Profile
I am a professionally qualified Electronics Engineer with over 15 years experience in the semiconductor industry. Experienced team worker, I am used to working with people from different cultures, and on multi-site and multi-country projects, and with high value equipment.
I am a committed Christian, and I volunteer in a number or roles, both within my local church, and with other charities.
Skills
Problem Analysis and Solving
As an Electronics Engineer, problem analysis and solving is part of my professional DNA. Providing solutions, delivering products, fixing issues, all within time and resource constraints, is a fundamental part of my job, and is a skill under constant development. In all the jobs I have had, delivery of results has always been paramount, and a key measure of performance.
Learning
As new technologies develop, I am required to keep ahead of the curve, and therefore I need to keep learning. Also I have an aversion to being pigeon-holed, and I have always sought opportunities in my job to diversify my expertise.
Outside work or study, I have done a variety of charitable work unrelated to my profession, ranging from children work with Christian organisation (Scripture Union, local church), to ambulance crewing, and canal boating.
Leadership
I have been the technical leader on a number of projects, and I have at various stages mentored (at times formally, but often informally) more junior or inexperienced colleagues, and have been at times involved in the recruitment for junior positions.
As part of my job I often need to manage expectations for project or program managers, and provide timescales estimates, status reports as well as understandable technical explanations to managers who are not technically proficient in my field.
Outside work, I am a very hands-on father, I have led a church home group with my wife for a number of years, and as part of my volunteering with a canal boat charity, I can be in charge of a boat with up to twelve passengers with all kinds of abilities, plus two crew members, and have full responsibility for the well being of everybody aboard the vessel, as well as the operating of the boat and the locks, and directing the crew.
I regularly serve on a voluntary basis at my local church, where I am an active member.
Communication
As part of my jobs, communication is fundamental to ensure that team work, and cross-team work happen efficiently, as well as to ensure management’s expectations and understanding of issues are clear. I also need to ensure as part of my work, that communication is clear and effective when dealing with suppliers, and when providing information to the legal team for contracts.
I often need to deliver presentations, either internally or to external partners, and a recent video clip I delivered for an external partner, was extremely well received at their worldwide sales conference.
Project and time management
On top of being responsible for meeting deadlines and managing my own work, I have recently taken responsibility for managing the work of a more junior employee, and in the past, in a previous job, I had the full responsibility for delivering a relatively small product, on a very short timescale (which was successfully met), bringing together deliverables from not only hardware and software teams, but also documentation, marketing and customer support. This involved interesting non-technical issues, like managing challenging personalities, and learning how very time consuming communication can be, albeit necessary to ensuring successful delivery.
I also regularly need to keep project managers updated, and provide schedule estimates.
IT
Due to the technicality of my job, I am more than proficient in IT, and often help family and friends with IT issues, ranging from networking issues, to PC/Smartphone/Tablet issues, and advise on potential solutions for backup, IT purchases, etc. based on requirements (which often are non-technical!). I enjoy a very good working relationship with various IT team members in my company with whom I often discuss IT issues and policies.
I have also been putting my IT knowledge to good use helping my daughters’ school association set up a website.
Languages
Other than being very fluent in English, after having lived for more than a decade in the UK, I am fluent in Italian (which is my mother tongue), and in French.
Education
Università degli Studi, Genova, Italy — Electronics Engineering, 110/110
References
References are available on request.
Luca Rastello 