Our Spotlight on Super series highlights the SRC team members who help keep SRC a great a place to work and grow. For this installment, we sat down with Jennifer Mejia Rosas, a 2+ year SRC employee who was recently promoted to the position of first shift assembly lead at SRC’s Chaska division.
Jennifer also holds the distinction of being the first female assembly department lead at SRC’s Minnesota division.
Q: First off, where are you from? Where’s home?
JMR: I’m originally from El Salvador. I came to the US when I was 15. My mom brought us here and I’ve been living in Minnesota ever since.
Q: And what’s your role here at SRC and what’s involved in that position?
JMR: I’m the first shift assembly lead. It’s a lot different than in my other roles here. Before, my job was to perform a manufacturing step on a coil or do just one step in a process, and now it’s my job to make sure all the assembly team knows what they’re working on, who is going to be doing what, what our priorities are for that day, stuff like that. There’s a lot of problem solving day to day.
Q: Have you held any other roles during your time with the company?
JMR: I started as production associate in the assembly department. After a little while they asked to me be a trainer, too, and at the beginning of this year I switched to a quality inspector position. And, most recently, I took the role of assembly lead. It’s been about three weeks so far.
Q: Did you work in manufacturing before coming to SRC?
JMR: Nope. I didn’t even know how to read a tape measure! Before Super Radiator, I was working at a daycare, but the schedule was hard for me. I don’t like to work late, so my new schedule at SRC was a lot better for me. I come in at 6 and leave at 2:30, which is really nice. It gives me more time to take care of my family and that sort of thing.
Q: How did you come to work for SRC? What’s the story there?
JMR: My cousin worked here and told me that they were hiring and so I thought I’d check it out, because I was definitely interested in finding a job with earlier work hours.
Q: What it was like coming into a role having no previous experience working in a manufacturing setting?
JMR: I’ll be honest, at first, I was really nervous. I really didn’t know anything when I started. It was hard at first, but I got training, and other people here were helping me learn, and I started doing better.
Q: What do you like about working at SRC?
JMR: I like being part of a team, and in my new position, I want to make sure that the assembly department knows that we’re a team. If someone doesn’t know how to do something or if there’s something complicated that we need to do, I like being able to help do it.
Like, just the other day, we needed to get a coil ready to be shipped the next morning, and part of building the coil was something that only one person on the team knew how to do and that person was on second shift, so he wasn’t there. But we needed to get it done, so I asked one of the assembly team to help me with it and they said, “but I don’t know how to do that,” and I said, “me neither, but I know we can figure out a way to get it done.”
Situations like that are one of my favorite things about working here. We all just work together to achieve our goals – regardless of what department needs the help, I like being able to help.
Q: So, apparently, you’re Chaska’s first female assembly department lead. What does that mean to you?
JMR: Yep, that’s what they tell me! I think that it's just was because there weren’t historically a lot of women working in manufacturing, so then it would make sense that there weren’t any female leads. But I’ve definitely started to see more women join the team since I’ve been here, so I think it’s good.
Q: What is something you would say to someone who is considering SRC as a potential employer? Especially someone who may be in a similar position to you when you first joined – switching industries, learning new skills, and all that?
JMR: I would say this is a good place to work if you want to learn. I switched jobs so everything here was new to me, but people helped me learn and I liked getting to know more about all the different departments and things like that. So, it’s a great place to get new skills, to work as a team, and just keep getting better as a person.
Q: What about when you’re not at work? How do you like to spend your time?
JMR: Well, I’m very busy with my family. Between my husband and I we have six kids in the house – most of them are teenagers but I also have a 14-month old, too. My husband and I thought “do we really want to start all over?” But we decided that we wanted to have one last kid, so we’re definitely busy. I also like to cook. My husband is from Mexico, so I’ve been learning how to cook Mexican food. I’ll also make Salvadoran things like pupusas, stuff like that.
If you’d like to know more about working at SRC, be sure to stop by our Careers Homepage to learn more about who we are, what we make, and where we work. And stop by our job listings page to see our open positions. Manufacturing experience is preferred, but not required. If you’ve got a positive attitude and a good work ethic, we’d love to hear from you. Thanks for reading.
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