Because she came from a family of engineers, Jessica Sink’s future seemed clear while she was going to Norwell High School in Wells County. Well, clear to everyone but her.
“Everybody thought I’d be an engineer,” Jessica says. “But I was stubborn.”
As it turned out, figuring out what she wanted to do would take some time. When she went to Grace College, event management and marketing captured Jessica’s attention. Organizing events and creatively finding effective ways to deliver messages allowed her to apply both her creative and analytical skills. Plus, both majors fed her passion for working with people.
Ultimately, though, even those disciplines weren’t where she was headed. Instead, she was headed into an environment that her engineer family might have envisioned for her: an advanced manufacturing facility.
The summer before her senior year of college, Jessica took an internship in talent development with 1,500-employee Fort Wayne Metals. Based not far from her Markle, Ind., home, Fort Wanye Metals was familiar to Jessica, but she didn’t know much about the company that manufactures precision wire-materials used in customers’ medical devices, other than it was supposed to be a good employer.
“I had family and friends who worked there,” she says. “People said they’re a great company to work for.”
That internship led to a full-time job in talent development with Fort Wayne Metals after graduation. While Jessica enjoyed the work, after a year and a half, the young woman who earned both a bachelor’s and master’s degree in only four years started feeling hungry for a new challenge. One of the company’s leaders suggested she talk to Fort Wayne Metals’ manager of continuous improvement about a role in that department. While the field was new to her, she found it intriguing, and the company was willing to give her the opportunity to learn.
She quickly found that everybody on the team was willing to teach and encourage her. She’s been in the role as a continuous improvement practitioner for two years, working with departments across the organization to help them navigate challenges and improve their processes, and loves it.
“It’s so fun,” says Jessica, who played soccer and softball in high school, ran Grace’s intramural sports program and now spends free time volunteering for her church and coaching high school softball. She adds that her new role also fits her urge to leverage both her creative and analytical aptitudes. “It’s a great balance of people and process.”
With her experience as a guide, Jessica urges young people to have the courage to try new things, ask a lot of questions, and avoid making judgments about the manufacturing world. Before she got to Fort Wayne Metals, she had expected to find a rigid culture that might not be welcoming to inexperience. Instead, she found a workplace that’s open to new ideas, constantly working to improve what it does, and leaders who are intent on providing a great place for a young woman to start a career. Even if it isn’t the career she – or anyone else – had imagined.
