long story short, our LinQ II did not get FDA approved last May, it was actually delayed by a full year, and you can see why we need workforce reduction if your product cannot be released in time. But I learned something new during my layoff. It was my first time getting 2.5 months paid with insurance, and they give you a company to help you to search for next job. I never knew what LHH is before, and I found they are super helpful in helping people in resume, interviewing and asking us good question of what we wanted in our career. I was just impressed how they asked me why I liked healthcare industry and am I sure I don't want to go back to .com and logistics industry with my expertise in Amazon for over 9.5 years.

So I decide to enjoy my time off, and see what opened to me. I got 2 offers in early July and I got a pending final interview with Mayo Clinic in mid July. I accepted my GEODIS offer, and asked God if he wanted me to go for healthcare industry or logistics industry. After my interview on site with Mayo, I prayed to God to choose for me. I said that if you wanted me to go back to logistics world, please close the job in Mayo as their senior health systems engineer. This was exactly what the Lord did, and I found the peace and joy to join GEODIS last August after my girl started her second grade.

Time passed. I could not tell you how much God blessed me in this France based third party logistics company. Not only I got to use all my skills from Amazon, it widened my engineering skills into design and city permit which I had no idea. The things touched me most is that they care for their employee's lives and job. We are to support first the safety, before GEODIS business and then the customer business. I did not know that that means initially until I am assigned a whole batch of work like COVD 19 assessment, workplace barrier design, sanitization strategy or reserach since April. Our CI team is just like a research scientist checking what chemicals will work to protect our hourly employee who are risking their lives to pick, pack and ship products to our customers.

I realized how narrow minded I was. Healthcare industry and logistics are both helping vulnerable people, we are both saving lives in different means. We are making sure the trailer is emptied in case the next one is to ship medical supplies. We are shipping the hand sanitizer and hand soap which are selling like crazy after the pandemic. Our customer Bath and Body Works shipped us 4 pallets of mask in April thanking us to keep their business while their Retail stores closed. I did not know we are that important to people lives. I wonder if it was not the layoff, will I ever go back to this field of logistics industry which I actually love? I was just tired of the long hours at Amazon after 9.5 years. It made you feel you never worked enough, and you never able to catch up the latest technology. I just needed a break and slowed down to see life are more than working. I don't hate this field at all. I love it like crazy. It just reminded me all the process improvement and the software testing I did, which I truly enjoyed. And I am working in a warehouse that smelled the best, and I can touch the BBWD product that is only sold online, and knew what it smelled like before I ordered it.

So with the choice to choose again, I would still join Medtronic in 2017. That learning and experience was just precious, and I won't be where I am here if I did not make the move. Thank you Jesus. You make every life experience a positive one! Without my experience in Amazon, I won't get the job in Medtronic and Geodis. Without my experience in Medtronic, I won't appreciate my husband's talents as much and see lives the way I am now, and really have the passion /skill to journal with people who suffered. Now I can really understand what is meant to lose a job even it is unrelated to you. Thank you Amazon and Medtronic for all the opportunities and the friendship you have given me. You are always in my hearts. I wish you all the best as I still have a lot of your shares in my 401K. Continue to obsess our customer with the largest selection, fastest delivery and help improve our patients' quality. I will continue to be a loyal Amazon customers, and hope that I never have to use any medical devices from Medtronic :)

#gratitude #Amazon #Medtronic #Geodis