This National Careers Week, we spoke with Morgan Ellis a member of The Welding Institute and Welding and Materials Engineer.

Morgan shared insights into her role, how she entered the welding field, and shared insights into the skills that are valuable in welding and engineering, along with advice to help you decide whether these fields, and their many possible career pathways, might be the right fit for you.

Read the full interview to hear Morgan's stories and insights below:

Morgan Ellis AWeldI

Welding and Materials Engineer, Subsea 7

Can you tell us about your current job role and what a typical day looks like?

I am currently a welding and materials engineer for Subsea 7. They're a subsea engineering and construction company who design and install subsea components. Most of that is to support the offshore energy industry, working in both oil and gas and renewables.

My role is to work with our clients and our suppliers to make sure that we are procuring material that is safe, compliant with national and international standards and our client requirements. I'll then work with our fabricators who help build these items, so these could be pipelines or large structures that are going on the seabed, and I'll work with them to develop procedures and support them in producing these items.

Day-to-day, most of my time I am based in the office and I'll be working with multidisciplinary teams. We'll have a project team that'll be made-up of design engineers, project engineers, materials engineers, as well as quality and supply chain.

We'll work on long-term projects that can last anywhere from a few months to two years. From that, we'll take the design from concept phase all the way from manufacturing, fabrication to installation on the seabed. While my day-to-day is in the office, it does mean that I do get to go out on site and see these things being made. I've had some really good trips to Italy to see some forge masters, as well as spending a lot of time with one of our fabricators in Peterhead in north of Aberdeen to support them in fabricating our structures.

How did you get into the engineering and welding field?

After finishing my GCSEs, I went to college to do my A-levels where I did maths, physics and computing. I then went to university to do mechanical engineering. Whilst I was here, I did a year in industry where I worked as an operations intern and focused on project management.

When I left university, I didn't really know what I wanted to do and decided that I was going to go and work at a foundry as a quality technician. This was where I started to learn more about materials and decided that maybe I was more interested in the material side than the mechanical engineering side.

I then came to work with Subsea 7 and they've supported me through doing the TWI Welding Diploma, which I finished this year, which has really helped me transfer what I've learned as a mechanical engineer and build up my materials knowledge and helping to develop my skills as a materials and welding engineer.

What I would say is that everybody that I meet in engineering has a different story of how they got into engineering, whether that's through an apprenticeship, or something they found later in life. So I guess rather than focusing on ‘you need these grades’, I would say the main skills you would need is to be creative, be good at problem solving and being a good communicator. If you enjoy these things and you find that you're good at them, then that's maybe a bit more important than thinking I need to have this grade in maths or this grade in physics.

I would say that engineering is massive, it’s so broad. So if you find that you don't particularly like one area, that doesn't mean it's not for you. Don't rule it out. You could find something that is more your thing. So I think the biggest thing is, do what you enjoy. Find areas that you enjoy, it'll be much easier if you do. Also find courses that are tailored towards that. I think if you are looking at chartership and professional development, one of the key things is to make sure that the course that you're planning to do is accredited by the Engineering Council.

But other than that, just find what you enjoy and what sounds interesting to you.

What advice would you give to someone who is considering a career in engineering or welding?

I'd say the first thing is don't pigeonhole yourself, I did a mechanical engineering degree and I've since found that engineering is a big open world with many different opportunities. Find the things that you enjoy and if opportunities come up that take you away from what you thought your core discipline was, that's fine, go with it.

Also, professional bodies like the TWI can support you in identifying areas that you may be interested in. They work in many different areas and can introduce you to different areas of welding and materials that you didn't really know existed.

So I'd say keep it open, do what you're interested in and talk to people about their careers and how they've got into it and what they enjoy about it.

Also experience, on-site experience is always good. So if you ever get the chance to go and see things, go and see them up close, see them in person, do it because you can be designing things from behind a computer, but until you've seen it up close and personal, then you can't really fully wrap your head around it. So as much site time as possible.

Many thanks to Morgan for taking part and sharing valuable advice on the skills needed to enter the welding industry, and how to figure out whether it’s the right career for you!

Watch the full video interview here!

Discover more about National Careers Week: Welcome - National Careers Week

Read our National Careers Week news item and download our PowerPoint about career pathways into welding, engineering and NDT!