Hello, Alto and Martin. Please tell us about yourselves and your team.
Alto: Hi. My name is Alto. I’m the manager of the Automation Maintenance team at the Anseong 8 center, located in Anseong, Gyeonggi-do. I’ve been on the team for seven years now since I joined in 2017.
The Automation organization consists of three teams: the Automation Maintenance team, which is responsible for the automation equipment; the Vehicle Equipment Management (VEM) team, which manages the special equipment; and the Facility Management team, which oversees the fulfillment center’s utilities. I’m on the Automation Maintenance team.
The Automation Maintenance team directly manages and maintains various pieces of automation equipment that are installed in the fulfillment center: to name a few, the sorter, which sorts products; the AGV and the AMR, which are bots that carry products around; the auto-labeler, the auto-bagger, the robot arm, and the general conveyor. The team also introduces new equipment and makes improvements to enhance the work efficiency and improve the productivity of on-site workers, all of which ultimately are to achieve one of Coupang’s goals: “Wow the Customer.”
Martin: Hi. I’m Martin. I joined in 2016 and was on the Automation Maintenance team as an automation equipment maintenance engineer until last year. This year, I’m on the VEM team of the Automation organization, managing special vehicles.
My current job, more specifically, is managing the fulfillment center’s forklifts. I handle the transfers of forklifts such as their deployments and returns, conduct maintenance and implement improvements to make sure the employees can operate forklifts safely.
What were your previous jobs and how did you come to join Coupang Fulfillment Services (CFS)?
Alto: I majored in fire protection engineering and worked in fire protection system management for about three years. For the last year of those three years, I worked at Coupang Deokpyeong Center, where the company I worked for at that time was a partner company. I was preparing to switch to a different fire protection-related job, and I got to see Coupang’s automated facility by chance. Seeing the equipment whose maneuvers were being controlled automatically was an eye-opening experience since I had only seen fire protection-related equipment. I didn’t know Coupang that well, but I figured that if I specialized and made my career in the automation field, I’d be able to work until I was 60 to 70 years old. I also thought I’d make it since I had always been interested in machinery, although the field might have been different. So, I took a leap of faith into automation and decided to join CFS.
Martin: I worked for a company that manufactured cell phone parts before I joined CFS. I was in China before I joined CFS. Even though I was in China, I knew that lots of changes were happening in Korea. Many e-commerce companies were starting up then. Coupang’s rapid growth and large-scale recruitment caught my attention, making me wonder what kind of company Coupang was to expand its business so aggressively and what sets it apart. So, I took the shot and luckily, I got in.
Alto from Automation
What capabilities are needed to work as an automation equipment maintenance engineer?
Alto: You must be diligent and responsible for the job. Maintenance work is constantly needed every day, week, month, and quarter. You must be earnest as the work basically repeats itself every year. You also need to have a high interest in your line of work and be willing to dive deeper as much as you can, since you need to keep yourself up to date regarding your center's automation equipment and investigate and troubleshoot problems that occur.
Martin: You must have a general understanding of blueprints and drawings of machinery, electricity layout, etc. Having experience in maintaining equipment, even indirectly, might also be important. Being familiar with basic indicators such as MTTR and MTBF and experienced in analyzing and improving the indicators are essential for a maintenance engineer. It’s even better if you have experience in managing standard operating procedures and spares, or have licenses related to PLC, machinery, and electricity. Even if you don’t have direct experience in maintenance, you can learn as you go if you know the basics.
What were your career paths after you joined CFS as automation equipment maintenance engineers?
Alto: I got to actually get my hands on the automation equipment after I joined CFS. My career-building started off with the basic conveyors. Moving up from there, I have handled and set up various kinds of automation equipment.
Martin: An automation equipment maintenance engineer of CFS gets to experience lots of different kinds of automation equipment. Coupang’s fulfillment centers are being continuously improved and are receiving heavy investments to keep on leading the market. So, you get the chance to see and handle new automation equipment and technologies early and to build a market-leading career at the market-leading company. For example, only a few companies in Korea use AGVs and you can see them practically only on foreign YouTube channels. But you can actually see AGVs here in our center, which is a thrilling experience for an engineer.
As engineers, you are required to work in shifts. What are the pros and cons of working in shifts?
Alto: I worked in shifts for about four years here. The pros are: Since the day and night shifts schedule is set in advance, you can arrange your personal schedule according to it. I can take care of things that need to be done during daytime, such as banking and medical appointments, when I work night shifts. Second is that you get extra pay for working in shifts, and this is a significant merit. When I worked night shifts during my early days in the company, I enjoyed it since I liked the atmosphere of early mornings and felt it somewhat romantic to work when other people were still asleep.
Working night shifts might be difficult at first for people who aren’t good at managing bedtimes, though.
Martin: The purpose of working in shifts is to have engineers present while the automated facility is in operation. While keeping that purpose unhindered, we do our best to take our team members’ opinions into account when scheduling shifts, which is why even off-days can be rearranged. Each person prefers a different type of shift and since the work differs between the day and the night shifts, some people prefer night shifts.
Both of you have been working for the company for quite some time. What are the reasons that made staying with the company for so long possible?
Martin: The most prevalent reason would be pride. I get a sense of accomplishment seeing the company grow. For instance, when a new fulfillment center is opened, the existing Automation team members are sent to stabilize the center’s operations. Once you successfully manage that, you feel a great sense of achievement afterward as you watch the bustling center in operation. Another thing is that CFS facilities are distinctive compared to those of other companies. All lines of a CFS facility are organically interconnected like train cars, whereas for other companies, each equipment is operated independently. So, you must be highly responsible since one piece of equipment going down affects the whole line, but the sense of accomplishment as an engineer is even greater when you achieve the target by maintaining the equipment well to prevent malfunctions. You can have that kind of experience only here in CFS, and that’s probably the reason that has been a major driving factor.
When do you feel proud to be automation equipment maintenance engineers of CFS?
Martin: I’ve subscribed to Coupang’s Wow membership and shop on Coupang quite often. It’s still surprising to see the product I ordered in the morning arrive in the evening on the same day. Since I know the process that the product goes through from the order stage to the delivery and that the automation engineers put lots of effort into the process, I feel thankful and proud every time I receive the product I ordered.
Alto: I feel proud when I see news about Coupang, especially when the news is about high-tech automation equipment such as the AGV. The fact that I’m managing such equipment myself for a company that is leading and changing the logistics industry is truly uplifting. And when I participate in an automation project that is set up to benchmark and globally implement a successful case of automation application of CFS, I feel we really do “Wow the Customer.”
What are some of the most special and memorable moments in your career?
Martin: About eight years ago, when I was still fresh into the company, the fulfillment center was short-handed on packaging during the Chuseok season, when the order volume would be the largest. The organization director, who would be equivalent to the vice president of a conventional Korean company, came to work at night to do packaging with the employees. It was inspiring to see him leading and working disregarding his job level, and I do my best to be a leader like him.
Alto: Recently, I was making rounds at the facility, monitoring the equipment. Then I heard some sort of tapping noise coming from a certain section. The noise was new, so I took a closer look and found out that one of the parts had a fracture. I immediately replaced the part and was able to stop a critical malfunction from happening. The part wasn’t under monitoring since it wasn’t to be replaced yet, but I was able to find the issue while making the rounds and avert a severe accident in advance. If a piece of equipment stops, it may lead to a large-scale incident such as the whole center coming to a halt, so the team members and I are setting up more well-thought-out plans to prevent such issues more preemptively.
Alto and Martin in the interview
How is the organizational culture of CFS?
Martin: What’s great about the organizational culture of CFS is its flexibility. You might think since the team handles machinery and there are mostly men and engineering graduates, the culture would be strictly hierarchical, but it really isn’t. You can always say it if you have a project that you want to participate in or an idea for improvement, and you will be given the chance to do your part.
You can always say what you have to say about things that are related to work other than maintenance. We exchange opinions freely, even trivial ones, and we’ve had more than several cases where those trivial opinions led to good results. This makes me even more proud of the organizational culture of CFS.
Alto: I couldn’t agree more with Martin. The organizational culture of CFS is like being in a sandbox where you’re given as much freedom as possible within the boundaries. Opinions are not overlooked and well-accepted. The overall atmosphere is positive as cooperation with other related organizations is conducted smoothly, and the team members look after one another and have each other’s back.
What were the parts of your job interviews that seemed differentiated from other companies?
Martin: I remember my job interview to have been very positive. The Q&A part was like having a casual conversation, which showed that the organizational culture of CFS isn’t rigid. The recruitment process taking the candidate’s schedule into account as much as possible was another candidate-friendly aspect.
Alto: You go through three online one-on-one interviews after you pass the phone call interview. For me, each of the three one-on-one interviews was an opportunity to give some thoughts to the answers that I would give and improve them. There was this one question that came out in every interview. I think it must have been an important one for the interviewers. I wasn’t very satisfied with my answer in the first interview, but I had the chance to reflect on it even for a short time since there were three interviews in total. Thanks to that, I was able to provide a better answer in the next interview when I was asked a similar question, by having improved on the previous interview.
Of course, since each interviewer also had a different set of questions to assess various aspects, I could see how elaborate and advanced the candidate evaluation process of CFS was.
What are your professional or personal goals that you wish to achieve in CFS?
Martin: Although CFS was late to the party, it has now become the leading company in the industry, and the company is constantly growing.
Looking at the automation side, the company keeps on introducing new state-of-the-art equipment and improving equipment maintenance and operation. And with the company conducting automation projects as the business has expanded to Taiwan, we have been able to do maintenance work and projects whose boundaries keep being widened beyond Korea. This sort of company’s growth definitely has positive effects on me, who works on site.
I wish to move forward along with the company’s growth and not fall behind as I develop my technical capability by constantly learning about new equipment.
What advice would you like to give to people going for the automation equipment maintenance engineer job?
Alto: First, you need to do some research about the job and know why you want it and what your goals are. Since the job of the Automation Maintenance team requires you to be able to project your technical capability as an engineer to areas other than equipment maintenance and management, it’s also important to have majored in mechanics, electronics or electricity, or to have work experience in these fields and engage in various projects and instances. It also helps to acquire Craftmanship certification, or a license related to the job, and diligently strengthen your technical capability to keep up with the advancing technology. Having your own stories that tell how accountable, enduring, and prudent you are might also help.
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