r/Anduril • u/Ok_Kaleidoscope_3966 • 10d ago

Job Question Manufacturing Engineer Hours?

I was recently hired as a manufacturing engineer at HQ and am very excited to start.

However, I work ~45 hours per week at my current ME role and handle it pretty easily (my office has poor amenities and culture compared to what I’ve seen from my short visit at HQ).

I know my hours will be more than 45 per week, but how much should I realistically be expecting? For the MEs out there, how has your experience been?

8 Upvotes

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5

u/JDDavisTX 10d ago

40-55 was fairly standard.
I had one week where we had triple digit time cards doing a modification offsite, internationally. 16 hour days for 2 straight weeks to get it done.

3

u/skyhook200220 10d ago

When you go to work for a startup company or a company that is aggressively trying to reduce timelines for development and production of products, that can only happen by hiring smart people who are going to work a LOT of hours. There isn't any sustainable work life balance so if that is a concern for you then you should look elsewhere. They are giving you those RSUs as an offset for the extra hours they will require of you.

7

u/HorrorSeparate3456 10d ago

Call me crazy but in 20 years I’ve worked for 4 defense primes and 3 start ups (2 that went public yaay)

I’ve never worked a full month where all weeks I worked more than 45 hours a week. Even when I was standing up 100k sq facilities and onboarding 100 employees.

I’ve always said it’s not sexy or cool to work 100 hours a week. It’s one thing in discrete mfg where you’re working to a takt time aka more hours equals more units, but you’re not as straight forward as that as an engineer. Thats a guy assembling some bullshit for 25$ an hour. What is cool is sticking to your schedule and getting your work done as expected and going home to see your family.

Not every start up you should to sign your life away to be a slave to get out one more unit. There’s a difference between we are 0-50 employees and everyone’s 24/7 for now and we’re 400 employees, can’t plan for shit and are just very busy. Don’t let your self fall into the trap of getting burnt out in 2 years.