P&H Mining Equipment Inc. Internship

Ekaterina Zakharevich
I am currently a Planner/Scheduler Intern in the Aftermarket Department at P&H Mining Equipment Inc. P&H Mining Equipment is one of the two operating units of Joy Global Inc. (worldwide leader in mining solutions). Another one is Joy Mining Machinery which specializes in equipment and support of underground mine operations, where P&H Mining Equipment specializes in surface mining operations. The machines that P&H Mining Equipment manufactures and supports are used to mine coal, copper, silver, gold, diamonds and more.

My responsibilities as an intern include a wide variety of daily/weekly/monthly activities. Some of them are: evaluating lot sizes and issuing purchase requisitions, extending parts to other facilities, creating material master records, running reports and other various projects. I also assist Aftermarket Department with planning, scheduling, and calculating inventory levels.

I can say that I have learned a lot in these three months. Now when I go back and look through the notes that I made when I just started this internship I sometimes laugh thinking to myself – “How could it be so hard for me to understand such a simple thing?” Obviously I do realize that there is still a lot to learn and I want to learn as much as I can while I have this opportunity. I was also able to apply what I have learned in my SCOM classes.

There were few challenges. One of the hardest was developing a “habit” of doing certain processes/procedures working only twice a week. The good part of it is that every time I do something I remember how I did it last time and I analyze the necessary steps to complete a task. So by completing certain tasks every day when I work I manage to learn new things, exactly because I am not doing it automatically yet and I need to think what else is there I can check into to make a better decision. My supervisor and coworkers have been extremely helpful in teaching and mentoring me. They also have been very patient with me. In return for their help I am trying to learn things faster by making detailed notes and looking through them before going and asking for help. I am also constantly trying to relate what I have learned at work to what I have learned in classes and vice versa.

I found this internship at a perfect time in terms of the classes I am taking this semester plus I still have plenty of time to expand my knowledge and increase my desirability as a potential employee. This internship helped me to understand what types of skills, what knowledge and experience I should have upon my graduation to be successful in finding a job. This internship made me even more passionate about supply chain.

I would recommend everyone to start looking for an internship as early as possible, and not just for an internship but for something you think you may want to do after graduation. I am extremely glad and thankful that College of Business has this internship program.