Can Saya is happiest when he’s learning. As an Advanced Field Service Engineer with GE Healthcare in Turkey, that means he particularly enjoys equipment repair assignment.

Can, 33, installs, maintains and services a wide range of GE Life Care Solutions equipment in hospitals and clinics, including ventilators, incubators, patient monitors and cardiology equipment. But because he’s most likely to learn something new when repairing a piece of equipment, rather than servicing or installing it, repairs are his favorite part of the job.

“When performing preventive maintenance or installations, you’re usually doing the same thing for each piece of equipment. But in corrective maintenance, some jobs really challenge me, when maybe I don’t immediately know the issue. I have to investigate, check repair manuals, ask colleagues, or even contact our remote field engineer teams overseas.”

“A job like this helps me learn new things. This increases my experience and motivates me.”

One of the most unusual repair jobs that Can has performed was on an incubator. The hospital didn’t have a maintenance contract with GE Healthcare but had purchased a spare part for the machine. The hospital requested a GE Healthcare field service engineer to install it. He went to the hospital and installed the part, but the machine still didn’t work.

Despite the hospital not having a service contract, Can inspected the machine to identify the problem and discovered that deep inside the machine, a cable was frayed, causing the breakdown. He replaced the cable and fixed the equipment.

What was so remarkable to Can about this repair was that it represented a learning opportunity. In nine years on the job, he’d never seen a cable failure like that, reinforcing for him how important it is to keep learning. After all, there will always be new scenarios.

Aside from facing unfamiliar repair jobs, a common challenge for Can is that some equipment, especially surgical equipment, can be in use at all hours of the day. That means, the only time it’s available for maintenance is in the evening. He also faces the constant challenge of doing excellent work quickly because it’s not uncommon to working on a job when an even more urgent call comes in.

Can is one of nine field service engineers from the Middle East, North Africa, Turkey and Pakistan region to be selected to participate in GE Healthcare’s Global Field Engineer Olympic Academy. They are among nearly 80 field service engineers from around the world selected to participate in a weeklong learning and development event during May at the GE Healthcare Institute in Waukesha, Wisconsin (USA).