Aodhan, Sales Engineer at Keyence

What do you do on a daily basis?

My working week is split down by office and field days. Field days involve visiting roughly 4 different companies demonstrating Keyence equipment, testing customers applications for live and future projects in addition to having commercial discussions to build strong relationships between Keyence and our customers. 

Each day we are faced with a new application/projects which keeps you on your toes at all times. As a result, the day are really varied.

There is great element of freedom to the job as schedule my own day. As you learn your territory, these days become more efficient as you know what companies are in the same vicinity. Over time you can minimise the time driving and ultimately boost productivity while out in the field. 

Office days usually entail contacting our customer base to find new opportunities for Keyence in addition to following up on current ongoing projects. The day is broken up by internal meetings which we typically have in the morning and prior to lunch. 

The latter half of the day I would typically get my admin work done from the meetings I had done earlier in the week such as sending quotes, working on test reports or having follow up Teams call with companies I am working with. 

The tail end of the day I would usually be testing application that I may not have time to test on site as well as working on some more complicated programs etc.

How has your role changed since starting?

I feel as though each day I am becoming better at my job. Some of our products are very technical, at the start this was a bit daunting to me however each day I become more and more proficient. This came as a result of working on new applications every day which increased my knowledge of the product I work with. 

Our technical team do an amazing job supporting us through training and while on the road so this was a big factor too!

Over time I have built good relationships with my customers through providing good technical solutions as well as support from both a sales and after sales perspective. At the start this job is purely proactive based but over time I started to have more and more incoming projects.

How did you learn the technical side of the role?

Keyence provide extensive training on the products we work with prior to heading out into the field. This training gave me the building blocks I needed to be in a position to demonstrate and use the systems in the field. 

This training is finite, so there is upskilling I had to do myself to learn some of the finer technically details of the system. A lot of this is sparked by customer questions. If there was something I couldn’t answer, I would speak to our tech team and they would advise me. I would then know for next time a customer asked etc. 

How would you describe our working culture?

Says Keyence have a great working culture. We are essentially the CEO of our own territory which brings great responsibility.

The working culture is very collaborative, the Dublin office has a great vibe to it, and everyone gets on really well which creates a fun working environment. 

What is your favourite thing about your role?

My favourite part of the job is definitely the ‘’closing’’ aspect of projects. Securing a sale after putting extensive work into a solution for a customer is really rewarding. 

Second to that, I would say the dynamic nature of the job is something that appeal to me. You typically see job adverts that say ‘’no two days are the same’’ when in actual fact that couldn’t be further from the truth. At Keyence, I can safely say I’ve never had two days that are the same. Each day I’m meeting new engineers, with new applications and seeing new processes. This keeps the role very engaging. 

Any advice to potential applicants

My advice to new starters would be to get stuck into training from the get go so you can go into the field the most knowledge as you possibly can. This will expedite your success with solving customer problems and ultimately closing projects.

I always say to new starters to try get in front of as many customers as possible in your first couple of months on the road just to get comfortable demonstrating our equipment, even if they don’t have an active project. There’s two benefits to this 1) you get more comfortable with the kit and 2) the customer may have a project down the line and you will be the one getting the incoming phone call!

Other than that I would say enjoy it and give it your all!