Craig Dubberley, technical sales engineer at Advanced Chemical Etching (A.C.E.) has been named The Manufacturer’s Employee of the Month March 2016.
What is your role and what are your main responsibilities?
I look after technical sales for Advanced Chemical Etching (A.C.E.). My main responsibility is to work on technically challenging products and developing relationships with existing and new clients.
I play a role in the New Product Introduction (NPI) Team to ensure new projects meet customer requirements and can seamlessly enter our production process.
What are the key technical skills you use?
I started as a CAD/technical design apprentice working on designing new products and overcoming technical issues. I’m still employing many of the skills and lessons I learned back then.
Before joining A.C.E., I was in a more business development role and the combination of skills has given me the ability to read technical drawings and identify potential issues before entering the manufacturing process.
What personal characteristics help you in your role?
Patience is a virtue and I hopefully possess it when I can! When you are trying to do something new, it is important to listen and understand what the customer wants, or more importantly, what they want to achieve.
Soak up as much insight and knowledge as you can and then it’s a simple case of using your technical skills to deliver the solution. It helps to be a team player as we’ll only be successful if every link in our company is working right.
What do you consider to be your biggest personal success at the company so far?
Working with external sales to introduce and educate new customers to A.C.E. and how etching can deliver the precision components they are looking for.
At A.C.E., we are continually pushing the boundaries of innovation and one specific success has been the introduction of our Titanium Etching process.
This has gone down a storm with clients in the medical sector, especially when creating implants or bionic parts.
What are the most rewarding parts of your job?
Seeing the final product come off the manufacturing line after working alongside the customer for months, sometimes years in preproduction activities.
Although we’re never allowed to talk about where the component is going I know that I’ve contributed a small part in making improvements to F1 cars, helped develop new technology and improved people’s vision and the way they move.
Do you have a career ambition?
These are very exciting times at A.C.E., with the company growing 20% last year to £4.2m and investing in a new 2,000 sqft inspection and quality assurance area.
I’m excited about how we are evolving and, importantly, improving etching as a process, introducing new materials that push our technical expertise to the extreme.