What does an “Environmental Engineer” do?

In fact, thank you for giving me this opportunity. You gave me the opportunity to “review my business life” and “if I had the opportunity, what could I say to myself when starting my business life”. The reason why I write is not to direct your business life, as someone who has traveled a few years more than you in business life, with your permission, I will write my wishes and goodies.

No one really helped me in this respect at the time, it could not. Of course, those who led, gave ideas. But no one can help a person in this sense anyway. I understand this now. Because he knows best what someone wants to do, what they can do, and the energy in them.

I spent the university both studying in my hometown and working in a fun but different sector in the same period. I haven’t experienced the disadvantages or advantages of staying in a dormitory or sharing a house with people I don’t know. As such, my university life took a long time.

My first job experience in Environmental Engineering
Then, being engaged, I immediately went to the military and when I returned I had only a short time to find a job. I made dozens of relevant, irrelevant job applications over the internet a day. Then I was called from somewhere and I accepted the terms without thinking / thinking. But even before the first week was up, I realized that this was not the place for me. I started at an environmental consultancy firm. I started out as a newly established and first employee by a very experienced person. Everything was zero in the office. When you say it was zero, it doesn’t mean there was nothing. So I was the first to use everything. I unpacked my computer, opened the printer out of the box to print out and set it up, and when I was dying for tea, I almost even ordered the tea machine. These seemed like beautiful things, but those who didn’t know what it meant to feel the feeling of not belonging anywhere, I understood at that moment. Sometimes I see it on Linkedin. that company is currently doing very successful works.

During this time, I started to be called from other companies I applied, but how would I go to the interviews. I had already started a job and was in my early days. It was a tough decision and I went for one meeting. They were invited to meet for the marketing department, not as an environmental engineer, but because of my experience as a radio programmer and host during my university years. Because I applied for that position. They wanted me to prepare a presentation. I prepared. It was admired. But I was wondering what to do in the marketing department of a huge steel factory. I prepared my presentation on the impact of the steel industry on the environment. I was an environmental engineer, after all. Or right now I think I think myself so.

My second job experience (or should I say my school?)
After the interview, they said to me, don’t you think about doing environmental engineering? I said yes I think. They said why don’t you do it. Because I said you are not looking for an environmental engineer. Then they said, come on, do environmental engineering with us. Of course I didn’t say to think. I learned environmental engineering and life in that steel factory for 3,5 years. They were receiving services from the known environmental consultancy firm and fulfilling legal obligations. But since it is a company with a broad vision, they wanted to give importance to the environmental issue, and they started it with me. I say with me, it is a bit selfish, but we were at the very beginning of the road in environmental engineering both there. And whatever I learned in this profession, I learned there. I saw it like a school. Occasionally, I dressed in janti and attended senior management meetings, sometimes I put on work clothes and took waste water samples from the sewer with my hand. The management of the landfills was entirely in my own hands and most of the time I was involved in the loading of the waste. Oh, I will never forget the moment that forklift pierced its knives into waste oil barrels as it approached by my direction. It wouldn’t be if I didn’t mention my manager at that time. Maybe this is the first time I’m telling someone I don’t know, but as I just said, I learned what I learned in the name of this profession and business life from my manager at that time. At that moment, I wish I was aware of this, too. Because I was very angry with him while he was living those moments. He felt it himself, and I’m sure he knew. After all, he had gone through these roads. We never lost our respect and love for each other, but we clashed a lot over work. It would be appropriate if I said he didn’t breathe But that’s how I felt them at that time. Looking back now, I realize that he actually taught me about life as well as work. He wanted a job to be done the way it was supposed to be done and never compromised, and he wanted us not to compromise. He wanted us to turn in a job whenever we had to turn it over. He wanted us to tell him if we wouldn’t be able to raise it, then not when the time was up, but when it was obvious that he wouldn’t be. As a result, there might be other things, and I said, “What the hell, it’s like to be so tight, to be so meticulous” and I was very angry with him. I didn’t know why anyone else would respect someone who didn’t respect their own work. And that the work I’m delaying delays other things like dominoes.

My good and wishes
As I mentioned at the beginning of my article, one of my goodies, as I have just mentioned, I can say to start a business life in a workplace and with a manager.

Let me come to my wishes here; I wish I could be aware of these ideas and thoughts at that moment. If I could understand more deeply that every moment I live is a learning opportunity, I could have had more enjoyable times. For this reason, I could have been more careful and attentive by being aware that the difficulties I had at the beginning of my business life actually prepared me for my current life. Another is an English topic. I think what I did and wish I had improved my English even earlier. An engineer today should be able to speak English comfortably as well as reading and writing.

I am glad I worked in the field and learned how and what was done in the field. Fortunately, with all the teams in the field; I was able to communicate with everyone from the fielder to his manager and say what I knew right, even if they were wrong, and I saw that they were wrong and corrected myself. I learned a lot from my fielder brothers in the field as well as from my manager and managers. Is it an example? I learned from my managers that I can color the waste bins in the field according to the waste types, and the placement of these waste bins in the most ergonomic way from my fielder brothers in the field. Should I be more open, okay. I learned that the layout of the waste bins and the landfill cannot be made from the company layout at the desk, but by observing the people who go to the field and emptying these waste bins, talking to them and taking their opinions, gives faster and more accurate results.

Then, we entered the management systems and certificated the ISO 14001 Environmental Management System in 3 of our facilities in just one year. I wouldn’t have succeeded if I hadn’t worked in the field that is called the kitchen. Again, it is a promise of my manager; “Write what you do, do what you write” is the logic of more or less management systems. We couldn’t write without doing it.

And my current workplace
After that, we started new searches. Considering what I did in the first workplace, and paying attention to my field and desk experience, I was chosen for my workplace now.

My main task was to establish and maintain management systems. But I was no longer at the beginning of my business life and saw every new task given to me as an opportunity to learn and didn’t say no. Again, the work that is around environmental engineering and that I or my team should do in the company has always overlapped. But now I knew that the difficulties I am experiencing now will appear as an opportunity and convenience in the future. For example, I can take part in the preparation of sustainability reports, where all the environmental works we have done during the year are compiled and presented in summary form, and I can report to international organizations. Now that my company is doing business abroad, I am enjoying the benefit of my English. In fact, I often say that I should go further, I wish I could speak like water.

I’m glad I can communicate with people comfortably. Even if I do not know a subject, I try to learn, I consult someone who knows. They say that people should be able to say no when necessary in business life. I do not agree with this. Maybe I think like this because I can’t say no, I don’t know. But even though he is not aware of it, people learn something from everything and in the future, something related to that subject will surely come up and this gives an advantage.

My last words
As I approach the end, I guess I can conclude by saying the following. I had a lot of trouble at the beginning. I was very troubled. I felt so alone at work. But fortunately I didn’t complain out loud. Because now I say I’m glad I had those troubles. Actually I saw it as a nuisance back then. I say the situations the job requires right now. It turns out that I have never experienced any situation to complain about. Without realizing it, I learned constantly and prepared myself for the years now. Now I feel like I am preparing myself for my next years.

I shouldn’t get tired of learning about my job. I can do many different things, and I have to. But there must be something in common from one corner of my work to improve my business life. Is it an example; Hosting a radio program during my university years enables me to be more comfortable and free in my current meetings and trainings, and my dealing with computers and websites during my high school years now enables me to be advantageous and fast in the special software I use for my work.

Let me end with a succinct word and be cool. Everyone is a captain in a calm sea. The important thing is to be able to swim in a stormy and choppy sea without sinking the ship.

This article was written after a recently graduated environmental engineer friend contacted me on Linkedin and asked me about my profession.