Gabe works as a technician at Micron in Lehi, Utah. Gabe started out working in a bike shop, but found out his local community college had a scanning electron microscope. Gabe earned a 2-year Associates Degree and a Microcopy Certificate. Now he’s a senior technician at Micron and trains other technicians.
The Talking Technicians podcast is produced by MNT-EC, the Micro Nano Technology Education Center, through financial support from the National Science Foundation's Advanced Technological Education grant program.
Opinions expressed on this podcast do not necessarily represent those of the National Science Foundation.
Join the conversation. If you are a working technician or know someone who is, reach out to us at info@talkingtechnicians.org.
Links from the show:
The Micro Nano Technology Education Center (MNT-EC): https://micronanoeducation.org/
Micron’s Job Site: https://micron.eightfold.ai/careers
Episode Web Page: https://micronanoeducation.org/students-parents/talking-technicians-podcast/
Gabe works as a technician at Micron in Lehi, Utah. Gabe started out working in a bike shop, but found out his local community college had a scanning electron microscope. Gabe earned a 2-year Associates Degree and a Microcopy Certificate. Now he’s a senior technician at Micron and trains other technicians.
The Talking Technicians podcast is produced by MNT-EC, the Micro Nano Technology Education Center, through financial support from the National Science Foundation's Advanced Technological Education grant program.
Opinions expressed on this podcast do not necessarily represent those of the National Science Foundation.
Join the conversation. If you are a working technician or know someone who is, reach out to us at info@talkingtechnicians.org.
Links from the show:
The Micro Nano Technology Education Center (MNT-EC): https://micronanoeducation.org/
Micron’s Job Site: https://micron.eightfold.ai/careers
Episode Web Page: https://micronanoeducation.org/students-parents/talking-technicians-podcast/
Peter Kazarinoff 0:02
From MNT-EC, the Micro Nano Technology Education Center. This is Talking Technicians, the podcast about technicians, who they are, what they do and where they come from. I'm your host, Peter Kazarinoff. I teach technicians and engineers at Portland Community College. In each episode, you'll meet a working technician and hear their story. That means real interviews with real technicians about real jobs. At the end of each episode, you'll hear actions you can take if you want to be a technician, too. In this episode, you'll meet Gabe. Gabe works at Micron in Lehi, Utah. Gabe, welcome to Talking Technicians.
Gabe 0:50
Thanks, Peter. Happy to be here.
Peter Kazarinoff 0:52
Tell me about yourself. Where do you live in How long have you been there for?
Gabe 0:56
I live in Salt Lake City, Utah. I've actually been here my whole life. So 31 years.
Peter Kazarinoff 1:01
And micron is in Lehi, Utah. How does that relate to Salt Lake City?
Gabe 1:07
You have the Salt Lake Valley. And it's just past what we call point of the mountain. So it's the next valley down. So not too far away. I live kind of mid-valley now in Salt Lake. And it's 25 minutes for me to get to work. So it's not too bad. Um, yeah.
Peter Kazarinoff 1:27
Is there anyone else in your household?
Gabe 1:31
That works there? No. But I do live with two roommates. Yeah.
Peter Kazarinoff 1:35
And tell me about where you work? What's your job title? And what do you do day to day?
Gabe 1:41
So I'm a senior technician there. I do physical failure analysis. And part of what we call the support group. Generally, my day to day, we have one group before me that will actually test out individual dies on wafers, give us coordinates of where to go what to look for. And then we have special ways of de-processing the different levels and looking for the defect.
Peter Kazarinoff 2:10
How long have you been at Micron? You mentioned that you're a senior technician, what are the technician levels that a technician can work at?
Gabe 2:19
There's I think, technically there's tech zero, but usually, I think, especially in the lab to start as a technician one and two. And then once you get to technician three and four, you're considered a senior tech. And I'm gonna be honest, I kind of forget if tech four might be even more special name. I've been there, this is going on four years, three years and four months, I think we're right around there. It's just kind of as you, as you gain different skills and whatnot, it's kind of move up.
Peter Kazarinoff 2:50
Are you willing to share how much money in entry level technician at Micron could make?
Gabe 2:56
I want to say I started once I was over 20. But at very least it was in the 20's. Low 20's. So I was certainly very happy after coming from a bike shop making a little bit less.
Peter Kazarinoff 3:10
And do you work in shifts? Or do you work a regular nine to five schedule?
Gabe 3:14
No, we work in shifts. So I work Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, every other Wednesday, day shift and I work 545 in the morning till pretty much six o'clock in the evening. So it's a little bit rough, early mornings long days. But you are guaranteed three and four day weekends. You always get some overtime on your paycheck. And depending on how it all lines up, if you can line it up, right, you can take three days off, and suddenly you have a 10 day weekend, which is pretty great.
Peter Kazarinoff 3:48
And do you work alone? Or do you work in a team?
Gabe 3:52
Work? Well, I have a team that we all work with. I do the PFA for the most part. There are other technicians on my team, one of them, the sound technicians, so they're doing more cross sections and everything for inline. And then we also have a TEM tech who does all the TEM prep, lamella prep. And they - well they're told where they need to prep something out or whatever. And they'll make a lamella of it. So go to the actual TEM.
Peter Kazarinoff 4:22
And besides the technical work that you do, what kind of communication work do you do with the other technicians, engineers or employees?
Gabe 4:30
I guess with my my immediate team? I mean, we there's a lot of - I guess I'm understanding your question, right? I mean, we do a lot of training together. There are definitely times we have to help each other. For the most part, we're all capable, and do kind of our own thing when it comes to doing the actual job unless we're shadowing somebody. There are times where we'll get in touch with other people around the fab other engineers to try and under And what they want, or to explain what we're seeing or why their request is going to be hard to do or possibly impossible. Yeah, I'm not quite sure if that's what you were looking for there. But
Peter Kazarinoff 5:16
Are there opportunities for professional growth at Micron if you start as a technician?
Gabe 5:21
Yes. So you can without school I believe or not, I believe I know people. So you can go from a tech up to I forget if you have to be a tech four but you can actually go into engineering roles. I know at least two people who have done that now, as well as Micron offers help with school reimbursement and everything. So that makes it definitely a little bit easier if you're willing to put that in to work your way up after getting a degree or while getting a degree.
Peter Kazarinoff 5:53
And how did you get where you are now, you mentioned you worked at a bike shop, what was your work experience and school experience before working as a technician at Micron?
Gabe 6:05
did a little bit up at the U of U like one year that didn't go great necessarily. And then went back to school, the Salt Community College found out we had a desktop SEM and AFM's that we could use so I once I found out that that was something I'd actually have a chance to use it was me Those were always equipment that I had no idea if I would ever seen in my life. So I found that out, got the certificate for microscopy through SLCC, was still working at a bike shop because I want white that was kind of a dream job. I love mountain biking and working on bikes is stupid fun. I think and all your coordinates, just such a fun time. And the way I ended up out at micron is that SLCC, had a class totally space in his name right now with this kid. And he came into the bike shop remembered me, I did not remember him. So I felt bad about that. And he just pretty much suggested "Dude, you should apply for an RTA position out there". And I kind of just got on Micron site then decided to apply randomly. Didn't get the first two positions, really. And then I got this position in the why you left field enhancement lab with the microscopes. And I've loved it since. I mean, it's used amazing microscopes. And getting to play with with microchips has been out of this world.
Peter Kazarinoff 7:39
So you mentioned SLCC, SLCC is your abbreviation for Salt Lake Community College, right?
Gabe 7:45
Correct. Yeah.
Peter Kazarinoff 7:46
And you also mentioned that Salt Lake Community College has a SEM and an AFM, would you be willing to just quickly say what those are, and why it's kind of unusual that Salt Lake has those available for students?
Gabe 8:02
So the SEM the scanning electron microscope, it is a desktop model, which is nice. It makes it much, much easier to fit into a single room. And it uses the electron beam right to get very high magnification, high resolution images, of very small items. I just didn't know anywhere that had one. It is one of these things that for me, it always seemed images, National Geographic, right? That false color of mosquitoes and stuff and was always just amazing looking. But to me, it was always this, no way I'm ever going to even have a chance to use those or see them in person. I was pretty surprised when they had that. The AFM - actually, I don't know a ton of places that necessarily have them other than slick right now. That just uses right the like a nanoscale probe to essentially probed the surface. And look at typography, the ones we had, we did have conducting tips and some other stuff. There are an incredible array of atomic force microscopes out there for different uses. And I'm not even sure if I had really heard of atomic force microscopy before being at SLCC. Part of what blew me away with that also is just that they I mean, this tip that you're using is so small and they can make them well, easily they they make the tips all the time to probe the surface. I can't totally space not the word I'm looking for there. But there's just another amazing feat of what humans can create and how they figured out to make it work. To me.
Peter Kazarinoff 9:45
Before you worked at Micron did you graduate with a one year certificate or two year degree from Salt Lake Community College?
Gabe 9:53
So I graduated with an Associates of Science and then I'm trying to space it, I think at the same time I got a Certificate of Microscopy. And I'm trying to remember if that was they did all that in one year for the Certificate. But I think it was two years for that as well, just the number of classes that didn't quite overlap with other stuff. I also took my time going through SLCC, I definitely was jumping around from different areas, different areas until I found - really one of my teachers, Wes, he taught this Intro to Nanotechnology class and showed us the microscopy lab. And that's what really blew me away. I was just like, dude, I want to work with this stuff. To a certain degree, I guess I could thank him for getting me into it.
Peter Kazarinoff 10:43
And besides the training that you got at Salt Lake Community College, when you started at Micron, were there other things that you needed to learn?
Gabe 10:53
Well, definitely. So with the microscopes themselves, right, even if you understand the idea behind what's going on. So the one out at SLCC is, is quite the right way to say but like a standard scanning electron microscope, SEM out at Micron, we have what are called dualbeam. So we have the electron beam, and then we also have an ion source. So we can actually do cross sections in the microscope. So I had to learn the whole idea of how to use those, they have different chemicals for actually putting different layers of material on your surf on the surface or structures in the microscope. So there's definitely a lot of learning when it came to how to use all the tools. Since they're - right, every every microscopes different these ones were way more advanced than I had used. And then I needed to learn how the de-processing worked. And to a certain degree, you know, I knew what a microchip was, but I definitely did not appreciate what goes into it. What's needed to make them sorry, one of my cats just got in the room. So to make them size, just how essentially perfect everything has to be for these things to work. So there was a lot of training there, too. And still, I guess,
Peter Kazarinoff 12:16
What did you feel like your first day at work at Micron? What did it feel like walking in the door the first time?
Gabe 12:24
Well, a little bit nervous, you know, you don't want to, I don't want to come off as like, Oh, this guy doesn't isn't gonna be able to learn or be able to do anything like, you know, you want to show that you're pretty capable. And there's all these people, senior, other senior techs are just people have been there a long time understand what's going on. But for the most part, everybody's really nice, and is happy to, you know, help and show you what to do explain. They're part of the whole, the whole YE lab system.
Peter Kazarinoff 12:52
What is something unexpected about working at Micron that you only learned after you started?
Gabe 12:58
Again, how small everything is and how absolutely amazing it is that we can make these computer chips repetitively and well, and that you can land these different levels on top of levels. It still absolutely blows me away. Doesn't matter. I know. I've essentially asked that question just at the at Micron. You know, what's something that blew you away when starting to work here? And a lot of people that's just how small everything is, but yet how well we can do it gave me a better appreciation for what humans are actually capable of doing.
Peter Kazarinoff 13:40
Now that you're a senior technician, have you trained any entry level technicians and Micron?
Gabe 13:47
Yeah, we so especially right now, we're actually doing a lot of training. So I've been working with I just started working this last week, earlier this week with a bunch of the yield analysis people who we work very closely with, they do the data mining, and then they'll send wafers to the lab to look for defects and stuff. So we actually just started showing them what we have to do for certain jobs, so they have a better idea of what happens - they have a better under, you know, a broader understanding of what has to happen in the lab for certain jobs and stuff. As well as I've definitely tried to help train different technicians on FA. While they also you know, they'll try and help me learn TEM prep and stuff.
Peter Kazarinoff 14:35
And what's FA and what does TEM stand for>
Gabe 14:39
Sorry, so FA would be failure analysis. And technically what I do is PFA physical failure analysis, the electrical, there's EFFI electrical failure, fault isolation. They electrically test out the dies and look for different failures depending on what they're looking for. They do failure analysis send it to, to us in the PFA group to do the physical failure analysis to actually try and find it. TEM or the TEM, prep techs and everything they do. So that's tiny tunneling electron microscope, microscopy or transmission. What we do as TEM techs, is not true TEM work that requires an actual TEM, which is a much bigger tool than the dual beams we use. We do have two different dedicated TEM's on site. And it is, I mean, you can get down to lattice size imaging, right to look at actual atomic lattice of your, your sample. What we do in the microscope is actually STEM scanner scanning believe it's the scanning transmission electron microscopy. And it doesn't have the same resolution as a true TEM. But you can still I mean, we can see grains of metal, it really lets you thin a sample, could you thin a sample way down? So that when we really want to analyze what we're looking at and not get some, you know, if you want elements or something, you're not getting stuff from far back that well, was that where the defect is? Or is that however far back in the sample? So it lets us get very accurate idea of what's going on, we can get high accuracy images. Yeah.
Peter Kazarinoff 16:34
What advice would you give current students or people who want to transition careers and work at Micron?
Gabe 16:41
I honestly say, you know, read up on the job titles and through the posts, and just try and apply. I know. I tried to think - I don't think most people, I'm not 100% sure. I'm not sure if everybody in the lab even has a full on certificate or microscopy or anything. You know, if you are adept at learning, working with teams. And open, you know, trying to have a good mindset and everything, a lot of times, it's something that you can be trained on, and work your way up. Obviously, having prior experience and all that always helps. But a place like Micron, or fabs in general, I would assume, I guess is the only one I've worked at. But there is such a wide array of jobs that need to be done that, you know, I work with microscopes, but we need technician techs to work on the tools, there's people that have to monitor the tools to make sure everything's going correctly tools not suddenly going haywire. And once you're working there, and I forget, I think Micron is you have to be in your position for one year before you can look at you know, moving around in the company toward another position. So you could try RDA if you want to which is real-time defect analysis and that, they're looking at defects in line as the wafers are being fabricated. And you could try that for a year and you don't like that you could see if there is a position for yeah tool maintenance or somewhere in metrology which does measurements. So honestly, my feeling is just just apply. Worst comes to worst. And worst comes to worst doesn't quite work out the first time. Again, I the first two positions I applied for, I didn't get. Wasn't till the third one that it worked out. So yeah.
Peter Kazarinoff 18:38
Thanks. And we'll make sure to leave a link to Micron's job site in the show notes for this podcast episode. So Gabe, thank you so much for being on Talking Technicians.
Gabe 18:50
Thank you so much for having me, Peter.
Peter Kazarinoff 18:51
Bye now.
Gabe 18:52
Bye.
Peter Kazarinoff 18:59
Talking Technicians is produced by MNT-EC, the Micro Nano Technology Education Center, through financial support from the National Science Foundation's Advanced Technological Education grant program. Opinions expressed on this podcast do not necessarily represent those of the National Science Foundation. Join the conversation. If you are working technician, or know someone who, is reach out to us at info@talkingtechnicians.org. We're always looking out for great guests to share more stories with you.